MVP2: Most Vertical Primate

After a short stint as the Most Valuable Primate on a minor hockey team during the first film, Jack the chimpanzee retired to a nature preserve. Yet his heart is still on the ice, so when the ZHL Simians offer him a position on their team, Jack is off to Seattle.

One might think an ape in the national league would stick out like a hairy thumb, but not in this menagerie of other misfits, including a punk rocker, a former figure skater and a hot dog devouring Swede. Despite some misgivings from the coach and a fellow player, the chimp gets a chance to show off his stuff, and the fans go bananas.

Right when it appears everything is going along skating-ly, disgruntled opponents decide they've had enough monkey business. Using the old catsup trick, they succeed in getting the chimp benched for biting. In the aftermath of boos and false accusations, Jack slips out the back.

But wasn't this sequel supposed to be about skateboarding? Not until the primate heads onto the streets does the story takes a vertical turn. Here Jack meets a runaway boy (Scott Goodman) with a skateboard. The two fugitives take refuge at an abandoned swimming pool that doubles as a half-pipe paradise. Converting from ice-skating to skateboarding, the monkey is moving like a pro in no time at all. Meanwhile society's social net threatens to entangle the unlikely pair.

In the jungle of direct to home video products, MVP2: Most Vertical Primate offers few content concerns other than minor hockey violence and rather simplistic solutions to some of life's more complex problems. To add appeal, moviemakers have included a skateboarding competition featuring real life boarder Bob Burnquist. Unfortunately, this family flic doesn't deliver a very radical plot or awesome acting. But alas, I'm not thinking like the under ten crowd the movie was intended for. To do that, I must simply overlook the script's rambling shortcomings the same way every character in the film overlooks the obvious incredulousness of having a chimp in human clothing wandering through their world.