Review of Banana Joe

Banana Joe (1982)
2/10
This is a childhood movie that I only watched for nostalgic reasons.
10 August 2023
This movie has been in my mind for a while because I watched it when I was a little kid and I have fond memories of it, and because I found this movie very funny in my child mind, I decided to rewatch it after more than 30 years, and after I finished Banana Joe, I realized why I found it so funny when I was a child because this movie is so silly and dumb in every sense and only a 7-year-old child can find it funny.

When I was a child, my family had one television, and there was only one channel, so I had no choice other than Saturday cartoons. I remember this movie being frequently shown every Sunday, and it seemed fun, so I watched it. This movie was made in 1982, which is the year I was born, and I have to say its humor is not only terribly aged; it's also so juvenile and idiotic, and the editing is terribly done; unrelated scenes just merge with each other without any sense; all characters are basically cartoony caricatures or stereotypes, so actors played these characters with exaggerated manners; and the main character is big, burly, uncivilized, illiterate, and dumb as a rock banana seller. He didn't know his surname or his family; he didn't have an identification card, as an American, he also didn't know how he came to Colombia. Is he an illegal immigrant, or was he just born here? We just didn't know about this character. Plot, which is about a cartoony capitalistic dude who wants to build a factory Banana Joe's small village and our big hero tries to prevent his mission in some comedic situations and adventures are so silly and cheesy, there are also some pathetic attempts to create physical comedy, which only little kids can find funny and laugh at.

If you consider this movie a kid's movie, that's fine, but Banana Joe lasts more than 1:30 hours, so for an adult audience, it's just a waste of time. I just watched this movie for nostalgic purposes, and I don't regret spending time on this silly and stupid movie, despite the fact that I probably lost a few digits from my IQ. I also want to say that I love the exotic and tropical southern Colombian settings and catchy background music, but that's the only positive thing I can say about this outdated movie.
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