The plot has been recycled out of many another Manhattan comedy about the evil property developer who wants to tear down the colorful little brownstone and put up some architectural monstrosity. (I am sure I saw most of this story in “Where The Heart Is” (1990), the movie about an evil property developer, etc.) The rent-controlled apartment building in this film is occupied by a little old lady, who is tripped by hidden wires and in other ways forced out of her flat by the nephews of the evil slumlord (played by Don Ho--yes, Don Ho).
But then the hero, Joe (Jerry O'Connell) moves into the apartment, posing as her heir, and so the nephews start on him. The real tenants of the apartment are tens of thousands of cockroaches, who at first dislike Joe but eventually become his friend and gang up on the slumlord. I am not sure that I need to go into all of the details involving Joe’s new girlfriend Lily (Megan Ward), or how hard she works on her garden, or how well Joe collects manure from the carriage horses of Central Park to help her, or how her dad is a senator (played by Robert Vaughn--yes, Robert Vaughn).
If you want to know how the pink scented urinal cakes come into the story, send me a stamped, self-addressed postcard. On second thought, don't stamp it. The roaches are the real centerpiece of the movie. These are not ordinary roaches. They sing and dance. Some people will be reminded of the singing mice in "Babe," but singing mice are one thing and a roach quintet is quite another. The insects have obnoxious, piping little voices and sound like the Chipmunks had inhaled helium. Some of the roaches are given names, but I must say none of them really emerged as individuals for me. They were more of a large squirming mass, and when several hundred of them crawled across Joe's face, I for one was happy to be sitting in the back row, lest a fellow moviegoer be moved to hurl. The special effects are very good, I suppose. You can see every detail of the carefully articulated armor on their little tummies, if you want to.
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