Try as I might, I just can’t seem to figure out what the original story pitch for Woo could have been: “A Nineties-style `It’ girl finds romance in the big city despite herself?” “An obnoxious fashion plate falls for the buppie of her dreams and learns she isn’t `all that’ after all?” “The WB and Fox Network life lessons of `let them eat crap’ taken to new cinematic extremes?” It’s all too much, or, in the case of Woo, perhaps not enough. Pinkett Smith plays Darlene “Woo” Bates, who, as the film opens, is having her fortune read by her drag queen pal Celestrial (Girlina). Despite Woo’s penchant for nailing herself to the wrong fella, her psychic love connection appears to be in alignment this time as Celestrial assures her that her one and only is about to enter her life any second now. Woo is doubtful at first, but when a chance meeting with a handsome, sensitive paralegal named Tim (Davidson) materializes out of thin plot, she’s ready to take her chances over the course of a (lengthy) evening of miscommunication, gender land mines, and eventual (what else?) love. Mayer, who (under her full name von Scherler Mayer) directed Parker Posey in the underrated Party Girl, tosses everything against the wall (including the kitchen sink) and prays for something to stick. Something does, but unfortunately it’s an amorphous blob of comedy goo, and it slithers right down to the baseboard and lies there like a recently deceased Shmoo. Woo’s tone is all over the place, veering from the gratuitous, dogg-pound comedy of Tim’s three buddies — Martin, Ralph, and Heath — who stereotypically prejudge their potential mates on the size of their posteriors, to Chappelle’s downright creepy turn as a fowl-obsessed sex-addict with a penchant for cheap wine and cheaper women. Tim, by comparison, is all manners, though the script takes pains to point out that even this self-effacing bupster is as full of hot air as anyone else. It’s up to Pinkett Smith, then, to carry the film, which she manages to do up to a point. Early scenes of her stopping traffic in Times Square (Toronto, actually) with her billowy, pink, spaghetti-strapped dress and teasing bob, are a hoot. She has the same sexy electricity Mae West had, only in a more compact package, but the character of Woo is so cloyingly over-the-top that the jokes wear thin faster than a third-string condom. Taken as a glimpse into the hectic, unforgiving world of date ‘n’ mate, Woo is a comparative lightweight, an easy, breezy cover girl on the make who fails to make you laugh much at all.
This article appears in May 15 • 1998 (Cover).