THE MAN (2005) * Samuel L. Jackson, Eugene Levy, Luke Goss, Miguel Ferrer, Susie Essman, Anthony Mackie, Horatio Sanz. (Dir: Les Mayfield)<br /><br />Tired retread of the 'buddy' flick <br /><br />Why is the 'buddy' film such a tired vehicle? You'd think mixing a comic actor with a dramatic one would be a proved formula since it worked for Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte in "48 HRS" which pretty much launched the subgenre of cops and comedy 20 odd years ago. Well it certainly hasn't aged well and the latest venture of comic and dramatic actors joined at the hip with bullets flying may well signal the death knell for it.<br /><br />The plot has hapless nice guy schmuck dental equipment salesman Andy Fidler (Levy in his trademark character form) is in Detroit for a convention but winds up gumming up the works inadvertently for a sting operation by undercover ATF Special Agent Derrick Vann (perpetually glowering Jackson) when Fidler unwittingly walks into a diner and sits where Vann is supposed to be for a very important meet with an arms dealer who assumes Fidler is 'the man'. <br /><br />When Vann abducts the shocked Fidler and ingratiating him into the operation at hand well insert the laughter here folks because this is when and why it is supposed to be funny: a fish-out-of-water white tight-ass with an angry black street-smart cop team up to get the bad guy. Are you laughing yet?<br /><br />The plotting is so tedious and by-the-numbers you beg for the 'hilarity to ensue' already. The script by Jim Piddock (Levy's co-star in several of the Christopher Guest mockumentaries of late) and Margaret Oberman and Stephen Carpenter feels like it is a textbook playbook and Mayfield's debut as a director is skeptical at best. <br /><br />The chemistry between the two seems natural yet in reality very forced. Fart humor and calling each other a bitch is the high point in this low-concept comedy of errors. Make a citizen's arrest and don't bother seeing this film anytime soon.