Men in Black (film)

This article is about the 1997 science fiction film. For the 1934 Three Stooges film, see Men in Black (1934 film).

Men in Black
File:Men in Black Poster.jpg Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Barry Sonnenfeld
Produced by	Walter F. Parkes Laurie MacDonald
Written by	Ed Solomon
Based on	The Men in Black by Lowell Cunningham
Starring	Tommy Lee Jones Will Smith Linda Fiorentino Vincent D'Onofrio Rip Torn
Music by	Danny Elfman
Cinematography	Don Peterman
Edited by	Jim Miller
Production company	Amblin Entertainment MacDonald/Parkes Productions
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures
Release dates	July 2, 1997 (1997-07-02)
Running time	98 minutes
Language	English
Budget	$90 million
Box office	$589.4 million

Men in Black is a 1997 American science fiction action comedy film directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and produced by Walter F. Parkes and Laurie MacDonald. Loosely adapted from The Men in Black comic book series created by artist Lowell Cunningham, the film stars Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith as two agents of a secret organization called the Men in Black who supervise extraterrestrial lifeforms who live on Earth and hide their existence from ordinary humans. The film featured the creature effects and makeup of Rick Baker and visual effects by Industrial Light & Magic.

The film was released on July 2, 1997, by Columbia Pictures, and grossed over $589.3 million worldwide against a $90 million budget, becoming the year's third highest-grossing film. It received worldwide acclaim, with critics highly praising its witty, sophisticated humor, Jones and Smith's performances, and musical score. The film received three Academy Award nominations for Best Art Direction, Best Original Score, and Makeup, winning the latter award.

The film has spawned two sequels, Men in Black II (2002) and Men in Black 3 (2012), and an animated series, Men in Black: The Animated Series. A reboot of the film series has been discussed and is in development.

Plot

Agent K and his partner Agent D intercept a truck smuggling illegal immigrants into the United States. Inside they discover an alien disguised as a human. When he runs, they shoot him and use neuralyzers to wipe the memories of the border patrol witnesses. D decides to retire and asks K to wipe his memory too.

NYPD officer James Darrell Edwards III pursues a supernaturally fast and agile suspect. Before the suspect jumps to his death, Edwards sees his irises blink horizontally. In upstate New York, an alien crash-lands and kills a farmer named Edgar to use his skin as a disguise.

K interviews James about his encounter, then neuralyzes him and leaves him a business card with an address. Edwards goes to the address and undergoes a series of tests, for which he finds unusual solutions. While the other candidates are neuralyzed, K offers Edwards a position with the Men in Black (M.I.B.), a secret non-government agency that polices extraterrestrial activity on Earth. Edwards accepts and his identity is erased, becoming Agent J, the newest M.I.B. recruit.

The alien in Edgar's skin goes into a New York restaurant and kills two aliens disguised as humans. He steals from them a container, searching for something, but finds only diamonds inside. After investigating the crash landing at the farm, K concludes that Edgar's skin was taken by a "bug", a species of aggressive cockroach-like aliens. He and J head to a morgue to examine the human bodies the bug killed. Inside one body they discover a dying Arquillian alien, who says that "the galaxy is on Orion's belt". The alien, who used the name Rosenberg, was a member of the Arquillian royal family and his death may spark war.

M.I.B. informant Frank the Pug, an alien disguised as a dog, explains that the missing galaxy is a massive source of energy housed in a small jewel. The bug and J separately deduce that the galaxy is hanging on the collar of Rosenberg's cat Orion, which refuses to leave the body at the morgue. J and K arrive just as the bug takes the galaxy and kidnaps the coroner, Laurel Weaver. The Arquillians deliver an ultimatum to M.I.B: return the galaxy within an hour or they will destroy Earth.

The bug arrives at the site of two disguised flying saucers, the observation towers of the New York State Pavilion at Flushing Meadows, and abandons Laurel. The bug escapes on one saucer, but K and J shoot it down. It sheds Edgar's skin and swallows J and K's guns. K provokes it until he too is swallowed. The bug tries to escape on the other ship, but J slows it down by taunting it and crushing cockroaches, angering it. K blows it apart from the inside, having found his gun inside its stomach. They recover the galaxy and are about to be attacked by the bug again but Laurel shoots it with J's gun.

At M.I.B. headquarters, K tells J that he has not been training him as a partner but a replacement. At K's request, J neuralyzes him; K returns to his civilian life and Laurel becomes J's new partner, L.

Cast

• Tommy Lee Jones as Kevin Brown / Agent K: Agent J's grizzled and humorless mentor, formerly known as Kevin Brown. Clint Eastwood turned down the part, while Jones only accepted the role after Steven Spielberg promised the script would improve, based on his respect for Spielberg's track record. He had been disappointed with the first draft, which he reportedly said "stank". Jones felt it did not capture the tone of the comic, which he declared was what motivated him to get into the project. Like Jones, Smith said he accepted the role after meeting with Spielberg, who had been suggested to invite Smith for J by his wife Kate Capshaw.
• Will Smith as James Darrell Edwards III / Agent J: Originally James Darrell Edwards III, an N.Y.P.D. police detective recruited by K to join the M.I.B. Smith was cast because Barry Sonnenfeld's wife was a fan of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Sonnenfeld also liked his performance in Six Degrees of Separation. Chris O'Donnell turned down the role because he found the role of a new recruit too similar to Dick Grayson, whom he played in Batman Forever and Batman & Robin. David Schwimmer also turned down the part.
• Linda Fiorentino as Laurel Weaver / Agent L: A Deputy Medical Examiner who has had a few run-ins with the M.I.B. in the past. She later joins the M.I.B. as J's new partner following Agent K's retirement.
• Vincent D'Onofrio as Edgar the Bug: A giant alien insect who flays a verbally abusive farmer and uses his skin as a disguise. He comes to earth to kidnap the Galaxy and use it to destroy the Arquillians. John Turturro and Bruce Campbell were both offered the role. The make-up increasingly enhanced the damage on D'Onofrio's face to indicate the decomposition of Edgar's skin worn by the Bug.
• Rip Torn as Agent Zed: The head of the M.I.B.
• Tony Shalhoub as Jack Jeebs: An alien, posing as a pawn shop owner, who deals in illegal weapons.
• Siobhan Fallon Hogan as Beatrice, Edgar's wife.
• Mike Nussbaum as Gentle Rosenberg, Arquillian jeweler: Guardian of The Galaxy, which he has attached to his pet cat's collar.
• Jon Gries as Van Driver
• Sergio Calderón as Jose
• Carel Struycken as Arquillian
• Fredric Lehne as Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) Agent Janus
• Richard Hamilton as Agent D: Agent K's partner at the film's start, he decides he is too old for the job and has K erase his memory so he can retire.
• Kent Faulcon as 1st Lieutenant Jake Jensen
• John Alexander as Mikey
• Keith Campbell as Perp
• Patrick Breen as Mr. Redgick
• Becky Ann Baker as Mrs. Redgick
• Sean Whalen as Intergalactic Passport Officer
• David Cross as Newton the Morgue Attendant. Sonnenfeld himself had considered taking this role, but he cast Cross for his better comic timing.
• Tim Blaney as Frank the Pug (voice): A smart-talking Pug-like alien.

Production

Development and writing

The film is based on Lowell Cunningham's comic book The Men in Black. Producers Walter F. Parkes and Laurie MacDonald optioned the rights to The Men in Black in 1992, and hired Ed Solomon to write a very faithful script. Parkes and MacDonald wanted Barry Sonnenfeld as director because he had helmed the darkly humorous The Addams Family and its sequel Addams Family Values. Sonnenfeld was attached to Get Shorty (1995), so they approached Les Mayfield to direct, as they had heard about the positive reception to his remake of Miracle on 34th Street. They actually saw the film later and decided he was inappropriate. Men in Black was delayed so as to allow Sonnenfeld to make it his next project after Get Shorty.

Much of the initial script drafts were set underground, with locations ranging from Kansas to Washington, D.C. and Nevada. Sonnenfeld decided to change the location to New York City, because the director felt New Yorkers would be tolerant of aliens who behaved oddly while disguised. He also felt much of the city's structures resembled flying saucers and rocket ships. One of the locations Sonnenfeld thought perfect for the movie was a giant ventilation structure for the Brooklyn–Battery Tunnel, which became the outside of the MIB headquarters.

Filming

Filming began in March 1996. Many last-minute changes endured during production. First, James Edwards chasing a disguised alien was to occur at the Lincoln Center. But once the New York Philharmonic decided to charge the filmmakers for using their buildings, Sonnenfeld and Welch went for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Then, five months into the shoot, Sonnenfeld decided that the original ending, with a humorous existential debate between Agent J and the Bug, was unexciting and lacking the action that the rest of the film had. Five potential replacements were discussed. One of these had Laurel Weaver being neuralyzed and K remaining an agent. Eventually it boiled down to the Bug eating K and fighting J, replacing the animatronic Bug Rick Baker's crew had developed with a computer-generated Bug with an appearance closer to a cockroach. The whole action sequence cost an extra $4.5 million to the filmmakers.

Further changes were made during post-production to simplify the plotline involving the possession of the tiny galaxy. The Arquillians would hand over the galaxy to the Baltians, ending a long war. The Bugs need to feed on the casualties and steal the galaxy in order to continue the war. Through changing of subtitles, the images on M.I.B.'s main computer and Frank the Pug's dialogue, the Baltians were eliminated from the plot. Earth goes from being potentially destroyed in the crossfire between the two races into being possibly destroyed by the Arquillians themselves to prevent the Bugs from getting the galaxy. These changes to the plot were carried out when only two weeks remained in the film's post-production, however, the film's novel still contains the Baltians.

Design and visual effects

Production designer Bo Welch designed the M.I.B. headquarters with a 1960s tone in mind, because that was when their organization is formed. He cited influences from Finnish architect Eero Saarinen, who designed a terminal at John F. Kennedy International Airport. As the arrival point of aliens on Earth, Welch felt M.I.B. HQ had to resemble an airport.

Rick Baker was approached to provide the prostethic and animatronic aliens, many of whom would have more otherworldly designs instead of looking humanoid. For example, the reveal of Gentle Rosenberg's Arquilian nature went from a man with a light under his neck's skin to a small alien hidden inside a human head. Baker would describe Men in Black as the most complex production in his career, "requiring more sketches than all my previous movies together". Baker had to have approval from both Sonnenfeld and Spielberg: "It was like, 'Steven likes the head on this one and Barry really likes the body on this one, so why don't you do a mix and match?' And I'd say, because it wouldn't make any sense." Sonnenfeld also changed a lot of the film's aesthetic during pre-production: "I started out saying aliens shouldn't be what humans perceive them to be. Why do they need eyes? So Rick did these great designs, and I'd say, 'That's great — but how do we know where he's looking?' I ended up where everyone else did, only I took three months." The maquettes built by Baker's team would later be digitized by Industrial Light and Magic, who was responsible for the visual effects and computer-generated imagery, for more mobile digital versions of the aliens.

Music

Main article: Men in Black: The Album

Danny Elfman composed the film's score, making use of his usual combination of orchestra and electronics. The score also makes prominent use of jazz for the M.I.B. theme, which consists of an ostinato, usually played on lower instruments. Will Smith recorded a song based on the film's plot, also called "Men in Black". Elvis Presley's cover of "Promised Land" is featured in the scene where the MIB's car runs on the ceiling of Queens–Midtown Tunnel.

Two different soundtracks were released in the U.S.: a score soundtrack and an album, featuring various songs. In the U.K., only the album was released.

Promotion

Galoob released various action figures of the film's characters and aliens. An official comic adaptation was released by Marvel Comics. The official Men in Black game is a third-person shooter developed by Gigawatt Studios and published by Gremlin Interactive. Released to lackluster reviews in October '97 for the PC and the following year for the PlayStation. Also a very rare promotional PlayStation video game system was released in 1997 with the Men in Black logo on the CD lid. Men in Black: The Animated Series was created by Sony Pictures Television, and also inspired several games. Men in Black was the inspiration behind the Men in Black: Alien Attack ride at Universal Studios Orlando, in which Will Smith and Rip Torn reprised their roles. A Men in Black role-playing game was also released in 1997 by West End Games.

Reception

Men in Black won the Academy Award for Best Makeup, and was also nominated for Best Original Score and Best Art Direction. It was also nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy.

The film was well received by film critics and currently holds a 92% rating on the Rotten Tomatoes film critic website, and the consensus on the site states: "Thanks to a smart script, spectacular set pieces, and charismatic performances from its leads, Men in Black is an entirely satisfying summer blockbuster hit." The film holds a 71% on Metacritic, indicating "generally favorable reviews". On Empire magazine's list of the 500 Greatest Movies of All Time, "Men in Black" placed 409th.

Following the film's release, Ray-Ban stated sales of their Predator 2 sunglasses (worn by the organization to deflect neuralyzers) tripled to $5 million.

American Film Institute Lists

• AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs - Nominated
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains:
  • Agent J & Agent K - Nominated Heroes
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs:
  • Men in Black - Nominated
• AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes:
  • "You know the difference between you and me? I make this look good." - Nominated
• AFI's 10 Top 10 - Nominated Science Fiction Film

External links

• Men in Black at IMDb
• Men in Black at AllMovie