Professor Popinjay's Compendium of Perspicacity

A Non-review by Professor Popinjay

SPOILERS AS IF THIS MOVIE HASN’T ALREADY BEEN SPOILED SIMPLY BY EXISTING!

My dad rented this on vhs from the Four Corners Rental Store because he thought it looked cute. I watched it unironically and found nothing bizarre about it whatsoever. This is not a reflection of my current opinion of this film today but rather a reflection on how, back then, my family and I could put just about anything into our vhs player and if it pacified our brains for an hour and a half we were happy, no matter what we were shown. Well, my mom was usually asleep (which she was probably happy about) but my dad and I were awake and happy and thoroughly entertained.

I don’t remember a kid in a wheelchair rolling down a hill. I don’t remember an insane party at McDonald’s. I don’t remember the aliens being disturbingly naked. I don’t remember the plot being almost exactly like E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial. All this entered into my seven year old brain and was instantly pushed-broomed into the hole labeled “unremarkable” in the floor at the back of my mind.

Imagine, over 20 years later, this apparently unremarkable movie about which I did not give a second thought is being talked about. There’s hour long podcasts about it. There’s memes. Paul Rudd shows the same clip from it every time he’s on Conan O’Brian. Now it’s 15 more years later and people still talk about it. Memes are still prevalent. Paul Rudd is still duping Conan into showing the same clip long after his late night show was cancelled even on non-visual mediums!

Fact of the matter is, this movie was absolutely remarkable in an enjoyably terrible way and I did not have the wherewithal to recognize this when I was 7 years old.

It seems Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and Sears (all of whom were connected in some way) practically funded this whole movie and the product placement went overboard. They didn’t just put a coke can in the scene, they pulled a coke can from a pyramid of coke cans and caused a coke can avalanche. They didn’t just drink a McDonald’s soda, it was better than water for the alien. (Quite the health conscious message, wouldn’t you say?) The characters didn’t just have a McDonald’s hamburger, they went to a McDonald’s that just happened to be having a dance party hosted by Ronald McDonald himself! The movie itself was named Mac and Me! MAC! Like Big Mac! This whole movie was a commercial!

And who can blame them? McDonald’s is your average run-of-the-mill single-location mom-and-pop restaurant that needs all the exposure it can get to stay afloat! It’s not like they have a sign outside the place that touts “Over 99 Billion Served, Suckers! Get your fat asses in here and consume our edible gimmicks, you brain-dead food tubes!” 

I eat at McDonald’s. You may ask why might I do such a thing to myself? Well, it’s because I love this movie so much, naturally.  Why else would anyone go? Also, if I don’t go I’ll die of thirst because water just doesn’t cut it and everyone knows McDonald’s Coke hits different.

I could probably complain about this movie indefinitely but plenty others already have. If you can get past the shameless abundance of product placement, the terrible puppetry, the flagrant ripping-off of E.T., and a silly sound of a slide whistle tooting when a kid in a wheelchair goes off a cliff in a scene that was not at all played for laughs (Thank God), then “Mac and Me” is not the worst movie ever.  If you can’t get past these things then it’s pretty enjoyable anyway.