“Tammy and the T-Rex” is quite possibly the strangest film I’ve ever sat through. On the surface, it seems rather safe and mundane. The story centers on Michael (Paul Walker), a wholesome teenager who’s in love with his girlfriend, Tammy (Denise Richards). Their relationship upsets her ex, Billy Bad (George Pilgrim), who enlists the help of his gang to abduct Michael and abandon him in a wildlife park to be mauled by a lion. I don’t know what’s more bizarre: homicide revolving around a wildlife park’s dangerous species or the fact that the evil ex-boyfriend’s last name is actually Bad. Thanks to a game warden who was conveniently hanging out in the wildlife park after hours, Michaels is saved from being devoured by a lion. As fate would have it, the now comatose Michael would be abducted once again, this time by the evil scientist, Dr. Wachenstein (Terry Kiser), who wants to use his brain to bring life to his mechanical dinosaur and reap the profits; oh, and there was something about immortality in there, too.
While the plot itself is certainly strange, it’s nothing to bat an eye at. “Tammy and the T-Rex” is obviously an innocently cheesy film aimed at children to cash in on the dinosaur craze, right? That’s where things get truly strange. The film is actually rated PG-13 and it’s not hard to understand why. The film is littered with violent content and sexual humor, but only enough sprinkled throughout for the film to attain the PG-13 rating, making one question why the content’s there in the first place. The violence and sexual humor feels out of place and clashes with the tone of the film, which is so childish that one has to believe this was made to be marketed towards children. Michael & Tammy are too wholesome to be designed for a teenage audience to connect with them; they act more like characters in a Disney Channel sitcom than actual teenagers. Their plight, that being Michael’s brain now inhabiting a mechanical dinosaur and Tammy trying to bring him back to human form, is so simple-minded that it’s only going to attract the attention of a younger viewer. Most importantly, the humor, when not focused on sexuality, is juvenile: the dinosaur pats people on the back to get their attention; a thug mistakes the dinosaur’s leg for a tree to urinate on; Tammy plays charades with the dinosaur; characters jokingly refer to the possibility of a dinosaur attack before one actually happens; the evil scientist and his minions are so hammy that they made me want to become a vegetarian, etc. In the midst of all of this childish humor and tone, why throw in excessive violence and adult humor?
I began to wonder if “Tammy and the T-Rex” was meant to be a parody of cheesy B-movies for kids. The ingredients are there for it to be a parody, what with the convoluted plot, vanilla and/or over-the-top characters (as well as their obvious names, such as Bad and Wachenstein), and acting so hammy that it had to be intentional. This would explain why the violence and adult humor are present, as a way to juxtapose the innocent nature of these types of film. What makes me doubt this being a parody is that the violence and adult humor are so sporadic. If Stewart Raffill (who directed & co-wrote the film alongside Gary Brockette) was aiming to sendup cheesy kids’ movies by planting adult content into one, then why not go full bore with it? Have the film’s story be one you’d find in a kids’ film while the tone is that of an adult film.
A few examples of the violence and adult humor are in order. I’ll start with the humor. While surveying the scene of a crime, one cop says to another, “We got two squished bodies and a one-legged woman…still kinda good-looking!” Another line from the cop centers on Michael’s homosexual friend, Byron (Theo Forsett), stating, “If you drop anything, don’t bend over.” A penis joke comes from Tammy when she and Byron are searching the morgue for a new body for Michael; she looks beneath the covers of one corpse and says, “Not for me!” When Dr. Wachenstein is tied up, he has his female assistant chew the ropes off, with the framing insinuating she’s giving him a blowjob (as do his facial expressions). The most gratuitous example comes at the end, so if you don’t want this film spoiled, I advise you skip to the next paragraph. At the end, it’s revealed that Michael’s brain has now been connected to a video camera and speakers (the camera to act as his vision and the speakers to act as his hearing and vocal chords). To cheer him up, Tammy performs a striptease for Michael that almost results in Denise Richards fully stripping down to her birthday suit; Michael’s ejaculation, represented by sparks exploding, cuts this off. It’s at this point that I sincerely hope this was made as a parody for adults and teenagers; if not, Raffill & Brockette should never be allowed near children if they think this is appropriate material for them.
With the adult humor out of the way, let’s focus on the violence in the film. As far as PG-13 films go, it’s quite tame. The film opens with Michael & Billy engaging in a fight on school grounds, including Billy locking Michael’s dick in a vice (it’s revealed that Michael’s wearing a cup, eliciting one of the film’s few genuine laughs); the lion attack mentioned in the beginning of the review, while not graphic, is intense, strongly resembling how an actual lion attack would play out (points for authenticity in a film about one’s brain being transported into a mechanical dinosaur, effectively bringing it to life); the neurosurgery performed on Michael’s corpse is grotesque; Michael the Dinosaur’s ravaging of a party includes him slashing chests, biting off heads, stomping on victims, and trapping two thugs under a car and crushing them beneath it. All of these sequences cut away at opportune times to assumedly avoid an R-rating, though that doesn’t make them any less graphic in tone. These may not be shocking for a PG-13 film, but for a film I believe was made with the intention of being screened for children, it’s rather alarming.
To further my confused state on this film’s target demographic, I discovered that an R-rated version of “Tammy and the T-Rex” exists, exclusively released in Italy. In this cut, the film becomes increasingly more violent: the lion attack is longer and more intense, the neurosurgery is much more graphic and bloody, and the dinosaur attacks are filled with spilled intestines and spurts of blood. One entire sequence was cut from the film that involved the evisceration of Wachenstein’s annoying child assistant by Michael the Dinosaur (in the PG-13 cut, the kid just mysteriously disappears). Even the sexual humor is more apparent, as Michael’s corpse sprouts a boner when his brain is being tampered with. All of these sequences can easily fit into the final cut without radically changing the film’s tone, though they’d still clash with it just like the rest of the film’s inappropriate content.
In the midst of all of this moral pondering, I’ve overlooked one aspect of the film that’s surprisingly well done, that being the practical effects. The mechanical dinosaur is remarkably well crafted, towering over people and moving smoothly for a creation its size. The amazement does wear off a bit on close-ups, as it becomes clear the hands are just green gloves. Some of the dinosaur’s movements are questionable, as its arms have too far of an extended reach for a t-rex. The mechanical dinosaur also suffers an identity crisis, as Raffill presents it as a real dinosaur at points, including one scene where it sheds actual tears. One could assume the longer Michael’s brain inhabits the mechanical dinosaur’s body, the more it becomes sentient, but that’s stretching it.
Whilst being one of the stranger films I’ve seen, “Tammy and the T-Rex” also holds the distinction of being one of the hardest films to review. While it’s easy to lay out the insanity of the movie, it’s hard to critically dissect it. If I take it as a parody, I’d like to give it a positive rating, as the film made me laugh a lot. However, as a parody, Raffill half-asses it and never goes full bore, so I wouldn’t be completely satisfied. As a kids film, it’s horrifyingly inappropriate! If it’s not meant to be a kids film nor a parody, then I have no idea who the hell this film was made for! What I do know is that I enjoyed myself throughout the film’s runtime; I just don’t know if I was laughing at the film or laughing with it. Seeing as I can’t make heads or tails of this film, I’m going to give it my vaunted fun failure rating, as that seems most appropriate. Regardless of how you land on the film, I recommend everyone check this out, if not just to bask in its insanity.
Final Rating: FF (Fun Failure)