Osmosis Jones

Osmosis Jones
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Bobby Farrelly Peter Farrelly
Written by	Marc Hyman
Produced by	Dennis Edwards Bobby Farrelly Peter Farrelly Zak Penn Bradley Thomas
Starring	Chris Rock Laurence Fishburne David Hyde Pierce Brandy Norwood William Shatner Molly Shannon Chris Elliott Bill Murray
Cinematography	Mark Irwin
Edited by	Lois Freeman-Fox Stephen Schaffer Sam Seig
Music by	Randy Edelman
Production companies	Warner Bros. Feature Animation Conundrum Entertainment
Distributed by	Warner Bros. Pictures
Release dates	August 7, 2001 (2001-8-7) (premiere) August 10, 2001 (2001-8-10) (United States)
Running time	95 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$70 million[1]
Box office	$14 million[2]

Osmosis Jones is a 2001 American

Frank DeTorre is an unkempt zookeeper at the Sucat Memorial Zoo in Rhode Island. He copes with his wife Maggie's death by overeating and forgoing basic hygiene, much to his daughter Shane's concern. Inside his body, white blood cell Osmosis "Ozzy" Jones is an overzealous officer of the "Frank Police Department," the body's center for responses against bodily threats; Ozzy's attempts to catch germs often cause trouble in Frank's body and have given him a negative reputation.

Mayor Phlegmming, who is facing an election against Tom Colonic, doubles down on his

Ozzy and Drix visit Chill, a flu vaccine and one of Ozzy's informants, who directs them to Thrax's hideout in a germ-ridden nightclub in a large zit on Frank's forehead. Ozzy goes undercover and infiltrates Thrax's gang, where he learns that Thrax intends to masquerade as a common cold and use his knowledge of DNA to kill Frank. When Ozzy is discovered, Drix comes to his aid, causing a brawl which culminates in the zit being popped by a grenade. Its pus lands on Mrs. Boyd's lip during a meeting between her and Frank; in response, Phlegmming closes the investigation, and despite their warnings, dismisses Ozzy from the police force and orders Drix to leave Frank’s body. Back in the real world, Frank prepares to go to Buffalo, much to Shane's disapproval.

Unbeknownst to the duo, Thrax had survived the zit's destruction and launches a lone assault on the hypothalamus where he steals a crucial nucleotide and then abducts Phlegmming's secretary, Leah Estrogen, before fleeing to the mouth to escape. Thrax's actions disable the body's ability to regulate temperature and Frank develops a dangerous fever. As Frank is hospitalized, Ozzy, having discovered Thrax's survival, convinces Drix not to leave and the duo catch up to Thrax and rescue Leah. Thrax induces Frank to sneeze him out of the mouth using pollen. Drix shoots Ozzy after him and he and Thrax both land on Shane's cornea. As the two battle, they end up on one of Shane's false eyelashes. Ozzy tricks Thrax into getting his hand embedded in the lash and escapes just as it falls into a beaker of rubbing alcohol, killing Thrax.

As Frank's temperature surpasses 108 °F (42 °C), he goes into cardiac arrest. Riding in one of Shane's tears as she mourns Frank, Ozzy falls back into Frank's mouth with the stolen nucleotide, reviving him just in time. Ozzy is welcomed back into the police force as he begins a relationship with Leah, while Drix stays as Ozzy's new partner and Frank commits himself to living a healthier lifestyle. A now disgraced Phlegmming becomes a janitor in the bowels and is ejected from Frank’s body by flatulence after he ignores a notice not to trigger it.

• Bill Murray as Frank DeTorre, Shane's widowed father and Bob's brother, in whom the animated portions of the film take place.
• Molly Shannon as Mrs. Boyd, Shane's science and gym teacher.
• Chris Elliott as Bob DeTorre, Frank's brother and Shane's uncle.
• Elena Franklin as Shane DeTorre, Frank's 10-year-old daughter and Bob's niece.
• Danny Murphy as the zookeeper superintendent
• Jack McCullough as a zookeeper

• Chris Rock as Osmosis "Ozzy" Jones, a quick-witted white blood cell with an impulsive personality.
• virus
  who intends to gain infamy by killing Frank within a record of 48 hours of infection.
• David Hyde Pierce as Special Agent Drixenol "Drix" Drixobenzometaphedramine, a by-the-book cold pill who becomes Ozzy's best friend and partner.
• Brandy Norwood as Leah Estrogen, Mayor Phlegmming's secretary and Ozzy's love interest.
• William Shatner as Mayor Phlegmming, the arrogant, incompetent and corrupt mayor of the City of Frank.
• Ron Howard as Tom Colonic, Phlegmming's rival for the mayor of the City of Frank who promotes good health for Frank in his campaign.
• Joel Silver (uncredited) as the unnamed chief of the City of Frank's police department who is Ozzy's boss.
• David Ossman (uncredited) as Scabies, a lead germ of the heavies before Thrax murders him.

provide the voices of the fictional band "Kidney Rock".

Production

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Osmosis Jones went through development hell during production. The animated sequences, directed by Tom Sito and Piet Kroon, went into production as planned even being completed ahead of schedule, but acquiring both a director and a star actor for the live-action sequences took a considerable amount of time, until Bill Murray was cast as the main character of Frank, and Peter and Bobby Farrelly stepped in to direct the live-action sequences. As part of their contract, the Farrelly brothers are credited as the primary directors of the film, although they did no supervision of the animated portions of the film. Will Smith was interested in the part of Ozzy, but in the end, his schedule would not permit it.^[3]

Principal photography on the live-action scenes took place from April 2 to June 19, 2000, in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Osmosis Jones was originally rated PG-13 by the MPAA for "crude language" and "bodily humor" in 2000. However, Warner Bros. edited the film to make it family-friendly; and in 2001 when it was released, the film was re-rated PG for "bodily humor".^{[citation needed]}

The first trailer for Osmosis Jones was released in front of

Osmosis Jones was released on

Osmosis Jones had its world premiere screening on August 7, 2001, at the

On Rotten Tomatoes, Osmosis Jones has an approval rating of 55% based on 112 reviews, with an average rating of 5.5/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "The animated portion of Osmosis is zippy and fun, but the live-action portion is lethargic."^[5] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 57 out of 100, based on 28 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".^[6] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.^[7]

The animated parts of Osmosis Jones were praised for their plot and fast pace, in contrast with the criticized live-action segments. Robert Koehler of Variety praised the film for its animated and live-action segments intervening, claiming it to be "the most extensive interplay of live-action and animation since Who Framed Roger Rabbit".^[8] The New York Times wrote "the film, with its effluvia-festival brand of humor, is often fun, and the rounded, blobby rendering of the characters is likable. But the picture tries too hard to be offensive to all ages. I suspect that even the littlest viewers will be too old for that spit."^[9] Roger Ebert gave the film 3 out of 4 and wrote: "Likely to entertain kids, who seem to like jokes about anatomical plumbing. For adults, there is the exuberance of the animation and the energy of the whole movie, which is just plain clever."^[10]

The use of

The film also received criticism for its use of the Kid Rock song "Cool Daddy, Cool", the full version of which has lyrics promoting statutory rape.^[16]

The film received numerous

A soundtrack containing hip hop and R&B music was released on August 7, 2001, by Atlantic Records. The soundtrack failed to chart on the Billboard 200, but Trick Daddy's single "Take It to da House" managed to make it to number 88 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.

Ozzy & Drix, an animated series that serves as a stand-alone continuation of the film, starring Phil LaMarr and Jeff Bennett as the titular characters, aired on Kids' WB for two seasons and 26 episodes from September 14, 2002 to July 5, 2004.

• Once Upon a Time... Life, an animated series with similar anthropomorphic representations of cells and germs.
• Cells at Work!, a Japanese manga/anime series with a similar premise.
• Inner Workings, a Disney short film that is set in the human body.

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