Man, this snuck out without a lot of fanfare. I saw it today.
It’s probably Gondry’s least-“Gondry” film, but it’s also weirder, longer, and less obvious than the “capital-C Comedy” that it’s being advertised as. There are a lot of double-funny in-jokes for cinephiles and movie fans in general, but there’s a real heart and sadness to the film that comes through in the second half. Still, the “sweded” movies are absolutely gut-busting.
I saw the trailer for this and immediately thought “No thanks”. Is it actually any good or is it just another Jack Black vehicle?
I thought the trailer was absolutely hilarious and am very much looking forward to seeing it.
I am not a big fan of Jack Black but this looks like one of those movies where he actually does fit.
Took my wife yesterday.
Had to live with that decision the rest of the day.
S-L-O-W.
I liked it, she was bored to tears. Yeah, cinephiles wll get more out of it, but…
It looks awesome! I can see it being slow but it just looks great. I can’t wait to see it.
When I saw Jack Black wearing an afro, crying “What’s happened to our 'hood”, I knew that this was a movie I need to see. Hopefully, I’ll get to it this weekend.
Saw it yesterday w/the little brother (well, “little” only in the sense that he’s 23 and actually larger than me, physically).
Very disappointed. As a comedy, it dragged badly. There were some hilarious scenes and some funny dialogue, but they were woefully few and far between. And worse, it had the feeling of a movie that had been severely over-edited to try and “pick up the pace.” As a result, it had a kind of disorienting (to me, at least), herky-jerky pace.
Saw it this weekend and loved it. It’s not a laff-riot comedy, but a funny, sweet, fairy-tale of a movie. I agree with the critic (I think from Slate) who said that at heart, it’s a tribute to the joy of making things with your friends.
Their Sweded version of Ghostbusters alone was worth the price of admission.
Eh. I like Gondry behind the camera, but he really needs to stay away from pen and paper (or a computer).
Also, from what I saw in the trailer, the message bothered me. If they erased all the tapes, and then made their parodies / summaries / whatever-thingies for just the little old lady friend to keep her happy, that would’ve been fine. Absolutely charming and heartwarming. But as far as I can tell, they sell the parodies–there’s a shot of Mos Def stuffing money into a cash register. They’re making money off somebody else’s work, somebody else’s ideas.
If I wrote some fanfic for a show and then sold it as a book, lawyers would be knocking down my door faster than you can “copyright infringement”. The FBI guy is the evil nasty villain in the trailer, only he happens to be right.
I have to admit I was really disappointed.
I love Gondry’s work as a director. That’s what he should stick with, though, because he’s awful as a scriptwriter. There’s really no time spent fleshing out the characters beyond the superficial quirks (in fact, Jack Black basically plays… well… ummm… Jack Black), and the story is really just a series of vignettes rather than a coherent narrative. It’s the same problem that plagues SNL movies - the idea was really great when it was 5 minutes long with one simply punchline, but it just doesn’t stand up to the demands of a full-length feature.
The sweded movies are the real highlight, which is why I was disappointed to see so little of them and so much of Jack Black mugging for the camera (consolation prize - the full versions of the sweded movies are available online, and they’re bloody wonderful). Too bad… good concept, craptacular execution.