Norbit

Eddie Murphy puts on an idiot grin and a nerdy lisp to play milquetoast orphan Norbit, wiggles into a fat suit to play his screeching bridezilla, Rasputia (who is so grotesque it makes his "Nutty Professor" look like Mr. Universe), and dons a bucktooth grin and a fortune-cookie accent to play his Chinese foster father. Thandie Newton's portrayal as the childhood sweetheart of browbeaten Norbit is this shrill comedy's closest thing to a human being. She returns home and sparks the sweet but battered Norbit back to life, which turns the jealous Rasputia into King Kong on an estrogen overdose. That's mostly what passes for humor here: Her hoodlum brothers (Terry Crews, Clifton Powell and Lester "Rasta" Speight) terrorize the town with their extortion schemes and Rasputia batters Norbit and brings down property values by parading publicly in a bikini that gets lost in the folds of her flab. Murphy also wrote and produced this strange, toneless collection of fat jokes, fart jokes and foul sex gags, which wound up making more than $90 million. Sadly, I'm afraid that success will only encourage him. Eddie Griffin gets in the best lines as a swaggering peacock of a pimp and steals the film by preaching during an impromptu revival meeting that plays like a musical number. Cuba Gooding Jr. co-stars a smug con man.

If you just can't get enough of the latex-enhanced slapstick, the DVD features 14 deleted scenes as well as the featurettes "Man of a Thousand Faces" and "The Stunts of Norbit" and the complete mock infomercial for "Power Tap" with Marlon Wayans. Available in separate wide-screen and full-screen editions, Blu-ray and HD DVD formats.