The Screengrab : talladega nights

Trailer Review: Brüno (Red-band)

Paul Clark — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 16:00:00 GMT

I believe that Sacha Baron Cohen may be the most talented comic currently working, and that his performance three years ago in Borat is one of my favorite performances of the decade. Which makes this red-band trailer for Baron Cohen’s latest, Brüno, doubly disappointing- despite all the outrageousness on display, I didn’t laugh once the first time I watched it, and just to be sure I wasn’t just in a bad mood, I watched it again the next day, again without a laugh. Of course, it doesn’t help Brüno may be the least funny of the regular characters from Da Ali G Show. Say what you will about Borat being a caricature, but what really sold the character was less the strange situations he got himself into than his seeming over-eagerness to please in spite of it all. Brüno, on the other hand, is mostly just a mincing stereotype who tries to make people uncomfortable with his unmistakable gayness- which is fine, but the joke only goes so far, and I fear that Sacha Baron Cohen may have overextended it. Still, I have high hopes for his future cinematic projects- the guy is seriously talented, and even in other people’s projects he makes a big impression (he’s a scream in Talladega Nights). And I have a feeling that if some adventurous filmmaker found the right semi-dramatic role for him, he could knock that out of the park too.

April Fools: The 35 Funniest Movie Characters Of All Time (Part Three)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 21:00:00 GMT

WILL FERRELL AS RICKY BOBBY IN TALLADEGA NIGHTS: THE BALLAD OF RICKY BOBBY (2006)

Will Ferrell’s Anchorman may be more absurd, but Talladega Nights is still the SNL alum’s greatest big-screen achievement to date, a NASCAR-set bit of lunacy that mocks American culture while simultaneously exhibiting fondness for it. Via the character of Ricky Bobby, a nitwit car-racing star, Ferrell manages to send up our national gluttony and materialism, as well as Southern political and social conservatism, with a no-holds-barred goofiness that’s nonetheless underscored by affection for his redneck milieu and its inhabitants. To keep things evenhanded, Sacha Baron Cohen’s aggressively homosexual French F-1 champ Jean Girard provides a hilarious caricature of liberalism. It’s Ferrell’s titular clown, however, that truly embodies the film’s fair-minded attitude, his Ricky Bobby an egotistical good ol’ boy whose jingoism is as inane as his predilection for saying grace to the baby Jesus – an extended bit that gets funnier with every subsequent viewing – and yet whose me-first ridiculousness is laced with a childish kindness that makes him both an embarrassing and endearing personification of 21st century southern America. (NS)

CHEVY CHASE AS CLARK GRISWOLD IN CHRISTMAS VACATION (1989)

While the original remains the most popular, and European Vacation is probably the funniest, the Vacation series’ most heartwarming entry was 1989’s Yuletide saga, in large part because its holiday setting provided Chevy Chase with the best opportunities to convey not only Clark Griswold’s buffoonery, but to root that silliness in his deep, abiding love of family and tradition. In this second sequel, Clark’s homestead is invaded by parents, in-laws and the clan of Cousin Eddy (Randy Quaid), and this raft of supporting players – which also comes to include the Griswold’s prissy Yuppie neighbors (Nicholas Guest and Julia Louis-Dreyfus) – helps take some of the comedic burden off of Chase. Despite surrounding him with talented co-stars, however, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation’s spotlight nonetheless remains squarely on its headliner, whose pratfall skills are in fine form, and whose sympathetic embodiment of his well-intentioned doofus patriarch – aggravated by his kin, disappointed over not receiving the work bonus he was counting on, and tormented by a squirrel let loose in his abode – lends the manic, messy proceedings real warmth. (NS)

PAUL REUBENS AS PEE-WEE HERMAN IN PEE-WEE'S BIG ADVENTURE (1985)

Too much fun in a porn theater may have destroyed Paul Reubens' career – and, consequently, the life of his iconic Pee-Wee Herman character – but his 1985 big-screen debut, helmed by first-time director Tim Burton, stands up as a perfectly realized idiosyncratic original. In this fanciful, carnival-esque saga, Reubens' strange-talking man-child Pee-Wee embarks on a cross-country odyssey to recover his beloved red bike, which he believes was stolen by his rich, spoiled, nasty neighbor Francis (Mark Holton). Even on his first feature, Burton’s flair for crafting strange, wild, wondrous visions was in full effect, as was Danny Elfman’s aptitude for offbeat scores. Nonetheless, it’s Pee-Wee who cements his place in the film-comedy pantheon. From the colorful, gadgety confines of his home (where he chows down on some Mr. T breakfast cereal), to the Alamo (whose basement he foolishly hopes to investigate), to a roadside bar where he famously displays his dance moves while surrounded by a horde of nasty-looking bikers, Pee-Wee proves himself a one-of-a-kind weirdo whose irrepressible cheer is infectious, and whose childlike innocence is endearing. (NS)

ALBERT BROOKS AS ALBERT BROOKS IN REAL LIFE (1979)

Albert Brooks has built a career – and a pretty fine one, if you ask us – out of portraying himself as a complete jerkoff. Even when he’s not playing a fictional character who’s kind of a schmuck, he’s kind of a schmuck: the “Albert Brooks” he plays in his films is a rampaging egomaniac who’s completely oblivious to how he comes across to people. Nowhere is this better realized than in his first full-length feature as a writer and director, 1979’s Real Life. This criminally underseen comedy, which brilliantly anticipates the reality-TV craze of 20 years later, sees Brooks playing himself as a desperate-to-please filmmaker who decides to film a normal, average American family; the comedy lies in the fact that he quickly assesses that the moviegoing public will be bored stiff by normality and averageness, and immediately sets about interfering with their lives for entertainment value. Unsurprisingly, this ruins the experiment, and starts to ruin the family’s life as well – but right up until the very end (where he hits upon the brilliant idea of burning their house down in order to provide his disastrous movie with a suitably exciting ending), Brooks is completely blind to the fact that the only thing wrong with his movie is that he’s the one making it. “Albert Brooks”, as portrayed by Albert Brooks, is so fine a portrait of a self-absorbed Hollywood phony it must have made Robert Evans blush.

CHICO MARX AS BARAVELLI IN HORSE FEATHERS (1932)

Although we’ve chosen his role as Baravelli in the campus comedy Horse Feathers as representative, it’s really just a stand-in for any Chico Marx performance. In the Marx Brothers’ films, Groucho’s role was to be the anarchist, the fly in the ointment, the wild card who refused to play by society’s rules and hilariously wrecks the smooth running order of things; Chico’s role was to do the same thing – only to Groucho. Often stereotyped as the dimwitted punster, Chico’s roles went far deeper than that: he was a true comic foil to his younger brother, reminding him that he couldn’t always win, that there was always someone there who could outhustle even the great Groucho – even if it was by playing dumb. Groucho was the subversive riddle that brought down authority, and Harpo was the dynamite bomb thrown right in the middle of the room, but Chico was a Chinese finger puzzle: it looked so simple, but once you were caught in it, no matter how smart you were, you couldn’t get out. Nowhere is that more clear than in the famous “Tutti Frutti” scene in Horse Feathers, where a supremely confident Chico prevents a slow-burning Groucho from betting on the horse he wants to win. It’s one of the greatest examples of pure comic timing ever captured on film.

Click Here For Part One, Two, Four, Five, Six, Seven & Eight

Contributors: Nick Schager, Leonard Pierce

Pat Hingle, 1924 - 2008

Phil Nugent — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 16:00:00 GMT

Pat Hingle, who died this past weekend at the age of 84, was one of the most familiar and dependable of all American character actors, over the course of a career in film, TV, and the stage that spanned some fifty years. Born in Denver, Colorado, he served in the navy during World War II and studied acting at the University of Texas. In the first several years of his career, Hingle appeared in the Broadway productions of Tennessee Williams's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (as Gooper, father to the no-neck monsters), Archibald Macleish's J.B. (in the title role), and William Inge's The Dark at the Top of the Stairs (for which he received a Tony nomination). He also made his movie debut (not counting an uncredited small role in On the Waterfront) in the 1957 Method melodrama End as a Man (A.K.A. The Strange One, based on a play that he had also appeared in. Hingle was offered the title role in the 1960 Elmer Gantry, but before the film started shooting, he suffered a horrendous accident, falling more than fifty feet down an elevator shaft. He was laid up for more than a year recovering from his injuries, which included a fractured skull, his left leg broken in three places, and the loss of a finger. Elmer went ahead with Burt Lancaster , who won an Academy Award for it. Hingle maintained a good-natured attitude towards the whole thing: ""I know that if I had played Elmer Gantry, I would have been more of a movie name. But I'm sure I would not have done as many plays as I've done. I had exactly the kind of career I had hoped for. And I never, never forget that I'm the recipient of the blessing that is life. It was given to me to try again."

Hingle returned to work looking older, gruffer, squatter, and craggier: an easy casting call for authority figures at a time when those roles often meant dads who don't understand their kids (as in Splendor in the Grass, where he played the father of Warren Beatty, who was all of fourteen years his junior) or cops who were either crooked or self-righteously brutal or both. He appeared with Clint Eastwood in Hang 'Em High, The Gauntlet, and Sudden Impact, played Sally Field's father in Norma Rae, starred in the original Broadway production of Arthur Miller's The Price, and did an unholy shitload TV, notably playing Colonel Tom Parker to Kurt Russell's Elvis Presley in John Carpenter's 1979 Elvis and Sam Rayburn to Randy Quaid's Lyndon Johnson in the 1987 LBJ: The Early Years.

Unlike a lot of actors who work that much, Hingle has the distinction of having continued to get better, tapping into deeper veins of regret and exposing a streak of wry humor as he started to get almost as old as his characters. Reviewing the 1985 The Falcon and the Snowman, in which he played the hardass FBI-agent father of Timothy Hutton, Pauline Kael wrote, "It's a role Hingle has played dozens of times --he's a pop-culture joke in this role--but I doubt if he has ever done it as well." Five years later, he went to town in perhaps his best movie role, the terrifying cracker crime lord Bobo Justus in Stephen Frears's Jim Thompson adaptation The Grifters, giving Anjelica Huston the shivers and making it seem as if all the secrets to the universe might be contained in the line, "You'll never shit right again." He also played Commissioner Gordon in the 1989 Batman, a role that he would reprise in three other movies, playing it alongside a total of three different different--Batmans? Batmen? Whatever. More recently, he played Ben Franklin in a late-'90s revival of the Broadway musical 1776 and turned up in the movies A Thousand Acres, Muppets from Space, Shaft, and Talladega Nights. He died at his home in Carolina Beach, North Carolina, where he decided to settle after working there shooting the 1986 Maximum Overdrive, Stephen King's directing debut. ""I really do believe there was a divine hand that headed me here," he had told a local reporter.. "I am happy that I think it's going to end here."

Morning Deal Report: Dueling Sherlocks

Scott Von Doviak — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 15:00:00 GMT

As if Guy Ritchie didn’t have enough problems, what with the gossip sheets running wild with rumors that A-Rod is shtupping his wife. Now it turns out that his Sherlock Holmes feature will face competition from Borat himself. Per Variety, Columbia Pictures has announced “an untitled comedy that will star Sacha Baron Cohen as master detective Sherlock Holmes and Will Ferrell as Watson, his crime-solving partner.” According to Columbia president Matt Tolmach, this re-teaming of the Talladega Nights stars is a sure-fire knee-slapper. "Just the idea of Sacha and Will as Sherlock Holmes and Watson makes us laugh…having them take on these two iconic characters is frankly hilarious." Thank you for speaking frankly, Mr. Tolmach. Of course, this is not the first time rival productions involving the same iconic character have gone head-to-head, as we recall from the great Robin Hood war of the '90s. But then, that was a war nobody won.

The cast of Roland Emmerich’s latest rendition of the end of the world is coming together. Triple threat Thomas McCarthy, who most recently wrote and directed The Visitor, will join John Cusack, Amanda Peet and Danny Glover in Emmerich’s 2012. “As an actor, I've never worked on anything with this scale before, and I always go see these movies,” McCarthy tells the Hollywood Reporter. “This does have a big budget and I do make more money, which is nice, but I know if you take a job like this just for the money, you'll be miserable.” Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell it to Nicolas Cage.

Meanwhile, the French hit Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis (Welcome to the Sticks) is being remade not only in America (Will Smith will star for Warner Bros.) but in Italy. Variety describes it as a “heart-warmer about a postal worker forced to relocate to a small town in the north where he can't understand the patois, the food or the many quirks.” We’ll wait for the Portuguese version.

Related:

No Shit, Sherlock: Guy Ritchie Reimagines Holmes
1949 vs. 2012: John Woo/Roland Emmerich Deathmatch!

Trailer Review: Step Brothers (red-band)

Paul Clark — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Given the disappointing box office for Semi-Pro, it’s hard to say how Step Brothers will fare in the crowded late-summer crush, especially since it’s lacking in an easy, audience friendly hook like Will Ferrell’s previous Adam McKay collaborations Anchorman and Talladega Nights. But I’m going to come right out and say it- this looks pretty damn hilarious, at least to me. There was evidence of this in the original theatrical trailer, but here, with the boys free to drop all kinds of naughty words, the raucous R-rated goodness of the movie finally comes through loud and clear. Plus it should go without saying that Ferrell and John C. Reilly have awesome comic chemistry, and that the casting of Screengrab favorite Richard Jenkins is a good sign. I’m not sure how much money Step Brothers will make, but if it flops, don’t blame me- this trailer’s already guaranteed that I’ll be there opening weekend.

Trailer Review: Step Brothers

Paul Clark — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Will Ferrell's high-concept comedies almost always rake in the dough, but overall they're pretty inconsistent. But if one director can bring out Ferrell's broadly comic side while making films of a fairly high caliber, it's Adam McKay. And pairing him once again with John C. Reilly, with whom he had real comic chemistry in Talladega Nights, is a wise decision. Which is why I was a little disappointed that this trailer wasn't funnier. Part of the problem is that the first minute or so feels pretty forced — the concept of the movie is funny, with Ferrell and Reilly as grown men who nonetheless experience the antipathy many young boys feel when they suddenly become part of the same family. But a lot of the gags don't quite work. It's not until they start getting along — "did we just become best friends?" — that it starts getting laughs. Not all of the subsequent gags work either (the brawl with the kids feels too much like a nod to the newscasters' rumble in Anchorman), but these guys work much better together as buddies than as rivals. Besides, it's entirely possible that half the jokes in the trailer won't make it into the movie, considering how much footage ends up getting cut on its way to the theatrical release.

Trailer Roundup: "Semi-Pro"

Paul Clark — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Is it just me, or are all these Will Ferrell vehicles starting to look alike? There's certainly a formula at work here- Ferrell plays a _________ who's forced to prove himself to the world, with hijinks inevitably ensuing. It's a formula that's served him well in movies like Anchorman and Talladega Nights, but it's getting more than a little stale. Heck, there's even a fight between Ferrell and a large animal, just like those earlier movies. Here, Ferrell revisits the 70s in the hope of working some of that old Ron Burgundy magic, only this time on the basketball court. And you know what that means- tiny shorts, garish colors, and headbands? You bet! To Ferrell's credit, he's still giving it his all, instead of simply biding his time until Adam McKay comes calling again. Then again, when even the likes of Blades of Glory can rake in the money, what's the motivation for him to do anything new?