Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here. First we got in one mediocre review for this film, then we got in a second more positive review. This review, though, made me laugh a lot, and I think it’s the best written of the three. Will I agree with this guy’s take on the film? Beats me... but I certainly enjoyed reading it.
This man Achilles made my heels tingle with his review of Walk Hard. I was at that screening, and have a completely different take on it. Personal bullshit: I graduated from USC last year and I’m already bitter. I write and want to direct. I am a slave to story and character in films. That makes me a shitmuffin in a town of twatwaffles, but hey! End personal bullshit. Beginning ad hominem attacks with no basis in fact: Achilles clubbed a baby seal… with a baby human. When Achilles sleeps (in a bacon suit) he sees Hitler in his dreams – and gives him a high-five. Achilles deserves to be lashed to the front of a leaky schooner and sent into the Aegean Sea with nothing but a starving man-hungry spider monkey and a starving man-hungrier Mandy Patinkin to keep him company. End ad hominem attacks. The screening itself: Located in Burbank, California. There are two AMC Theaters in a two block radius. That is shitty shitty Burbank. Shitty shitty Burbank, we hate you. The length of the movie: Dude hated it, so of course he’s gonna think it’s long. If I have the Trotskis, I don’t care if it’s thirty minutes, it’s gonna feel like I’ve had thunderous fireshits all the live-long day. I think maybe that guy really had to shit the whole time. Frankly if I had an impending date with the porcelain goddess then John C. Reilly, a bad case of the giggles, and a compulsory comment card would ruin my day too. Seriously, though, the movie was actually 1 hour 35 minutes give or take credits. But I didn’t think it sucked, and let’s just say I’m a regular guy, so to each his own as far as colorectal perception of the space-time continuum goes. The movie: Now, I know it’s tough for some people to discern between this gosh-fangled new-darn “Will Ferrell” comedy and the kind of stuff Judd Apatow and Jake Kasdan normally do/have done so far. Adam McKay and Will Ferrell I see as the new Laurel & Hardy, you know? Very much influenced by surface, riffing on easy shit that’s mostly incidental to a character’s costume or time period or how much doobage the writer-at-hand was riffing that particular minute. You’d be remiss (little remiss sunshine) to not see a difference in the Judd Apatow brand of lolz! His shit, to completely generalize, maintains not just a certain degree of character development – independent of plotline or time period/woman period jokes – but also a certain quality in the spoofitude of it all. The game in both cases is farce/parody, but Apatow’s productions in particular I find to be far more studied. This results in a more limited audience than a Ferrell-make-haha movie, and anyone is perfectly entitled to not enjoy the comedy. I think the jokes in it and enjoyment of the damn thing as a whole depend on your knowledge of these movies and how much you hate and/or love them. What I loved most about Walk Hard, and the reason I enjoy movies like this is that it’s studied. The dialogue and sequences and even characters in this are funny or goofy or even dumb on their own, but they almost always have an extra layer to the joke in reference to the biopic subgenre - a.k.a. the retarded cousin of Lifetime MOWs that the Academy likes to mercilessly Fatty Arbuckle with golden statues annually. I won’t reference the other reviewer any more in this, but I will say that I think this film oughtta be played in double features with Walk the Line – there are comparisons down to individual shots and character reactions. Of COURSE people will have seen this in other films – that’s the point. It’s a fucking parody, people. Goddamn, could Mel Brooks have gotten a job in this town anymore? I doubt it. Nevermind that I put Judd Apatow and now Jake Kasdan on Mel Brooks’ level in terms of the spot-on structuring and pacing of the big jokes in this. I won’t spoil any of the dialogue in the movie, but almost every cameo – from John Michael Higgins to The Beatles to Elvis Presley – wrestles with the leads for the scene and often comes away with a tie. And the songs – all of which were sung by John C. Reilly and performed by each of the actors instrument-by-instrument are incendiary, especially when Dewey is dragged into the politically conscious 1960’s. I know they’re performed by the actors because the man who fixed my guitar today just happened to have been the music coach for the actors. It’s an incestuously small world, after all. To put too fine a point on it, anyone who dislikes the jokes in this movie either does so because they don’t connect with parody or have a freakish Depp-as-Wonka-creepy love for biopics that commands unerring respect for every second of them. Or they’re blind. I can honestly say the blind may not get this movie. Seriously, I’m not saying someone who dislikes this film “dislikes comedy” or is “stupid,” because they’re not and they probably love comedy just as much as everyone else. And I’m not sure I really need to be soldiering to the defense of this, as I’m sure a lot of folks are going to see it based on the stars/director/producer alone. But I think the hidden audience for this movie and the real source of its staying power (depending on advertising cleverness) is the people who love biopics. It’s smarter than an SNL sketch, and with any luck it’ll have far broader appeal because, again, its jokes and setups are nuanced in a way that people who KNOW these films will recognize and maybe appreciate. Again, I’m not gonna go through the plot or bitch and moan about five frames that could’ve been cut here or there. It was a work print and some shit is gonna change, but it truly met or exceeded my expectations (which were high). Walk Hard even in this form was fucking hilarious and worth revisiting when it comes out, especially to see what the MPAA gestapoes into the trash bin of some distraught man’s AVID deck for ejaculation on the umpteenth version of the DVD. Finally, I would be saying here that Walk Hard is my favorite comedy of the year. But I have seen Superbad, and it may be the funniest movie I’ve ever motherfucking seen. So, my sincere apology to the producer Judd Apatow, because I found the movie by Judd Apatow to be funnier than the one produced by Judd Apatow. No relation I’m sure. If you use this call me s00p3rm4n, because, uh, that’s my Aintitcool name. And take care dude.
