The Golden Child

The fate of the world rests in one small bald headed boy. Bet you thought everything depended on Clinton, Yeltsin, and all the other idiots with their fingers hovering over the buttons, didn't you. Well Stella, this is Hollywood, and in Hollywood, anything and everything happens. This time, it happens to Eddie Murphy, and The Golden Child.

Eddie Murphy is a ... well, I don't know exactly what he is. I guess you'd call him an activist. He doesn't have a job, but he runs around rescuing inner-city kids from the various things that seem to happen to them. This time, he's trying to find a girl that has been missing for several days. While all this is going on in LA, Charles Dance (the bad guy in Last Action Hero as well), has been massacring monks in some distant Tibet monastery, just so he could kidnap the little bald headed kid (and no, it isn't Charlie Brown). It seems that this kid isn't just any child, he's the golden child (I'm sure there are lots of disappointed parents out there - discovering that their kid is just an ordinary golden child). The fate of the world depends on this one kid. Did I mention that he's magical as well? Yeah - he can make pop cans turn into little dancing men, colorful birds appear out of nowhere and transmit messages to people, one touch turns the meanest person into a real sweeten, and he can live on one little leaf a day (and you thought your diet plan was extreme!) The reason he's living on leaves is, Charlie wants to kill the kid (Charlie is actually some sort of demon, and offing the kid would give his master the ultimate power trip). The kid can't be killed by normal means, but if he eats something that defiles him, he wouldn't be so lucky. So Charlie keeps offering food with blood in it, and this is where Eddie comes in, because the blood was from the girl who was missing. Actually, Eddie was about to get out, but along comes Charlotte Lewis - one of the good guys - who tells Eddie what's going on, an that he's the Chosen One - the guy who is destined to rescue the golden child. Naturally enough, he's very skeptical, so she takes him to James Hong (look for him in Bladerunner and Wayne's World 2), who introduces him to the Dragon Lady who lives in the basement (her mother was raped by a dragon several hundred years ago, so she is quite literally a dragon lady). So, Eddie and Charlotte go off in search of Charlie and his cohorts. Their first stop is a biker hangout, where Eddie tells Charlotte to wait in the car while he goes in to check the place out. They catch him, and Charlotte rescues him (she also has her white blouse soaked to near transparency - the closest thing to nudity in this film - well, there is Eddie's dream -but that's later). The next stop is a Chinese restaurant, where Eddie tells Charlotte to wait in the car while he goes in to check the place out. They don't catch him, only because Charlotte came in before they had a chance. They're hot on the trail of the guy they're after, but Charlie (the little rat) kills the guy before he can talk. They give up for the night. Eddie invites Charlotte up, but she declines and stays in her car, guarding his house. That night, Charlie invades Eddies dreams, and tells him that he wants the Ajanti Dagger, and that he's willing to make a swap. In actuality, the head demon told Charlie that the Ajanti Dagger is the only way he could kill the golden child, but he didn't mention that to Eddie. After Charlie burns the shape of the dagger on his arm (so he'd remember) Eddie wakes up. He goes down to Charlotte, and they go to James, and he decides to send them to Tibet to get the dagger. Well, by the time they're ready to leave, Charlotte has fallen in love with Eddie, they've slept together, and she's told him if he doesn't cooperate, she'll try to do it by herself. So, Eddie quits trying to talk her out of the trip, and off they go to Tibet. They arrive, and while Charlotte's arranging passage inland, Eddie gets ripped of by an ugly little street peddler (Victor Wong), who disappears from beneath his nose. When our brave adventurers make to the temple where the dagger is, Eddie finds that the ugly little street peddler is the head of the monastery, the guy he needs to get the knife from, and in another strange twist of fate, is Charlotte's father (grandfather, or something - he's the guy she considers her father, that's what counts). So, Eddie gets the knife (after braving an adventure worthy of a CD-ROM game), they manage to get it on the plane, and return to the US, where Charlie's waiting at the gate with the police. He told them that Eddie stole the knife from him, and wanted him arrested. Eddie takes him aside, and explains that if Charlie has him arrested, the police will take the knife and lock it in a little room until after the trial, which could be a long time, whereas, if he followed his agreement, he could have the knife soon. Charlie leaves in a huff, Eddie and Charlotte go to a house where they'll be safe. Yeah right. That night, Charlie and his minions attack, get the knife, and while attempting to kill Eddie, get Charlotte instead. The Dragon lady tells him that the only hope she has is if Eddie can get the golden child to her before the sun goes down. Eddie goes, and after big fights and showdowns with demons, rescues the golden child, brings him back to Charlotte - and just in time I might add - and after her successful resuscitation, they all live happily ever after. Except for Charlie that is.

This movie was an attempt to capitalize on Murphy's early success in films, and comes quite close. He's very funny in the film, and the script gives him lots of chances to be extremely witty. The special effects are OK, even with the heavy use of stop action photography (the Dragon Lady looks an awful lot like an attractive version of Medusa from Clash Of The Titans, for example). The film, while not exactly a block buster, didn't seem to hurt any careers, in fact, the only major character actor in the film I've never seen elsewhere was J. L. Reate, the little baldheaded kid himself. OK, maybe the film isn't as golden as it's title, but it certainly is shiny enough.