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Cedric The Entertainer is one of the bigger names in stand-up comedy. As one of the original Four Kings of Comedy, he made a name for himself with his uproariously funny observations of life. The success of those shows and DVDs has lead to a film career. Cedric has been in a few different films, mostly playing second banana to the action. Finally he gets his chance to be the lead in the spy/comedy hybrid flick Code Name: The Cleaner.
The film starts with Jake (Cedric) waking up in a hotel room bed with a body beside him. As he moves to get cozy with what he thinks is a live woman, he discovers he is next to the body is a dead FBI man. He also notices that he has a bleeding wound on his head and a bad case of amnesia. He has a pass badge on him that is an access code for Digital Arts, a computer game company. Opening a briefcase, he discovers a giant cache of cash.
Not knowing exactly what to do, Jake runs down to the lobby where he meets Diane (Nicollette Sheridan). Diane informs Jake that his life is in danger and that she is his wife. They travel back to their home a mansion fitted with a dozen sports cars. The family doctor examines Jake, telling him that some sensory device could trigger back his memory. Jake keeps having flashbacks to a combat situation and also knows that the current situation he is in is not the truth. He discovers that the doctor and Diane are planning something nefarious.
Jake escapes Diane and travels to Digital Arts but something tells him to go to the diner across the street. Gina (Lucy Liu), the waitress at the diner is mad at Jake because he hasn’t been calling her. According to her, Jake is her boyfriend and the janitor for the Digital Arts building. Jake, due to the flashbacks, is convinced he is some kind of Special Ops, super spy on a case. Everyone at Digital Arts is looking for an X-1 chip and believes that Jake either has it or knows where it is. The rest of Code Name: The Cleaner is about Jake finding his true identity, the facts behind the flashbacks and how every person in Jake’s life is not exactly who they say they are.
Cedric The Entertainer is comfortable in all the different aspects of the role. Wither he is a bumbling janitor or a kung-fu man, he keeps the focus of the film always on his antics. The screen just loves his round face and his rotund body flashes back to the roles of John Candy. He delivers his comedy lines more along the lines of some of the old school classic comics. But he also handles a weapon with low key grace.
Lucy Liu helped produce this flick, showing that she is not waiting around for Hollywood to hand her roles. Even though this is more of her own baby in terms of making decisions, she takes a back seat in the film. Still one of the most stunning faces in Hollywood; she takes on the thankless role of the girlfriend (but with a twist). She could have been the femme fatale role that Nicollette Sheridan has in Code Name: The Cleaner. Wearing the barest of a costume, Nicollette Sheridan shows that she has the body and the bravery to bear almost everything that God gave her.
The balance between doing comedy and action is precarious at best but director Les Mayfield keeps both sides of the plot spinning. I feel that there should have been a bit more comedy and a few less flashbacks. But he does keep the narrative moving and the comedy chunks sprinkled liberally.
Code Name: The Cleaner is surprisingly a decent little film, but all the press materials and previews give away almost all the good parts. It is not as funny as you would expect but neither is it as silly. It is a slight piece of entertainment that does entertainment on a basic level.
