Clark Kellogg (Matthew Broderick) leaves his mother and animal rights vigilante stepfather Dwight Armstrong (Kenneth Welsh) in Vermount to attend NYU film school. Arriving in the big city, con man Victor Ray (Bruno Kirby) steals all of his luggage. He encounters Victor again and this time, Victor offers him a job working for his uncle Carmine Sabatini (Marlon Brando). He's taken with Carmine's daughter Tina (Penelope Ann Miller). Carmine tasks him with a pick-up job. He brings along his film-school roommate Bushak (Frank Whaley) and the package turns out to be a Komodo dragon.It's a fun return of Marlon Brando's Godfather character. The Komodo dragon brings a full-on comedic romp. It's fun and charming especially the ending. Baby-faced Broderick still has some of his Bueller charms. The movie has fun dangling the Godfather in front of the audience.

"The Freshman" (1990) stars Matthew Broderick as a freshman film school student in New York City. Desperate for money, he's hired by the local Godfather-type who just so happens to look and act exactly like Vito Corleone from the famous '72 Coppola film, probably because the character is played by the inimitable Marlon Brando. Penelope Ann Miller plays the daughter of the Mafia don, Bruno Kirby a fast-talking con and Maximilian Schell a curious chef of exotic foods. This is a unique crime dramedy, which I found okay on my initial viewing, but liked better on my second, probably because I utilized the subtitles and could make out Brando's mumbling dialogue. Broderick was still in his 20s and shines as the wide-eyed protagonist, but Brando naturally steals the show. It's not great, but it's amusing enough and wins points for its peculiarities, like the komodo dragon. The film runs 102 minutes and was shot in New York City and Ontario. GRADE: B

Matthew Broderick is the fledgling NYU student of the film's title, made an offer he can't refuse by an aging Italian padrone bearing an uncanny resemblance to The Godfather's Vito Corleone. Hardly surprising, since the part is played by Marlon Brando, and that's the only real joke in the entire film: Brando's word-perfect parody of his earlier role. Elsewhere the movie is simply writer director Andrew Bergman's third person film school fantasy, with a screenplay only an underclassman could appreciate. It might have been a modern screwball classic except for the slack pacing, lame jokes, annoying voice-over commentary (always a sure sign of lazy writing), and transparent plot twists, including a climax lifted directly from 'The Sting', but with the outcome laboriously spelled out beforehand. Brando himself admitted the film was a piece of garbage, and with good reason. It's almost worth the price of admission to see him carrying his considerable weight so gracefully around an ice skating rink, or hear Bert Parks sing the Miss America theme song to a Komodo Dragon, but otherwise this freshman flunks.

I think i'm missing the point with this movie.Yes, it's great to see Brando on the screen once more in 'Godfather' mode, but it all stinks of blatant cash in to me.The story is your typical fish out of water scenario. Broderick plays new student who loses everything within ten minutes of being in New York, gets offered a job by Brando, and there is a massive racket going on involving endangered species dinner parties (yes, really).it has it's moments, there are some funny lines from Kirby and Whaley, but the main stars really have little to do, apart from re-enact previous roles (Corleone and Bueller respectively).it's not a bad film by any means, but they could have improved the script and the story a little, and made it a little more special.still, lucky for the film makers it was made before Part 3.not bad, just bland...