Second Chance (1996 Video)
1/10
Never deserved a first chance.
8 May 2004
It's not surprising that the video of this film was distributed by Rodeo Video, a company in tiny Snowflake, AZ. They currently distribute, appropriately enough, rodeo videos. I think they've been thrown off a few too many bulls if they thought this film ever deserved to be distributed.

This is a no-budget kiddie flick that anyone of any age will find tremendously boring. Three `scientists', although I use that term as loosely as humanly possible, somehow come up with a formula which is supposed to make you younger. They ingest their creation and hope to be about 25, but things go terribly wrong and they end up as six-year-olds. The catch is that they will stay that way forever and never grow up if they don't get the antidote. (`Second Chance' isn't intelligent enough to discuss whether they would then have the possibility of living for hundreds of years. It IS supposedly a kid's movie after all.) Problem is, some bad guys have the antidote and they want to do a swap. They'll turn it over in exchange for the composition of the youth formula.

Some proof of this movie's lameness: 1. There was a scene with some Little Leaguers playing a baseball game. The batter simply wore his cap backwards instead of wearing a helmet. 2. There are multiple scenes where we are supposed to believe that six-year-olds have virtually no difficulty driving a Chevy Blazer. 3. The bad guys in this movie find out that the scientists are now little kids. When a little kid shows up at the lab acting strangely, none of the thugs get suspicious. 4. The scientists/animal researchers give their guinea pigs cutesy names and treat them like family pets. 5. There is a wasteful scene where the kids go to a department store and think they can buy clothes with a credit card. 6. The video box has the gall to compare itself to the movie `Big'.

Arte Johnson is touted as the `marquee' talent of this film but it is only Julie Hughes who comes out of this thing unscathed. It's too bad she wasn't able to find much work after this role. The kids are your typical straight to video kids. In other words: they can't act. It really doesn't matter though because the generic story and amateur direction killed this film from the start. Since Richard Lyman was both the director and main writer, he doesn't have anyone to blame but himself. 1/10
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