I Watched This On Purpose: Bio-Dome
Sometimes, even The A.V. Club isn't
impervious to the sexy allure of ostensible cultural garbage. Which is why
there's I Watched This On Purpose, our feature exploring the impulse to spend
time with trashy-looking yet in some way irresistible entertainments, playing
the long odds in hopes of a real reward. And a good time.
Cultural infamy: Critics and audiences alike found the 1996 Pauly
Shore/Stephen Baldwin vehicle Bio-Dome to be an abomination unto
the Lord, an affront to the gods of cinema, and also a very bad movie, bad
enough to be considered the gold standard of crapitude in Shore's oeuvre. It
currently holds the distinction of having the single lowest Metacritic score in
history (it scored 1 out of 100), though
it does have a comparatively robust 8 percent approval rating on Rotten
Tomatoes. Co-star Kylie Minogue has called it the single biggest mistake of her
career. It won Shore a Golden Raspberry for Worst Lead Actor, helped destroy
his film career, and popped up as a punchline on Family Guy, Futurama, and the "Weird Al" Yankovic song "Albuquerque."
But can Bio-Dome also be
considered a crucial part of Christ's master plan for humanity? According to
one of its stars, the answer is "Yes."
Curiosity factor: Jesus led me to Bio-Dome, or rather,
it helped lead Stephen Baldwin to his current calling as Jesus' emissary among
the young, stupid, and totally X-treme, which in turn led him to write a book
called The Unusual Suspect, which I'm
covering for a blog feature called "Silly Show-Biz Book Club." Here's my main
man Stevie B on why Jesus wanted him to follow a potentially career-making turn
in The Usual Suspects by playing
second banana to The Weasel:
I can honestly
say that part of God's plan for my life was for me to ignore the advice of my
managers and make a movie that was universally panned by the critics. Yes, God
wanted me to star in a film about two brainless slackers who spend their days
watching television, making out with their girlfriends, and drinking large
quantities of various substances… The film was brainless and pointless and
hilarious and God wanted me to make it. I didn't think like that at the time.
Making Bio-Dome played right into my
usual, let's have a good time attitude. God had other plans, I just didn't know
it at the time.
When I say God wanted me to make
this movie, I do not mean to imply that He approved of everything in the film.
The film contains stuff that does not reflect the life I now live. I haven't
even allowed my children to see it.
I know some people think the
movie kept my career from really taking off the way it could have after The
Usual Suspects. People who think that don't
realize that without Bio-Dome I
could not have the career I have today, and I'm not talking about movies.
The critics may have hated Bio-Dome, but kids loved it. They loved it when we
first made it and they still love it today. Everywhere I go I have some kid in
his late teens or early twenties come up to me and tell me that this is their
favorite movie. Most have never seen The Usual Suspects, or 8 Seconds or Fled, or One
Tough Cop or any of my other sixty movies,
with the possible exception of The Flintstones In Viva Rock Vegas. But they've seen Bio-Dome over and over again. That's why God wanted me to make
the film.
I didn't know it ten years ago
when I agreed to become Doyle Johnson, but God had already called me both to
know Him personally and to impact the youth culture in America with the Good
News of Jesus Christ. I didn't know it because I didn't know Jesus at the time.
One of the reasons kids will listen to me today is because they recognize me
from the movies. But not just any movie. One movie: Bio-Dome.
God had me make this film to give
me the platform that would later become my life's work. At the time I just
wanted to goof off with Pauly Shore for a couple of months. God knew that, and
He also knew the plans He had for my life, plans He made sure came to pass.