Comedy

Tag

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  • Title: Tag
  • IMDb: link

Tag blu-ray reviewAs Dodge Ball taught us, grown-ups playing kid games can be dumb but also surprisingly fun. Based on real people, Tag tells the story of a group of friends who has being playing tag for decades. Despite growing up, getting careers, and moving to different cities, the friends continue to play tag one month out of the year in the hopes of finally beating the one member of the group (Jeremy Renner) who has never been “it.”

Our players include Ed Helms, Jon Hamm, Jake Johnson, and Hannibal Buress. Also along for the ride are Isla Fisher as Helms’ wife, Leslie Bibb as Renner’s fiance, and Annabelle Wallis as a reporter who knows a good story when she hears one.

The film isn’t perfect. Renner’s mastery of the game is stretched to a ridiculous degree, and, in much the same vein, the script forces Fisher into some over-the-top uber-competitiveness which is only funny half the time. Still, for a game about tag there is fun to be had.

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Game Night

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  • Title: Game Night
  • IMDb: link

Game Night Blu-ray reviewJason Bateman and Rachel McAdams star in this forgettable comedy as competitive couple Max and Annie who host a weekly game night for their friends Kevin (Lamorne Morris) and Michelle (Kylie Bunbury), and Gary (Jesse Plemons) and his girl of the moment. When Max’s more successful brother Brooks (Kyle Chandler) hijacks game night with an elaborate murder mystery trouble ensues as “coincidentally” Brooks just happens to be kidnapped for real on the same night he hired actors to kidnap him as part of the game. And no one realizes it isn’t a game.

The script by Mark Perez (Accepted, Herbie Fully Loaded) offers some cheap laughs and chuckles, if you can swallow the absurd pretense. Lots of time is given to the relationships of the various couples, but it’s really only when all are involved and the crazy is turned up to 11 (such as throwing a priceless piece of art around a gangster’s mansion) that things get interesting.

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The Death of Stalin

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  • Title: The Death of Stalin
  • IMDb: link

The Death of Stalin DVD review

Very often, comedy comes from tragedy. The Death of Stalin is an unusual film. The political satire set during the days immediately before and after Joseph Stalin‘s (Adrian McLoughlin) death in Russia, the film follows the infighting and backstabbing among Stalin’s most loyal subordinates who maneuver to control Russia following the party leader’s death.

Rather than assemble a Russian cast, director Armando Iannucci brings together a group of primarily English and American actors (including Steve Buscemi, Jeffrey Tambor, Simon Russell Beale, Paddy Considine, and Michael Palin), allowing each to perform in his natural accent. The result only increases the absurdity of the proceedings which is counter-balanced by the darkness of Stalin’s policies.

While being one of my favorite forms of comedy, satire is hard which is the reason so few are made compared to the glut of physical and romantic comedies. Part satire, part political drama, and part farce, The Death of Stalin is an amazing and improbable piece of filmmaking that must be seen to be believed.

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Super Troopers 2

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Super Troopers 2
  • IMDb: link

Super Troopers 2 movie review2001’s Super Troopers may not have broken the box office, but the comedy featuring the Broken Lizard comedy group had definite charm and has earned itself solid cult status over the years. Not nearly as much fun as the original, with a plot more convoluted than necessary, there are still laughs to be had for a film that struggles fighting off sequelitis.

17 years in the making (including relying on crowd funding to help raise money for the film), Super Troopers 2 brings back all the familiar faces of the former Vermont Highway Patrol. Having lost their jobs as state police since the last movie in an often-referenced tragedy involving Fred Savage (which sadly doesn’t offer nearly the payoff one would expect), the group is given a second chance when the Canadian border is redrawn around a single town and the U.S. needs a trained police force to step in.

Most of the sequel centers around our heroes struggling to get along with Canadians who didn’t ask to be Americanized and getting into juvenile pranks with the local Mounties (Tyler Labine, Will Sasso, and Hayes MacArthur) who they are replacing.

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The Cutting Edge

/ / Home Video
  • Title: The Cutting Edge
  • IMDb: link

“Those are figure skates, pal.”

The Cutting EdgeThis week’s Winter Olympics inspired Throwback Tuesday post takes us back to 1992’s sports comedy The Cutting Edge starring Moira Kelly as ice queen Kate Moseley and D.B. Sweeney as retired ice hockey player Doug Dorsey who becomes her unlikely figure skating partner in hopes of winning an Olympic Gold Medal.

After an injury at the previous Olympics prematurely ended his hockey before it began, and with the tempermental Kate unable to make it work with any potential partners, the pair get thrown together for an unlikely Olympic run. Terry O’Quinn and Roy Dotrice round out the cast as Kate’s father and her figure skating coach.

The script by Tony Gilroy (Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Michael Clayton, The Bourne Ultimatum) doesn’t stray far outside on box featuring and odd couple pairing who come together both on and off the ice. That said, there’s certainly some charm seeing two characters, both rough around the edges in their own way, come together. And while the skating is far from Olympic quality, it works well-enough to sell the story.

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