So I've really been taking advantage of this new deal with Blockbuster--I watched like three movies over a 2 day period--then went and checked out 3 more. My eyes are beginning to blur.
1) Anchorman--The Legend of Ron Burgundy. Will Ferrell was a great character performer while he was on Saturday Night Live, and this movie is essentially a 90 minute skit. Now, that can be good (Blues Bros) or bad (The Coneheads). Fortunately, this is a good one. The movie reminds me somewhat of Airplane! in that there are literally so many jokes thrown at the screen over the 90 minutes that, quite honestly, some of them fall flat. The good news however, is that there are enough that hit the mark that this is a very funny movie. Ron Burgundy is a local news anchor in San Diego circa 1973, a time when the local news guy dominated the local scene and was a much higher profile gig than it his now. The problem is that Burgundy is essentially a nitwit, one of those guys who's entire understanding of news is what appears in front of them on the teleprompter (as is displayed in a very funny scene during the film). Ferrell is joined by Christina Applegate, who is proving her self a very nice little film comedienne, but the best scenes in the movie involve Ferrell and (don't laugh)...his dog. Its not necessarily a knock on the film to say that some of the funniest lines in the movie go to the dog. Trust me. ***3/4
2) Napoleon Dynamite--here's a weird little film. Napoleon is a nerdy high school kid who lives in a small town in Idaho and who, like a lot of nerdy kids, gets picked on by the bullies and popular kids at his school. He ends up befriending the new spanish kid in school and helps him in his run for class president. Along the way, Napoleon has to deal with his even nerdier older brother and his more than just a little strange Uncle Rico, who has an Al Bundy-esque obsession with his football glory days back in 1982. This film is not for everyone. There are some genuinely meanspirited characters here, and Napoleon himself isn't the most likeable guy around...but sort of like a fungus--this film kind of grows on you. Half way through the film I was asking myself why I was sitting through it...but at the end I found myself glad that I had. There's a really cute scene towards the end of the film where Napoleon has his sort of "coming out" and in its ownway its a really uplifting scene.
One of the things I really enjoyed about the film was the performance of Tina Manjarino, who plays the girl that Napoleon has a crush on. She is a very good young actress who's someone to watch in the future. *** (but not for everyone)
3) Shaun of the Dead--I gotta be honest with you. I'm not a huge fan of zombie films. Never got into the whole Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead craze.
I did see 28 Days Later, which I thought was a good horror film about zombies.
But I read about Shaun of the Dead and decided to take a chance...especially since it had been describes as a "Zom-Rom-Com", which means it was a "zombie-romantic-comedy". I figured anything that had those 3 things thrown together had to be at least worth a look. Some of the zombie stuff is a tad grisly, but the humor stuff is very funny in parts, such as the scene where Shaun and his best friend are trying to fend off the zombies by throwing old records at them--while Shaun is trying to decide which albums he doesn't want to throw:
"Purple Rain?"
"What...are you kidding? That's a great record!"
"Sign of the Times?"
"Yeah...that's better...throw that one."
Again, this is not a film for everyone. Some will see the whole zombie part and decide their not interested. But its a very black comedy about what happens when a virus that is "not of this earth" wipes out a large portion of the population.
"Do you think he'd mind if I took his Jaguar? I've always wanted to drive it."
In its own warped way, its a pretty good film with some very funny moments.
Especially stick around for the end of the film, which shows what society decided to do with the...um....living dead. (I wouldn't have guessed a game show, but who knows?) ***1/2
Later,
Jeff
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