Kazaam is a 1996 musical fantasy comedy film directed by Paul Michael Glaser and written by Christian Ford and Roger Soffer. The film stars Shaquille O'Neal as the titular genie who becomes the servant of a young boy. The film is considered a notoriously bad film with even O'Neal admitting the film's various flaws.
Plot[]
A wrecking ball destroys an abandoned building, the impact knocking over a magic lamp inside and causing it to land on a boombox. The genie inside decides to make residence inside the boombox from there on.
Meanwhile, a 12-year-old boy named Max Conner goes to school. He greets his friend, Jake, with a goofy face and is chastised by his teacher. Max is confronted by a gang of bullies, who hold him on the bathroom floor and spray paint his outline. The bullies chase Max through Brooklyn. Max is chased into the abandoned building, where he discovers the boombox and accidentally unleashes the genie inside. The genie, who introduces himself as Kazaam, a 5,000-year-old genie, tells Max that he is now Max's genie and proves it to him by demonstrating his powers, which results in Kazaam disappearing off the face of the earth.
Max spots his father in passing during his return home from school, and finds that his mother is marrying a fireman named Travis O'Neil. Max instantly rejects Travis, and when his mother confronts him on his behavior, he counters by confronting her that his she lied to him about his real father's whereabouts, and that he is actually located in the city. Max then sets out to search for his father in the hopes of rekindling their relationship. He suddenly encounters Kazaam during his travels, who pesters Max into making a wish. Max eventually finds his father, only to learn that he is a musical talent agent who specializes in unauthorized music. But he initially doesn't care because his father, Nick Mateo by name, is overjoyed to see him again, introduces Max (Mateo) to the other employees of the agency, and gives him free VIP passes to an upcoming concert at the nightclub he works at.
Max goes to his personal secret hideout and tells Kazaam about his father. They decide to have a bike race through Max's hideout, during which Kazaam shows off his powers. Kazaam finally convinces Max to make his first wish, which consists of junk food raining from the sky. While eating all of this, Max suddenly realizes that he owns Kazaam until he makes his last two wishes. Max and Kazaam go out to see Max's father again.
After getting past an intimidating bodyguard, Max and Kazaam attend the show, where the performing act (with a little needling from Max) persuade Kazaam to join in. The owner of the nightclub, Malik, shows interest in Kazaam upon the realization that he is a genie, and he hopes to control Kazaam through Max's father. The next day, Kazaam stays in Max's home and passes himself off as Max's tutor.
Max confesses to Kazaam that he and his father aren't really connecting, though Kazaam attempts to shirk the issue with some rapping, revealing how he and his “best friend, Ha’ber, in 1000 BC” first became genies. Max attempts to wish for his father and mother to fall back in love, but Kazaam cannot grant this wish because he is not a djinn, and therefore not free to grant ethereal wishes.
Later that day, Max witnesses his father being assaulted by Malik and his minions and goes to Kazaam for help. Kazaam just received a record deal as a professional rapper and is reluctant to help Max. So Max uses his second wish to conjure a replacement tape, though this causes an argument and a rift to form between him and Kazaam. After school, when Max's father demand his son to hand over the Record Tape that he stole last night, he does. Then he leaves realizing that he won't get a second chance with him. Later that night, Max is kidnapped by Malik and takes possession of Kazaam's boombox, causing Max's father to understand the error he made, though he is also held hostage as well. Malik, having taken control of Kazaam's boombox, is now in control of Kazaam himself. Max is pushed down an elevator shaft by Malik. He summons Kazaam in the hopes that he will do his bidding. While Kazaam is initially powerless against his master, he soon breaks free from his oppression and defeats Malik and his minions.
Kazaam transforms Malik into a basketball and then slam dunks him into a garbage disposal. However, he then finds Max's lifeless body, and wishes that he could have granted Max's wish to give his father a second chance at life. Then, in his sorrow, Kazaam finally becomes a djinn, and is therefore able to do this for Max. With him officially a djinn, he pulls Max out of harm's way and carried out of the burning building by Travis. Max's father then shows up and tells him that he hopes to rekindle the bonding with his son, before he takes off with authorities. Kazaam is then last seen walking off being grilled by his girlfriend because he doesn't have a job, while at the same time, ecstatic over his newfound freedom.
Cast[]
- Shaquille O'Neal as Kazaam
- Francis Capra as Maxwell "Max" Connor
- Ally Walker as Alice Connor
- James Acheson as Nick Matteo
- John Costelloe as Travis O'Neil
- Marshall Manesh as Malik
- Fawn Reed as Asia Moon
- Mother Love as Mrs. Duke
- Wade Robson as Elito
- Jake Glaser as Jake
- Efren Ramirez as Carlos
- Steven Barr as Sam
- Deidra Roper as Spinderella
- Da Brat as Herself
- Deborah Rennard as Malik's Date
Production[]
Based on an initial idea by director Paul Michael Glaser, it went from idea to production in 10 weeks and was originally set up at Warner Bros before going into Turnaround were it was acquired by Disney.
Confusion with Shazaam[]
The film is a product of what is commonly referred to as the Mandela Effect. People falsely remember the film as Shazaam starring Sinbad as a genie, but no such film exists. In 2017, Sinbad teamed up with College Humor and created a sketch that paid homage to the non-existent film.
International Distribution Rights[]
Despite being produced by Disney through Touchstone Pictures, Disney chose not to directly handle international distribution of the film, instead allowing a third party to do the work.
PolyGram Filmed Entertainment distributed the film everywhere outside North America. Currently, the non-North American rights to the film are with Universal Pictures.
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This page uses content from the English Wikipedia page Kazaam. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. Text from Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. |