'' Wired '' screened at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival in May , three months before the film 's general release . Jack Mathews of the '' Times '' wrote that while '' Wired '' was " one of the most anticipated films in the festival , " by the end a " smattering of applause was drowned out by whistles and jeers . " Afterwards , Woodward faced a hostile press conference in which he was bombarded with questions about his inclusion as a character in the film . Rita Kempley of the '' Post '' also reported that the Cannes reception " recalled a hive of John Belushi 's killer bees . " The critical response to '' Wired '' was almost uniformly hostile . '' Wired '' has an overall approval rating of 4 % on Rotten Tomatoes based on 27 reviews , with an average rating of 2.9 / 10 . The site 's critics ' consensus states : " A tasteless unintentional parody of the life it attempts to dramatize , '' Wired '' butchers John Belushi 's memory with a misguided screenplay and unnecessary recreations of classic performances . " Leonard Maltin condemned '' Wired '' as " the film fiasco of its year " and " mind-numbingly wrongheaded . " Maltin noted that Michael Chiklis " looks a little like Belushi but conveys none of his comic genius in some clumsy '' Saturday Night Live '' recreations " and that J.T. Walsh , " as Woodward , is an unintentional howl with the decade 's most constipated performance . " Writing for '' The Washington Post '' , Rita Kempley dismissed the film as " the silliest celebrity bio since '' Mommie Dearest '' " and " a biography without an ounce of soul or a shred of dignity . Billed as a fantasy-comedy-drama , it manages to be none of these . The drama is laughable , the comedy lame , the fantasy without wings . " Kempley described the film 's direction as " ludicrous , " the script as " preposterous , " and also criticised Michael Chiklis ' portrayal of Belushi : " Sam Kinison might have played the part -- like Belushi , he 's obscene , overweight , abusive and mad as hell . Chiklis , who does look and sound like Belushi , is rather cherubic in his movie debut . There 's a Bambi-ish quality to his portrait of debauchery , a strangely cute requiem for a funny man . " Also writing for '' The Washington Post '' , Desson Howe wondered if the film is " what the real Belushi 's family , friends and fans really need . Certainly Belushi deserves as much scrutiny as the next public figure who died after heavy drug use , but this autopsy seems unnecessary . " Howe had no praise for Michael Chiklis ' performance as Belushi : " Despite a histrionic outpouring of growls , snorts , yells and re-creations of familiar Belushi shticks , from Jake Elmore to Joe Cocker , Chiklis seems to miss every opportunity to redeem himself . He 's loud where he should have been soft , flat where he should have been funny and dead where he should have been alive . " Howe also noted that the film version of Woodward " seems to have stumbled out of a '' Dragnet '' episode . " Vincent Canby for '' The New York Times '' described the film as " a bit fuzzy and off-center . " Canby also noted that Chiklis " seems to be doing the role a few years too soon . It 's not only that he seems too young , but also that he simply has n't any idea of what it 's like to scrape the bottom of life 's barrel . " Canby did praise Patti D'Arbanville , " who is exceptionally good as the addict who fatally ministers to Belushi in his last hours . She 's a lost , sad character , more vivid than anyone else in the movie . " Roger Hurlburt of the '' Sun-Sentinel '' also gave '' Wired '' a 1 ½ - star rating , writing that " we have director Larry Peerce thinking he 's Frank Capra doing '' It 's a Wonderful Life '' , or worse , Charles Dickens reworking '' A Christmas Carol '' ... As a film that relies on mystical scenes to join together fact , plus appearing and disappearing characters scattered among confusing time sequences , '' Wired '' is a movie of overkill . The fact is , Belushi becomes more unlikable , more idiotic and more pathetically self-destructive as the film progresses . " Caryn James for '' The New York Times '' began her '' Wired '' review with the words , " There is almost no excuse for '' Wired '' , a film so devastatingly dull that it seems longer than John Belushi 's whole career , " before adding " audiences do not like their pop icons tampered with , and in biographical films such tampering is inevitable . Audiences bring to such films vivid images of people they feel they know , and they have consistently rejected films that fail to reflect that image ... Any weeknight , viewers can turn on television reruns of the '' Saturday Night Live '' shows that made Belushi famous . And no matter how much Michael Chiklis , the star of '' Wired , '' resembles Belushi , his Killer Bee and his Joe Cocker imitation are no match for the highly visible , memorable , syndicated originals . " '' Rolling Stone '' labeled the film " a howling dog ... Whether by design or by forced compromise , '' Wired '' is even more of a gloss than the candy-assed view of Jerry Lee Lewis in '' Great Balls of Fire ! '' . Far from pointing any fingers , '' Wired '' the movie hardly names names ... it appears that nearly everyone Belushi encountered in big , bad Hollywood tried to warn him off demon drugs . '' Wired '' packs all the investigative wallop of a Care Bears flick . " The review also criticizes Michael Chiklis for capturing " none of Belushi 's charm , warmth or genius . It 's excruciating to watch Chiklis drain the wit from such classic Belushi routines as the Samurai , the Bees and the Blues Brothers . " In 2008 , writer Nathan Rabin posted a retrospective on '' Wired '' for his series " My Year of Flops " on '' The A.V. Club . '' Rabin wrote , " To call '' Wired '' an unconscionable act of grave robbery/defilement would be an insult to the good name of grave-robbers everywhere . There are snuff films with more integrity ... Watching '' Wired , '' the two questions that pop up constantly are ' What the hell were they thinking ? ' followed by ' What the hell were they smoking , and where can I get some ? ' ... I will give Rauch 's screenplay this much : it sure is audacious ... Rauch apparently set out to write a biopic as irreverent , wild , and unconventional as Belushi himself . The stakes were high . Had the filmmakers succeeded , they would have reinvented the biopic by injecting it with vast ocean of gallows humor , magic realism , and postmodern mindfuckery . The filmmakers took enormous chances , none of which paid off . They shot for the moon and fell flat on their asses . " Richard Corliss , in his review of the film for '' Time Magazine '' , singled out Michael Chiklis 's " boldly percussive performance " , but described the film itself as a " turkey , overstuffed as it is with mad ambitions and bad karma . " In his review of '' Wired '' for the '' Houston Chronicle '' , Jeff Millar noted that Michael Chiklis " looks reasonably enough like Belushi , and he impersonates him well enough to make us frustratingly aware that he is not John Belushi ... In the sequences when he is asked to imitate Belushi the entertainer , he is desperately overmatched - any actor would be - against the close memory of a hugely idiosyncratic comic actor . " Michael Wilmington for the '' Los Angeles Times '' praised the performances of Chiklis , D'Arbanville and Gary Groomes , but had mixed feelings about the film overall , noting that " the crippling flaw in the film lies in its mix of surface daring and inner funk . Inside , it keeps flinching . " Roger Ebert for the '' Chicago Sun-Times '' wrote that " Maybe there was no way to make a good movie out of this material , not yet , when everyone remembers Belushi and any actor who attempts to play him is sure to suffer by comparison . " Awarding '' Wired '' 1 ½ stars out of 4 , Ebert noted that '' Wired '' " is in some ways a sincere attempt to deal with the material , but it is such an ungainly and hapless movie , so stupidly written , so awkwardly directed and acted , that it never gets off the ground . " In his syndicated movie review show '' Siskel & Ebert '' , Ebert did concede that Chiklis did a " good job " with his performance . Belushi 's friend John Landis , who directed the actor in the films '' National Lampoon 's Animal House '' ( 1978 ) and '' The Blues Brothers '' ( 1980 ) , refused to have his name incorporated into '' Wired '' and threatened to sue for invasion of privacy , causing the producers to label a generic name on the film director who appears in the film . As played by Jon Snyder , the director is an obvious lookalike of Landis during the '' Blues Brothers '' sequence , and in the scene where he is walking across the movie set , a helicopter can be heard in the background ( a reference to the fatal helicopter accident that occurred when Landis filmed '' Twilight Zone : The Movie '' ) . The film also depicts the director punching a coked-out Belushi in the face during the filming of '' The Blues Brothers . '' This event , recounted directly from the opening of Woodward 's book , was dismissed by Landis as " not true "
1989 Cannes Film Festival
1989 Cannes Film Festival
Wired (film)