Good Burger

Good Burger
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Brian Robbins
Written by	Dan Schneider Kevin Kopelow & Heath Seifert
Produced by	Mike Tollin Brian Robbins
Starring	Kenan Thompson Kel Mitchell Abe Vigoda
Cinematography	Mac Ahlberg
Edited by	Anita Brandt-Burgoyne
Music by	Stewart Copeland
Production companies	Nickelodeon Movies Tollin/Robbins Productions
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date	July 25, 1997 (1997-07-25)
Running time	103 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$8.5 million
Box office	$23.7 million

Good Burger is a 1997 American comedy film directed by Brian Robbins and starring Kenan Thompson and Kel Mitchell. It evolved from the comedy sketch of the same name featured on the Nickelodeon series All That. It was produced by Nickelodeon Movies and Tollin/Robbins Productions and released on July 25, 1997 by Paramount Pictures.

Plot

On the first day of summer, a slacking high school student, Dexter Reed (Kenan Thompson), takes his mother's car on a joyride while she is on a business trip and accidentally crashes into and damages the car of his teacher, Mr. Wheat (Sinbad). Dexter is in danger of going to jail, as he does not have a driver's license or insurance. But Mr. Wheat agrees to let Dexter pay for the damages to both cars in exchange for not calling the police on Dexter. With the damages estimated at $1900 ,Dexter is forced to get a summer job. After being fired from a job at Mondo Burger for insulting the manager, Kurt Bozwell (Jan Schweiterman), he ends up finding employment at Good Burger where he meets and reluctantly befriends dimwitted Ed (Kel Mitchell) and a host of other colorful employees. Initially neither of them are aware that it was in fact Ed who inadvertently caused Dexter's car accident.

Things take a turn for the worse when a new Mondo Burger location opens across the street from Good Burger, its fancy decor and oversized burgers threatening to close down the smaller restaurant. Fortunately, Good Burger is saved by the invention of a secret sauce made by Ed. Upon learning from Mr. Wheat that the true damages from the car accident exceed the original $1900 estimate, Dexter takes advantage of Ed to make money off the secret sauce in order to pay off his debt sooner. Ed signs a contract that gives Dexter 80% of his profits.

Ed's sauce is a huge success and vastly improves Good Burger's business, but draws the attention of Kurt Bozwell who attempts to obtain the sauce for Mondo Burger. After failing to lure Ed away from Good Burger for a higher hourly wage at Mondo Burger, Kurt sends Roxanne (Carmen Electra) to seduce Ed into giving her the recipe for the sauce, but to no avail.

When a dog refuses to eat a discarded Mondo Burger instead of a Good Burger, Ed and Dexter become suspicious and decide to investigate. Disguised as fashionable women, the two infiltrate Mondo Burger's kitchen and discover that their burgers are being artificially enhanced with Triampathol, an illegal chemical; Kurt kidnaps them, and calls a man named Wade who has them committed to an asylum called Demented Hills so they won't tell the public.

Threatened by the success of Ed's sauce, Kurt breaks into Good Burger after hours and taints Ed's secret sauce with shark poison, but is confronted by Otis (Abe Vigoda), an elderly Good Burger employee who was sleeping on the premises, leading him to commit Otis to Demented Hills as well. After informing Ed and Dexter about Kurt's scheme, the three of them manage to escape Demented Hills and steal an ice cream truck to drive them back to Good Burger to prevent anyone from eating the poisoned sauce.

Ed and Dexter then break into Mondo Burger to expose their chemically induced burgers to the police. Dexter creates a diversion, during which Ed tries to take a can of Triampathol, but clumsily knocks one into the meat grinder. Inspired, Ed pours the entire supply into the grinder. Meanwhile, Kurt has captured Dexter, and is about to do away with him when Ed arrives bearing an empty can. Kurt mocks Ed's presumed foolishness, whereupon Ed snidely comments that the can wasn't empty when he found it. Chaos ensues in the Mondo Burger building; the burgers are now exploding due to overuse of Triampathol.

In the aftermath, Kurt is arrested for using the illegal substance and Mondo Burger is destroyed, with an artificial burger destroying Mr. Wheat's newly repaired car as well. Dexter also tears up the contract he formed with Ed and tells him that he gets to keep all the profits from his sauce. Ed and Dexter then walk back to Good Burger where they are both praised by the other employees as heroes for saving Good Burger.

Cast

• Kel Mitchell as Ed, the inept, but well-meaning teen cashier of Good Burger.
• Kenan Thompson as Dexter Reed, a sixteen-year-old high school student who desires to slack during his summer vacation.
• Abe Vigoda as Otis, an elderly Good Burger employee who cooks working as the fryer and also gets caught up in some of Ed and Dexter's adventures.
• Jan Schweiterman as Kurt Bozwell, the C.E.O. and restaurant owner of Mondo Burger who will stop at nothing to make his food chain number one.
• Sinbad as Mr. Wheat, Dexter's teacher who demands money from him for car damage.
• Shar Jackson as Monique, a Good Burger employee who scolds Dexter for using Ed's gullibility to steal most of his money, but eventually becomes his girlfriend.
• Dan Schneider as Mr. Baily, the owner and manager of Good Burger.
• Ron Lester as Spatch, the head fry cook of Good Burger.
• Lori Beth Denberg as Connie Muldoon, a customer whose extremely complex orders are too difficult for Ed to memorize.
• Josh Server as Fizz, the drive-thru employee of Good Burger.
• Ginny Schreiber as Deedee, one of the 2 female employees at Good Burger who is a vegetarian.
• Linda Cardellini as Heather, an insane girl in Demented Hills that has feelings for Ed.
• Shaquille O'Neal as Himself
• George Clinton as Dancing Crazy, a Demented Hills patient.
• Robert Wuhl as an Angry Customer
• Carmen Electra as Roxanne, a henchwoman of Kurt who tries, but fails, to seduce Ed into telling his secret sauce recipe.
• Marques Houston as Jake, Dexter's high school friend.
• J. August Richards as Griffen, one of Kurt's right hand men.
• Hamilton Von Watts as Troy, Kurt's other right-hand man
• Wendy Worthington as the Demented Hills nurse.
• Issac Kolb Reyes as Issac Kolb Reyes
• Bennett Hughes as Bennett Patrick Hughes
• Johaan Jimenez as Johhan Jimenez
• Kenneth Thomas as Kenneth Tyler Thomas

Filming

Most of the film's scenes were filmed along Glendora Avenue in West Covina, California in March 1997. The building known as "Good Burger" was filmed at a restaurant currently known as "Peter's El Loco" 437 Glendora Ave., West Covina, CA. Meanwhile, Mondo Burger was located across the street at the Samantha Courtyard shopping center, with extra details added to the facade for the film. Ed's house is located on 959 East Topeka Street, in Pasadena, California.

Soundtrack

Main article: Good Burger (soundtrack)

A soundtrack containing hip hop, R&B, funk, and punk music was released on July 15, 1997 by Capitol Records. It peaked at 101 on the Billboard 200 and 65 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums.

Release

Short film

The Action League Now! episode Rock-a-Big Baby was released prior to the film's screening.

Box office

In its opening weekend, the film grossed $7.1 million, finishing in 5th at the box head. It went on to gross $23.7 million.

Critical reception

Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 32% based on reviews from 38 critics.

Lisa Alspector of Chicago Reader gave the film a negative review, and wrote "The perceived notion that kids want their movies fast and furious is barely in evidenced in this 1997 comedy, a laboriously slow suburban adventure in which a teenager's summer of leisure slips through his fingers when he has to get a job—an experience that proves almost life threatening because of the cutthroat competition between two burger joints."

Andy Seiler of USA Today gave this film a score of 2/4, saying that "Good Burger is not very well done, but it does have energy."

Leonard Klady of Variety enjoyed the film and wrote "The meat of the piece is definitely FDA cinematically approved, and perfect if you like this brand of entertainment with the works."

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote "It didn't do much for me, but I am prepared to predict that its target audience will have a good time." He gave the film two out of four stars.

Home media

Paramount released the film on VHS on February 17, 1998, and on DVD on May 27, 2003. Warner Home Video (who releases Paramount titles on DVD and Blu-ray under license, as Paramount themselves have moved to digital-only distribution) reissued it on DVD on September 24, 2013.

The DVD releases lack special features. The film has not been released on Blu-Ray format yet, unlike most of the films from Nickelodeon. The only official HD version is available on Netflix.

External links

• Good Burger at IMDb
• Good Burger at AllMovie
• Good Burger at Rotten Tomatoes