Imagine That (2009) Movie

I had no idea whatsoever that Eddie Murphy was so slim. My impression of the actor was that he was a rather well-built chap in The Nutty Professor movies but he seems to have lost more weight in Imagine That.

Here's my attempt at a plot summary/ plot synopsis of the show: The show opens with Eddie's character, Evan Danielson acting all crazy about wanting his "goo-gaa" while being turned out of a house. It turns out the "goo-gaa" is the blanket which his daughter had used to transport them to an imaginary land where 3 princesses and a their queen, Qwali (note that throughout the movie we never see these characters and only his daughter is able to "hear" them) answer Evan's questions about what shares to buy or sell. Evan who works as a fund manager/analyst/banker for an investment co investing client's monies has grown dependent on imaginary world for providing him the answers for his work and when his boss pits him against his upcoming colleague/competitor Whitefeather, (the reward is the boss's position as the boss intends to retire) giving him 17 hours to come up with a proposal, Evan goes nearly crazy trying to get hold of the goo-gaa which will transport him to the imaginary land - he shows up at his daughter's friend's house where she is having her sleepover, creeps into the room with the sleeping little girls and steal their blankets which are knotted together. He also, prior to that, sneaks into his daughter's friend's birthday party and tries to bribe a little boy to get his daughter to come out of the kids-only room so he can take her blanket. Anyway, his daughter gives him the blanket in the end but he does not use it. Instead he depends on his pure hard work and skills to come up with the proposal working through the night. His competitor, Whitefeather on the other hand, eaten by jealousy at Evan's past successes which he attributes to the blanket after spying on Evan, goes to an Indian Shaman to buy a blanket for 6000 dollars, wraps it around his son and forces his son to dance around a fire and tell him whether to buy or sell each company. The day of the assessment by the Big Boss who flies in from China, the big boss tells Whitefeather that all Whitefeather has said is just a pile of poop. Before Evan presents though, he sees the goo-gaa at the bottom of his briefcase and remembering that his daughter has a singing concert, walks out of the meeting and rushes to go the concert. His daugther who appears to be having stage-fright and unable to sing, manages to sing after Evan bursts into the hall wearing a ridiculous costume. They then use the blanket and say good bye to the imaginary kingdom. The Big Boss goes looking for Evan at the school and offers him the coveted post, remarking sadly that he hadn't seen his own daughter for years. He wants to discuss the proposal with Evan but Evan tells him that it is Saturday and they agree to do it on Monday.

The Slog Reviews: 8.5/10. There was great acting from Eddie but I'll be amazed if he doesn't have a million facial wrinkles from all the facial contortions he did during the movie. It got tiring at some stage though having to watch him distort his natural good looks into some grosteque parody. I didn't find the movie funny as in haha-funny (unlike the movie which I watched before it which I fell off my seat laughing) the way it was advertised to be. The movie reminds one of the importance of family (spending time with family) over money (earning money) and because I'm reading the book "Fooled by Randomness" now, I could relate to the unpredictablity and randomness of stock-picking and money making in the stock market.