Norbit (Eddie Murphy) has never had it easy. As a baby, he was abandoned on the steps of a Chinese restaurant/orphanage and raised by Mr. Wong (Eddie Murphy) - that was heavy. Things get worse when he's forced into marriage by the mean, obscene, junk food-chugging queen, Rasputia (Eddie Murphy). Just when Norbit's hanging by his last thread, his childhood sweetheart, Kate (Thandie Newton), moves back to town. But Norbit will show them all why some vows are made to be broken.

I thought Eddie Murphy had finally turned the corner abandoning the days when he was once funny and showing us he can act with his powerful performance in Dreamgirls but I was wrong. Dreamgirls seems to be a just a blip on Eddie Murphy’s career as he returns to full force in a movie that might have been funny at the height of his career the 1980’s but now is stale and quite lame at times. Norbit feels like you should hop in a time machine and return to the 1980’s when cheesy comedies like this ruled the box office and Eddie was their king. There is the occasional funny joke and the movie has somewhat of a charm to it like the nerdy cousin of Coming to America but for the most part the movie is mediocre and falls very flat.

We are treated with all the traditional Eddie Murphy characters ala Coming to America with the very racist and clichéd Chinaman to the thug like brothers who run Norbit around. Not to mention Norbit himself who is the stereotypical good guy, nerdy but with a heart of gold that wins the heart of the beautiful girl. You have seen it all before, many times, and most of the time it was done with better style, funnier jokes and more class. Eddie Murphy for some reason just loves to jump in that fat suit and make fat jokes and it is supposed to be comedy. He is suppose to jump in that chinaman suit and make racist remarks like it was 1985 all over again and we are supposed to laugh. He can doll himself up to be the nerdy heart of gold loser and we are supposed to find some way to root for him to win the girl. We are supposed to buy the lame jokes, the lame scenarios, the lame characters and pretend it is the 1980’s all over again so Eddie can be funny once more, it’s just a lot to ask.

I have to take my hat off to the makeup crew though, I get flashbacks of Michael J Fox playing his daughter and older Marty McFly and it’s hard not to be impressed by how much makeup and technology has advanced in 20 years. You believe Eddie as all these characters he is playing because the makeup artists make you believe in them. Too bad they couldn’t find a screenwriter as talented as the makeup and special effects artists.

It’s time for Eddie Murphy to give up his comedy license, sorry Eddie you’re just not funny anymore and no amount of makeup is going to change that. And while were at it, let’s revoke Eddie Griffin’s right to make comedies as well. His dressed out Pimp was an escapee from Deuce Bigalo that we just wish we could make go away. You have to hand it to him he may be the only actor alive who turned a funny string of 7up commercials into a string of very unfunny movie roles. Eddie give us your more dramatic side bury these kinds of movies where they belong, in the past. Stop trying to relive the glory days, they are gone they are past, Dreamgirls proved you can act, Norbit might just unprove it.

Grade: D