Ed MPAA Rating: PG Entertainment: +2 1/2 Content: -1

Like the recent film Dunston Checks In, this comedy features a lively chimpanzee who's almost human. In this case, though, the monkey is neither real nor as endearing as Dunston. But Chubb (Jack Warden), manager of the Santa Rosa Rockets team in California, discovers he is quite a baseball player. At first, Chubb takes on the monkey as a mascot and names him Ed, but finds out that Ed is an amazingly effective, and funny, third baseman. Both the team and its star pitcher, Jack Cooper (Matt LeBlanc), are in a serious slump, so Ed and Jack become teammates and roommates in Jack's small, unkempt apartment. However, it's only after the pitcher learns to lighten up and enjoy the game, and also meets his attractive neighbor, Lydia (Jayne Brook), that the team starts to win big. Jack and Ed get involved in all sorts of humorous antics both on and off the baseball playing field, but overall the comedy seems rather contrived and shallow. In the advance screening, young children laughed at its corny humor, but others weren't particularly impressed.

ED is also lacking as a family film because it frequently resorts to crude bathroom humor for laughs. It's supposed to be funny when Ed holds his crotch and dances around to let Jack know he needs to use the bathroom. Both he and Jack pass gas and are seen more than once from the rear as they relieve themselves in the bathroom. A slang word for urination is used a few times for laughs, as well as an occasional sexually oriented remark. Refreshingly, however, Jack and his girlfriend Lydia don't get involved sexually. Lydia's young daughter uses a crude word describing Jack's backside and also casually speaks one obscenity. It's disappointing that the dialogue of this youth film has about 16 mild and moderate crude words and four obscenities. Jack himself is a decent fellow and the message that people should take time to smell the flowers as they live out their lives is commendable. Still, it is becoming more difficult to find a PG film without crudities and ED hasn't helped to relieve this dilemma.

Preview Reviewer: John Evans
Distributor: Universal Pictures, 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, CA 91608