Why I love Bren­dan Fraser’s per­for­mance in Looney Tunes: Back in Action

The Bren­dan Fras­er renais­sance is offi­cial­ly on. Fans of the FX series Trust and DC’s Doom Patrol will know he’s actu­al­ly been back for some time – and yet, watch­ing him in tears as he receives a stand­ing ova­tion at the Lon­don Film Fes­ti­val feels like a cathar­tic moment. Cathar­tic both for Fras­er, for whom The Whale marks an incred­i­ble come­back from years of per­son­al hard­ship, and for audi­ences who have sore­ly missed watch­ing a man who was once one of Hollywood’s most bank­able stars.

Fol­low­ing Fraser’s big-screen return, many have rem­i­nisced about how his ​‘90s and ear­ly ​‘00s action roles made him such a stal­wart box office iden­ti­ty – be it his swing­ing per­for­mance in George of the Jun­gle or his icon­ic role as Rick O’Connell in The Mum­my fran­chise. For var­i­ous rea­sons (includ­ing his health and the alarm­ing alle­ga­tion that for­mer Hol­ly­wood For­eign Press Asso­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Philip Berk sex­u­al­ly assault­ed Fras­er in 2003), his career stag­nat­ed. As audi­ences bask in Fraser’s return to the fold, large­ly miss­ing from their cel­e­bra­tions is any recog­ni­tion of the film con­tain­ing per­haps the best dis­play of Fraser’s abil­i­ty, humil­i­ty, and ded­i­ca­tion to his craft – the crim­i­nal­ly under­rat­ed Looney Tunes: Back in Action.

The film was a mis­er­able flop upon release, mak­ing back only $68 mil­lion of its $80 mil­lion pro­duc­tion bud­get despite its fine pedi­gree in Grem­lins direc­tor Joe Dante. Back in Action has also not enjoyed the same cult rev­er­ence as its toon­tas­tic pre­de­ces­sor Space Jam. It’s def­i­nite­ly fair to say that Back in Action isn’t much more visu­al­ly impres­sive than Who Framed Roger Rab­bit, which came out 15 years ear­li­er, and Steve Martin’s per­for­mance is toe-curling­ly exces­sive as he tries to out­per­form the ani­mat­ed char­ac­ters at every turn. But Back in Action is loaded with Looney Tunes’ great­est weapon: satire.Fraser, who is so whole­heart­ed­ly com­mit­ted to the part, brings jovi­al­i­ty and bite by par­o­dy­ing both him­self and the Hol­ly­wood machine for which he became such a poster boy.

Play­ing a Warn­er Bros. Stu­dios’ secu­ri­ty guard des­per­ate to make it as a stunt­man, Fraser’s per­for­mance as Dami­an ​‘D.J.’ Drake is as self-dep­re­cat­ing as it is charm­ing­ly fun­ny. It is a role that lets him mock what he had come to rep­re­sent in Hol­ly­wood at the time: the hand­some, clas­si­cal­ly mas­cu­line action hero who wins crowds over with a smile and does all his own stunts. ​“A mus­cle-bound beef­cake,” as Martin’s evil ACME Chair­man puts it.

Con­vers­ing with Daffy Duck on a trip to Las Vegas, D.J. gets defen­sive about his stunt­man record and protests ​“Did you see those Mum­my movies? I’m in there more than Bren­dan Fras­er is!” Tem­porar­i­ly plac­ing him­self in a moviegoer’s shoes, he then mock­ing­ly con­tin­ues ​“No no no, the Bren­mas­ter does all his own stunts!” Fras­er is hyper-aware of his own star­dom and is unafraid to use it for com­e­dy, glee­ful­ly skew­er­ing his mus­cu­lar gold­en boy image.

D.J. slow­ly grows into the kind of all-out star that Fras­er is known for being, albeit not with­out a healthy amount of ridicule. The final show­down is against a robot dog, and key ques­tions are answered away sim­ply by virtue of his name. How does he know mar­tial arts? How can he sky­dive off the Eif­fel Tow­er? How can he per­fect­ly deflect poi­son darts with a machete while absolute­ly rock­ing a tight blue vest? The answer to all of the above is very sim­ple: he’s Bren­dan Fras­er, and he knows it. Hence the glint in his eye when­ev­er he turns his sto­ic action-hero rep­u­ta­tion on its head in the name of goof­ball comedy.

Fraser’s pitch-per­fect cast­ing and ded­i­ca­tion to the part help to bring out the best in the movie as a whole too. Back in Action stands proud com­pared to the recent uncan­ny, unimag­i­na­tive squib of Space Jam: A New Lega­cy. The cast’s inter­ac­tions with the car­toon char­ac­ters, from their eye lev­els to their move­ments, ensure that they fit seam­less­ly into their world (Fras­er ver­sus some goons in a Vegas casi­no stands out for its goofy, pol­ished execution).

Such a take­down of stu­dio cliché rarely ages poor­ly. Sen­sa­tion­al silli­ness can arise when, like Back in Action, a Hol­ly­wood expe­ri­ence makes its very foun­da­tions the sub­ject of ridicule. You only need to look as far back as the finale of Marvel’s She-Hulk to see that at work. And Fraser’s per­for­mance, as it is with The Mum­my or Jour­ney to the Cen­tre of the Earth, is at the heart of the film’s success.

His finest moment, how­ev­er, comes right at the film’s cli­max. In a bizarre scene, D.J. con­fronts the ​‘real’ Bren­dan Fras­er: a lux­u­ry brand-wear­ing, hyper­bol­ic, self-obsessed car­i­ca­ture of him­self. ​“Remem­ber me? I threat­ened your man­li­ness and you got me fired?” D.J. asks him. Of course, ​‘Fras­er,’ does not remem­ber him, since he gets a lot of peo­ple fired. D.J. then punch­es him in the face and walks off tri­umphant­ly. It’s the high point of Fraser’s per­for­mance and evi­dence of how up for the assign­ment he has been since the begin­ning of the film. He quite lit­er­al­ly takes down the larg­er-than-life image of him­self that has dom­i­nat­ed for so long, and when all is said and done it is the kind and hard-work­ing man that remains. It is a win for the hum­ble, low-key hero that rewards cour­tesy and gen­tle­ness, throw­ing a punch at Fraser’s butch onscreen façade.

His for­ay into Looney Tunes may not be what Fras­er is remem­bered for, but you would be hard-pressed to find bet­ter exam­ples of his self-aware­ness and act­ing tal­ents (not to men­tion his lead­ing man sta­tus, a goal that many strive for but few can achieve with such ease). Such enter­tain­ing dis­plays of Fraser’s abil­i­ty and per­son­al­i­ty deserve to be remem­bered as he caps off a uni­ver­sal­ly pop­u­lar return to the big screen. Few films feel like a more appro­pri­ate cel­e­bra­tion of every­thing Fras­er was and con­tin­ues to be in the minds of audi­ences across the world – espe­cial­ly now he’s offi­cial­ly back in action.