Articles tagged with comedy

Hamlet 2

George Booker — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 19:07:45 +0000

Steve Coogan is doubtlessly one of the finest comic actors working today, notably with such British characters as "Alan Partridge", "Tony Wilson", and "Steve Coogan". These characters are subtle and remarkable bundles of vanity, ineptitude, delusion and contempt. What Coogan is not is a chameleon of the Peter Sellers variety, able to slip seamlessly between multiple accents and physicalities. Coogan's best characters are bottomless pits of neuroses that happen to look and move not entirely unlike himself.

Choke

George Smith — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 12:08:06 +0000

I am a Gigantic Palahniuk Fan: The man sent me a stuffed panda, and a signed two page letter with autographed photo sit hanging above the desk where I write this, so let's get one thing straight from the start: My problem with Choke isn't that Choke Is Not Fight Club.

My problem with Choke is the following:

Burn After Reading

Gary Collins — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 18:08:39 +0000

Less than nine months after their adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's No Country For Old Men collected Best Picture at the 80th Academy Awards, the Coen Brothers return to their usual quirky comedic territory with their latest release, the star-filled comedy Burn After Reading.

Pineapple Express

George Booker — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 12:04:52 +0000

Pineapple Express is a good name for many things. For a stoner movie, which this is, suggesting exotic but mundane fruit and action! Or at least frantic motion. Action with a dash of flavor? Yes. This movie will end fast and taste sweet! It does. If Huey Lewis made an unrepentant stoner anthem, he might call it Pineapple Express. With the News, Huey made that song for this film, and it rings as sweetly over the credit scroll as the Huey of the Back to the Future original soundtrack. The theme is at least as funny as

Hancock

George Booker — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:01:34 +0000

My twelve-year-old self would kick my ass to find how disengaged I am this summer, the Greatest Superhero Summer Ever (TM). Indeed, Hollywood is dropping well developed gems left and right, from the perfectly timed and conceived emergence of Iron Man to the premature dictate that The Dark Knight is a genre-topping masterpiece. Add to that sequel service the recurrences of Indiana Jones and Hellboy, and it becomes clear that geeks should really be happier.

The Ten

George Booker — Sun, 04 May 2008 18:56:25 +0000

The Ten is the second directorial feature from David Wain of the absurd comedy trio Stella. Wain co-wrote this one with Ken Marino, who also appears, as do most of the faces that populated "The State", fondly remembered from their 90s MTV sketch show. Amidst the incestuous cult comedy cast members are sprinkled more "serious" talent such as Winona Ryder, Liev Schreiber and Oliver Platt behaving ridiculously. Its all very fun, and often funny, though it doesn't quite hit the lunatic, giddy rush of Wain's debut, Wet Hot American Summer.

The Darjeeling Limited

George Booker — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 16:05:11 +0000

The Darjeeling Limited does not quite stand among Wes Anderson's best work, but it is a peculiar and beautiful movie. Anderson is one of the finest visual stylists of his generation, and even if familiarity with his set of formalist devices has dulled their novel thrill, his films remain aesthetically sound. After his promising but humble debut, Bottle Rocket, Anderson delivered two classics very early in his career with Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums.

Knocked Up

Lewis Parry — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 23:55:47 +0000

There's something unsettling to how multilayered and complex the simplest of plots can be. Knocked Up does that by being as wholesomely good natured as it is vulgar; being as simple superficially as it is layered in depth. It's not only one of the most innocently raunchy and hilarious films of the decade, but one of the smartest, sharpest, and meaningful. It's a contender for film of the year, and don't take that lightly.

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

Thomas Gillham — Thu, 23 Nov 2006 17:48:40 +0000

Rarely have I been relishing the prospect of a trip to the flicks quite so much. Rarely has chatter at work been so singularly focussed on a new release. Even more rarely, the mainstream press seemed unified in their praise for Sacha Baren-Cohen's creation, Borat: ten out of ten from the Guardian and an eight from the Independent. Only the Times suggested shortcomings, with a non-committal six. Sold out last week, a packed cinema last night, the stage was set.