excalibur-382-183911 I cannot disagree with the previous summary more. Whoever they are, they have no pulse! Just watched the movie last night with my family, and everyone had a great time - and laughed themselves silly. After a bit of a slow start, we find ourselves faced with one of the most inventive families ever - and one begins to lose track of how many lies have been told. The movie also lampoons fads in general. It is truly bizarre what can capture the public mindset, but when fashions are created upon a fictitious tribe, you know they've lost the plot. Jenna Elfman practically Xeroxed her Dharma character from Dharma & Greg, but she was more than welcome. Her charm and energy are infectious. Richard Dreyfuss was at his sarcastic best as well. And the Shelmickedmu? Hamamas! (If you want to know what that means watch the movie). It was a crying shame it was hard to find on DVD, but if you can pick up this gem, you won't regret it. And you'll find yourselves coming back for more.

TheWildGoose This was an opportunity for some truly biting satire, but it was instead a rather pedestrian and forgettable bit of fluff. Reading a description of the plot- "An ethically-challenged anthropologist concocts a completely fake tribe and fools the whole world"- it should be a brilliant send-up of the goofier aspects of anthropology. Perhaps a digression is in order.Anthropology is a strange field. In their zeal to become as "objective" as the scholars of the natural sciences, anthropologists have sometimes forgotten that their subject of study is homo sapiens, a species which frequently frustrates attempts at "objective" scientific analysis (except where quantitative measurement is possible). Because of this, anthropology, during its long history, has seen more than its share of hoaxes, frauds, and rank nonsense (George Psalmanazar, Vilcabamba, the Tasaday, Margaret Mead and the Samoans, "The Third Eye", etc). Sometimes anthropologists are taken in by the wild tales of tribesmen playing a grand practical joke on gullible foreigners. Sometimes anthropologists exaggerate local peculiarities, ignoring the great similarities between the locals and Westerners- or, trying to prove that differences are only skin-deep, they do the opposite, ignoring obvious biological differences in favor of cultural explanations. At other times, anthropologists are taken in by complete fraudsters whose elaborate nonsense confirmed those anthropologists' preconceptions.Undergirding and feeding nearly all such hoaxes is one constant- Western observers who project their own fantasies and pet theories onto strange and distant peoples about whom they have insufficient information. Whether it is Rousseau with his "Noble Savage", credulous 20th-century advocates of "free love", communitarian socialists, earnest anti-racism crusaders, or people desperate to explain away the differences between men and women as nothing more than "culturally constructed", anthropological frauds always find a fertile market among people who are more concerned with critiquing their own societies than with learning about strange ones. (None of this, by the way, is meant as a dismissal of the work of serious and sober anthropologists who study and analyze the human animal).This constant is exactly what is missing in "Krippendorf's Tribe", and its absence means that the satire never bites or cuts, but only gently prods. As far as the film is concerned, the only thing driving the popular interest in "Krippendorf's Tribe" is simple prurience- part of the equation, no doubt, but only one aspect of a much larger issue in real-life frauds.A better approach would have been to highlight the way that intellectuals could use a phony tribe to serve as a justification for their own crackpot theories about human society and human nature. "Krippendorf's Tribe" dances around this slightly, but we don't see much of it. Part of the problem is that Krippendorf himself remains more or less fully in control of whatever information comes out about his concocted tribe, the "Shelmikedmu". He only invents things on the spot, based on aspects of his own life. It would have been more pointed to see the Shelmikedmu tribe taking on a life of its own, with other hucksters, fraudsters, and over-zealous academics contributing their own (equally bogus) information and theories about the Shelmikedmu. Surely, someone with experience of backbiting and jealousy in academia could have helped sharpen the rather dull-edged satire here.Another part of the problem is the film's attempt to manipulate us into looking at Krippendorf as a sympathetic character, despite his lies and fraud. The movies uses most of the classic techniques- his wife died, he was under stress, and one lie just snowballed into another in true Fawlty Towers fashion, until other, more sinister people started manipulating him into bigger and bigger lies. We have seen all of this before, and it's not very convincing. A better approach would have been to portray Krippendorf as an unalloyed con artist, morally dissolute and positively eager to tell any whopper to keep the fraud going. This would have opened up many more opportunities for the kind of first-rate satire that this film should have had in spades, but didn't.At any rate, one does not wish to judge the film too harshly. The sexual jokes are crude and not nearly as funny as the filmmakers seem to think, but in most other respects, this film is adequate entertainment for a rainy afternoon in front of the TV.

tootsielover68 The plot of "Krippendorf's Tribe" is not entirely terrible. I would not mind seeing a movie about a college anthropology teacher who needs to find an African tribe but has blown all his money and then is forced to use the family as the tribe. The idea is funny and the movie itself had moments that were very entertaining and the movie is not boring at all. But there is a problem with this movie. The script is mildly funny, but the cast is totally in wrong parts that do not fit their talents. Dreyfuss in particular is good in serious roles which is where he succeeds best. "Jaws", "Always", and "Mr. Holland's Opus" are perfect examples of this theory. Now granted Dreyfuss has been good in a couple silly roles such as his parts in "American Graffiti" and "What About Bob?" But those films were written for a part that Dreyfuss can play. In both those films Dreyfuss is a comic figure but his mildly comic mostly serious personality works. All in all this silly role is wrong for him and I think this part would have been better possibly for either Bill Murray, Steve Martin or Chevy Chase. Those guys could play a part like this due to their silly personalities. As far as the rest of the film I found Jenna Elfman and Lily Tomlin to also be miscast. Elfman was very endearing on TV's "Darma and Greg", and Tomlin had wonderful supporting roles in "Nine to Five" and "All of Me". But how did Dreyfuss,Elfman and Tomlin think their talents would work in a script like this? It is not written poorly and its not the worst movie ever like some have claimed. As far as the writing and direction goes it is mediocre. But the casting is where this film fails because the actors that are cast are do too many sophisticated dramatic and comedic roles that they cannot afford to do something laid-back and silly like this. Its easy to see why the cast of this film (particularly Dreyfuss) have not had much activity in recent years. Might be worth the price of a Saturday night movie rental but you know the cast have been in better roles that fit them.

forest4005 Dreyfuss at his manic best. This is literally one of a very few comedy films I've watched where I absolutely fell off of the sofa laughing. The funniest part of the movie is the filming of the fake tribe by Dreyfuss' character using a love interest who, being rendered involuntarily drunk, has no idea what is going on. Lily Tomlin adds greatly to the mix playing an uptight, administrative bore. The rest of the supporting cast, who are currently not especially well known actors, blends beautifully with Dreyfuss and Tomlin. The movie has great timing. The plot and characters are plausible enough to create an additional humorous dimension. I would rank this as one of the best movies Richard Dreyfuss has made to date. I would marry, on the spot, any woman who finds this movie as entertaining and funny as I do. As long as she is rich and beautiful, of course.