Funny People: Far from amusing

Funny People (2009) • View trailer for Funny People
1.5 stars (out of five). Rating: R, for nudity, sexual candor and relentless profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.31.09
Buy DVD: Funny People• Buy Blu-Ray: Funny People (2-Disc Unrated Collector's Edition) [Blu-ray]

Wow ... what a tedious, self-indulgent mess.

Filmmakers who decide to become "meaningful" must be regarded with eyebrow-raised skepticism, because it's a sure sign that somebody is taking himself much too seriously. The situation inevitably occurs because the artist in question — often a director — has made buckets of money in the recent past, and therefore has the clout to be green-lighted for what amounts to an insufferable vanity project.

When Clarke (Eric Bana, far right) returns home early from a business trip, his
wife, Laura (Leslie Mann), stumbles to find a reasonable explanation to justify
the presence of long-ago lover George (Adam Sandler, left) and tag-along Ira
(Seth Rogen) in their home. Because Clarke is such an idiot -- a failing that
afflicts every character in this film -- it's not that hard a sell.

Which, in a world where poetic irony rules, flops.

Think back to Steven Spielberg, who stumbled big time with 1941, after having been such a media darling with Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Recall James Cameron, parlaying his two Terminator films into the mooningly melodramatic The Abyss. Or Barry Levinson, following Rain Man and Bugsy with the jaw-droppingly dreadful Toys.

Judd Apatow's shtick always has skirted the ragged edge of cruelty, and Funny People is distastefully mean-spirited. This is a sordid little tale of morally compromised troglodytes who are intended, in Apatow's imagination, to be sympathetic protagonists in his interminable, clumsily written narrative.

They are not sympathetic. They do not deserve happiness or anything else that might be construed as a "reward." As a group, they begin this film with the ethics of snake-oil salesmen, and their bad behavior remains consistent until a thoroughly unpersuasive epilogue.

They do not learn; they do not respect even their so-called best friends; they lack sense — common, good or any other kind — and carry on like spoiled children.

All of them. All the time.

Normally, such misanthropic behavior would be held up for low comedy, as was the case with Apatow's The 40-Year-Old Virgin or Knocked Up, both of which blended hilariously coarse dialogue with a sweet romantic underbelly. We tolerated and laughed at the former because the latter was a satisfying payoff: Steve Carell genuinely fell in love, Katherine Heigl did right by her unborn child.

Funny People, in great contrast, overflows with so much contrived melancholy and faux poignance that it becomes the sort of purple melodrama that Tom Servo and the 'bots from Mystery Science Theater 3000 would have roasted with glee.

Worse yet, this film gives us no satisfaction: nothing to be pleased with, as the lights finally rise after 146 interminable minutes.

G-Force: Furry frolic

G-Force (2009) • View trailer for G-Force
Three stars (out of five). Rating: PG, for mild rude humor and cartoon violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.30.09
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Although little more than a trumped-up Saturday morning TV movie with delusions of big-screen grandeur, G-Force certainly will be loved by the small fry who represent its target audience.

Parents also will appreciate the child-friendly content, although they're likely to doze off a few times themselves. Unlike the family films that come from Pixar, as just one example, adults will find little to embrace here: no clever sight gags, and certainly nothing deep in the storyline.

With their careers on the line, our gadget-laden guinea pig spies -- Juarez, left,
a sexy martial-arts expert, and squad leader Darwin -- infiltrate a sinister
industrialist's home, hoping to access his secret computer files.

After introducing the admittedly hilarious notion of gadget-laden guinea pigs, the screenwriters don't even bother trying for winks and nods by spoofing established spy-flick franchises.

This is strictly simplistic kid stuff.

Mind you, that's not a bad thing; the action set-pieces are colorful and crazed, and the "stars" are cute and cuddly. Young viewers will be kept happily occupied, and they're not likely to worry about the frequently sloppy script's rather glaring lapses of continuity or common sense.

It seems that Dr. Ben Kendall (bearded Zach Galifianakis, also currently on view in The Hangover is a rather amazing scientific genius, having developed the means to communicate with animals — and get them to talk back — while also fabricating way-cool miniature gadgets designed to be used by small furry rodents ... and even houseflies.

For some unfathomable reason, though, this incredible display of intelligence and creativity isn't enough for the FBI, which wants to terminate Kendall's work.

Apparently high-IQ guinea pigs that function as crack espionage agents and manipulate all manner of gizmos isn't impressive enough for Washington. (One wonders what would have caught D.C.'s attention!)

The Ugly Truth: Pretty amusing

The Ugly Truth (2009) • View trailer for The Ugly Truth
Three stars (out of five). Rating: R, for sexual candor and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.24.09
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Although viewers will be 15 minutes ahead of its predictable plot at all times, The Ugly Truth unapologetically recycles overly familiar material into a crowd-pleasing date flick.

Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler have much to do with this film's pleasures; they bite enthusiastically into the sharp-tongued, often amusingly coarse dialogue as mildly erotic sparks fly between them. Chemistry is everything in a film of this nature, and if Heigl and Butler don't quite channel the likes of Katherine Hepburn and Cary Grant, it's not for lack of effort.

The cheerfully vulgar and chauvinistic Mike (Gerard Butler) is everything Abby
(Katherine Heigl) hates in a man, and she's everything he finds predictably
uptight in a woman. Naturally, they wind up working together; just as
naturally, romantic sparks aren't far behind.

Not that this patchwork script — credited to Nicole Eastman, Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith, and feeling as if it has been further "sweetened" by several additional scribes — can lay claim to the rat-a-tat screwball genius of classic 1940s Hollywood romantic comedies. This is derivative material writ large, with a mash-up of The Odd Couple and Cyrano de Bergerac supplemented by 21st century pokes at the Mars/Venus male/female divide.

Even so, Heigl and Butler are quite engaging as (respectively) the Felix and Oscar in this ribald battle of the sexes. Director Robert Luketic has a much easier time whenever his two stars are sniping at each other, and his film noticeably drags when one or the other is absent.

Heigl stars as Abby Richter, the spit-and-polish producer of A.M. Sacramento, a morning talk show struggling for dwindling ratings in the network television market. Abby is old-school; she still believes that viewers are intelligent, and that they want actual news and provocative commentary, Walter Cronkite-style, as opposed to loud-mouthed infotainment delivered in bite-size segments with words of no more than one syllable.

She's something of a control freak as well, but she gets the job done; even her boss acknowledges that. But the product simply isn't getting the necessary ratings, and something needs to spice up the mix.

Off the job, Abby maintains her uptight persona with a succession of failed dates: No surprise, since she micro-manages a restaurant menu order and even brings along pages of "talking points" designed to facilitate a conversation. One wonders how her one-time-only companions manage to last beyond the pre-dinner cocktail.

The Hurt Locker: Explosive drama

The Hurt Locker (2009) • View trailer for The Hurt Locker
Four stars (out of five). Rating: R, for war violence and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.23.09
Buy DVD: The Hurt Locker• Buy Blu-Ray: The Hurt Locker [Blu-ray]


Although not quite the heart-stopper that its previews would suggest, The Hurt Locker certainly is the most absorbing Iraq-based drama mounted thus far by an American filmmaker.

I suspect its success derives from the curious quality of independent film production that automatically confers a level of authenticity so frequently absent from big-budget Hollywood projects, which also usually arrive with partisan agendas. The Hurt Locker has no political axes to grind, except perhaps the observation that young men die in war zones; director Kathryn Bigelow's muscular film seems content to be an intense character drama that dissects its central protagonist much the way he disarms bombs, in order to learn what makes them tick.

The laws of physics involved with a detonated bomb are remorseless, and if a
man is caught within the expanding diameter of concussive force -- even a man
wearing a special ordnance disposal suit -- mere flesh and blood with turn into
pulp. Small wonder, then, that the members of Bravo Company describe
experiencing an explosion as being put "in the hurt locker."

Honest films draw viewers, even when limited budgets preclude splashy advertising campaigns. Somehow, people just know; their collective interest becomes viral. And, judging by the unusually large crowd at the Tower Theater Monday evening — always the quietest night at a movie house — The Hurt Locker will build an impressive audience as it gathers momentum all summer.

Certainly Bigelow and cinematographer Barry Ackroyd (United 93) play up writer Mark Boal's documentary-style approach, often employing the grainy film stock and hand-held camera work that simulate events as they unfold. (Fortunately, Bigelow is savvy enough to minimize this technique, using it only when appropriate, to spare us attacks of vertigo.)

The unfamiliar faces heading the cast also draw us into their characters in a manner that rarely occurs with name-brand stars; the illusion is so complete that it's actually distracting when (for example) Ralph Fiennes briefly pops up, or David Morse's distinctive voice is recognized in another scene (his features obscured behind battle gear).

The time is the summer of 2004, the setting the streets of Baghdad, as patrolled by the Army's elite Explosive Ordnance Disposal Squad: the specialized technicians who search for and attempt to disarm the homemade roadside bombs that threaten Americans and Iraqis alike. Obviously, the job is dangerous enough on its face; it becomes exponentially worse — maddeningly suicidal — because these young soldiers are at constant peril from insurgents waiting with rifles or detonators, who hope to blow the bombs at the most inopportune moment.

We meet Sgt. J.T. Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) and Specialist Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty) of Bravo Company during a prologue, which establishes the film's central plotline and demonstrates the armored, spaceman-style suit worn by the man who gets up close and personal with each deadly device.