Wrongfully Accused (review by Doug Smith)
Finally, after over two years of running this site, I get to review a movie from my favorite genre; the parody. It will be kind of interesting, though, because I can’t do much to make these kinds of movies funnier, plus they kind of make fun of themselves. So, bear with me, this might suck.
“Wrongfully Accused” is mostly a parody of the “The Fugitive,” though lots of spoofs of other movies are thrown in the mix, too. Leslie Nielsen, one of my favorite comedic actors, plays Ryan Harrison, a famous violinist who has been wrongfully accused (hence the title) of murder. Richard Crenna does a killer Tommy Lee Jones spoof as Lt. Fergus Falls, the cop who’s after Harrison. Kelly LeBrock is Lauren Goodhue, the woman masterminding Harrison’s frame-up. Melinda McGraw is Harrison’s love interest, Cass Lake. And, finally, Michael York doesn’t get much screen time as Hibbing Goodhue, but at least he doesn’t have to hear the words “shag” and “randy.”
After he gives an outstanding performance, Harrison gets invited to a party at the Goodhues’ place. There he meets Cass Lake, the Goodhues and hits a Muslim guy in the balls with a tennis racket that he’s carrying around for some unknown reason. After the party, Hibbing leaves for an out of town meeting and Lauren puts the moves on Harrison.
The next night, Harrison has another performance and afterwards, finds a note from Lauren. In the note she threatens to kill herself if she doesn’t see him again. So, being the good violinist that he is, he heads over there. Little does he know that he’s going to be framed. As it turns out, Hibbing is back and has been shot by some terrorists, because he was influential in getting a senator to back an anti-terrorism bill. When Ryan gets there, a one-armed, one-legged, one-eyed man attacks him, knocks him out and plants a gun in his hand so when the police get there the next morning, they think it was him that killed Hibbing.
In the quickest trial in recorded history, Ryan is found guilty and sentenced to death. However, on the trip to death row, the prison bus bounces down a rocky cliff and lands on a train track. Ryan is the only one left mobile and as The Friggin’ Express bears down on the bus, he throws everyone out and leaps away just in time. Hey, it’s a Leslie Nielsen movie, what do you expect? Ryan thinks he’s safe but the train has a mind of its own and follows him off the track and through the woods.
When morning comes, the authorities find the crashed bus and realize Harrison is missing. They quickly set out to look for him. Meanwhile, Harrison’s in a tiny little town a few miles away, where he goes into a fishing store and John Walsh and a local cop show up. They don’t realize who he is until it’s too late and he gets away.
Ryan heads back to the Goodhues’ place to try to figure things out. There he runs into Cass again who says she thinks she’s Lauren’s sister. From this point on the plot and subplots get even more convoluted, which is actually a good thing when it comes to parodies. If you like this kind of movie, you’ll like this one. If you’re not a big fan of things like “Airplane!” and “The Naked Gun,” you probably won’t like it. I give it 2 ½ yaks. And I was right – this review did suck. Told ya so.