So Many Good Actors Participate In Making The Cinematic Atrocity That Is The Three Stooges.

The Good: Moments of performance (usually by peripheral character actors)
The Bad: Dismal plot, Lack of character development, Nothing superlative in most of the acting, Largely not funny!
The Basics: The modern remake of The Three Stooges is ridiculous, filled with comedic violence and, above all, not funny.


It is a rare thing that I get to use the phrase “perfect shitstorm of craptastic cinematic factors,” but for The Three Stooges, I will pull that phrase out. Following on the heels of Jack And Jill (reviewed here!) sweeping the Razzies, Project X has some competition for next year’s anti-award’s show in The Three Stooges. The Three Stooges is, as one might suspect from the trailers, that bad. What is worse than the film being bad in the areas of plot, character and acting is that the film is not funny. For an alleged comedy to go so long without making me laugh (for the record, zero laughs in the entire film!), the rest is unforgivable. If you’re going to sacrifice the key elements of a movie – telling a good story, populating it with interesting characters, giving actors a chance to perform in new and interesting ways – the payoff for that needs to be incredible. With The Three Stooges, it is not.

Instead, The Three Stooges is a humorless slapstick adventure that recreates the style and character types of the classic television series The Three Stooges. Recast and modernized for 2012, to a point, The Three Stooges unleashes three dimwits on the audience who are not worth watching at all. And, as the fundamental problem with so much slapstick, far too much of The Three Stooges derives an attempt at laughter out of physical gags that look utterly excruciating. The Three Stooges is like a violent horror movie, without the gore.

Moe, Larry and Curly are dropped off at an orphanage where they are cared for by nuns. They grow up and remain at the orphanage as the maintenance crew taking care of the grounds and the building, usually with many pratfalls and physical altercations that would leave others bloody or dead. When the orphanage is facing foreclosure from financial difficulties, the three adults put their heads together to try to raise the hundreds of thousands of dollars needed to save it. Good fortune seems to smile upon them when they encounter Lydia, who comes at the idiots in a roundabout way to get them to kill her husband. As Larry, Curly and Moe struggle to save the orphanage without murdering their old friend from the orphanage, they find themselves in increasingly more dangerous and ridiculous situations, not the least of which is reality television!

Like the television show that bore its name and the concept, The Three Stooges is far less about a sensible plot with interesting characters and is instead an elaborate set-up for physical comedy that looks painful, ridiculous and/or embarrassing. The Three Stooges lives up to its inspiration in that regard; the movie is filled with slapstick humor, quick physical gags and contrived situations that allow for chaos and ridiculousness. While The Three Stooges may have gotten the physics and speed of such slapstick absolutely right, it does not make for a satisfying movie at all.

Foremost, the characters are, predictably, idiots. But there are films where ridiculous characters can interact with the real world in a way that genuine comedy ensues. The Three Stooges is not that film. Instead, Larry, Curly and Moe are impossible to empathize with and their methods make them uncomfortable to watch. I actually noticed by the fourth time Larry got smacked by Moe that the audience I was watching The Three Stooges with started to shift uncomfortably. While Moe is given some motivation as the leader supposedly looking out for Curly and Larry, the way he treats his peers is reprehensible.

The big mystery for me is how so many talented comedic performers ended up in The Three Stooges. Why Jane Lynch would agree to participate in a film where Snooki is given more promotion than her is a mystery. Similarly, Sofia Vergara is used in a surprisingly listless way as Lydia. Having been watching the early episodes of Modern Family, it is incredibly clear that Vergara has the ability to play both funny and incredibly deadpan. In The Three Stooges, she is used as a vixen, but she uses none of her talents. Vergara could have been swapped out with virtually any Hollywood-good looking actress and the role would have gained or lost nothing.

The Three Stooges hinges largely on Chris Diamantopoulos as Moe. I realized I had only seen Diamantopoulos before on a single episode of Frasier and the truth is his role was utterly unmemorable. As Moe, he plays off Will Sasso’s Curly and Sean Hayes’s Larry well, but outside the trio’s ability to time slapstick gags well, they do nothing to create interesting or even viable characters on screen. Diamantopoulos has Moe carrying a huge amount of anger, but he presents it in a dry, often mechanical way that is hardly an impressive performance.

In the end, it is hard to muster up the enthusiasm to write about such a one-trick pony of a film. But for those who are considering it, the last words you should read on The Three Stooges are these: it wasn’t funny.

For other works with Jane Lynch, please visit my reviews of:
Glee - Season 2
Rio
Glee - Season 1
Shrek Forever After
The L Word - Season 2
Boston Legal
Best In Show

1/10

For other movie reviews, please visit my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing of all the movies I have reviewed!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A One-Line Concept Film Leaves Me Murky On The Message: Shallow Hal

The Good: Decent concept, Amusing moments, Average DVD bonus features
The Bad: Not terribly funny, Predictable
The Basics: A fairly average film based on a decent concept, Shallow Hal does what it promises to do with surprisingly few laughs, but decent enough presentation to warrant a viewing.


When we fall in love, we open up to new experiences. As a lover of movies, music, books and the like, that means that for me, I am opening up to new performers as I fall in love more. In practical terms, this means that I am giving Jack Black and his movies a second look. I have largely been in the Family Guy camp that Black's movies tend to be like their parody "The Unconventional Butler" and I have not lost much sleep on the idea that I had not seen many films starring Jack Black. In fact, the only movie that comes instantly to mind that I have seen of Black's is Cradle Will Rock (reviewed here!) in which he has only a bit part.

So when my love recently sat through Magnolia (reviewed here!) with me, I felt I should show interest in some of the films on her shelf. Truth be told, Shallow Hal was one I had heard mixed reviews on and still had some desire to see. Yes, falling in love is a good reason to see movies you might otherwise be on the fence about.

Hal Larson is a middle management type who is passed over for promotions and advancement at his job, so he spends his nights cruising the bars trying to pick up drunk, hot chicks. He and his lone friend, Mauricio, keep a running tally of the play they are getting and compare notes, seeking only vacuous relationships based on sex. It is doubtful either one has ever had a meaningful relationship, much less actually scored with the women who tend to be indifferent at best to them.

After floundering in this manner for a while, Hal meets success guru Tony Robbins, who gets trapped with Hal in an elevator. After hours of therapy with Robbins, Hal is brainwashed by Robbins to see inner beauty as stereotypical physical beauty. The result is that Hal begins to see beautiful women everywhere, who Mauricio is shocked about due to them not being the physical specimens Hal claims them to be. This culminates in an awkward meeting between Hal and Rosemary, who is leery of Hal's advances, but soon comes to see he is being genuine. As Hal and Rosemary - who happens to be the boss's daughter - get closer, Hal falls in love with her more, much to Mauricio's annoyance, as all he sees is a three hundred pound woman.

Shallow Hal is a remarkably simple, average comedy that is plagued by one severe conceptual problem. I can live with the way the film hides all the fat jokes by having the stick-figure Gwyneth Paltrow be the one on camera drinking up the giant milkshake and making the giant splash in the pool. Shallow Hal is borderline on how it views fat people, opting for the noble theme of inner beauty is more important than outer beauty . . . sort of.

Inner beauty is seen by Hal as Hollywood external beauty. That is the one-line concept of the film. Once you get that the reason Hal wants to score with Rosemary is because she looks like Gwyneth Paltrow and that she looks like Gwyneth Paltrow because she is altruistic, kind and funny, you pretty much get the entire film. But where Shallow Hal falls down is that the reversal is not true.

Hal sees women of charisma and spunk as Hollywood beautiful. What fails to hold in the film is that Hal does not see vacuous, trendy lousy personalitied people as ugly. So, in other words, only the people who are fat and nasty would be seen by Hal as ugly. Everyone else is Hollywood beautiful in his eyes. This is what I don't buy about Shallow Hal. In order for the concept to work, he should have seen someone who is Hollywood beautiful, but mean, nasty and vain as a leper. He does not. Instead, men and women alike who are endowed with a good personality are seen by Hal as Hollywood beautiful. In effect, all Tony Robbins' spell does is level the playing field for non-Hollywood beautiful types.

That gargantuan hole in the concept left me feeling underwhelmed by the movie. But what brought Shallow Hal back up to average territory in my schema was the other psychological aspects surrounding the people Hal comes to see as beautiful. So, for example, what might seem like a cheap fat joke - when Hal meets Rosemary's mother and comments on how Rosemary must get her figure from her mother - actually makes a decent sociological statement. Why do we only see the benefit of heredity when the result is stick-figure thin? After all, there is no less a genetic connection between two portly people and if one likes a robust, curvy woman, why must that be taken as an insult?

But even better in the film is how Hal's treatment of Rosemary opens others up to the rotten way they have treated her in the past. Yes, glorifying your non-stereotypically beautiful lover and treating her like she is every bit as beautiful as the women on magazine covers can change the world. It illustrates to parents - like Rosemary's mother and father - just how unsupportive they have been to their daughter, who works hard and does some amazing things with her life and time (like volunteer work and charity work).

This - and Mauricio's character arc - are the redeeming messages of the film. Shallow Hal attempts to reteach what we ought to have mastered in grade school, that being nice to people is a good thing and that personality is more important than looks. Mauricio's character arc in the movie is obvious - he realizes just how shallow he has been and how he truly screwed Hal over by taking the whammy off Hal after he has fallen in love with Rosemary - but it is still a worthwhile one. I suspect I would have been vastly more disappointed had Mauricio not learned any lesson at all.

That said, Shallow Hal is much more of a concept film than a character one. Rosemary is as much a stereotype as Hal, with her large but jolly nature and altruistic ways. Hal seems to run into the nicest fat women in the city, but none of the mean, angry bitter ones (who should still look terrible to him). Rosemary is the stereotype of the jolly fat (wo)man. Just as Mauricio and Hal are the loser cruisers who are clearly just out for sex, Rosemary is more a type than an actual and actualized character.

That said, the role of Rosemary is a decent one for Gwyneth Paltrow. She is allowed to play with her shy, understated side and that works well, especially compared to the more forceful and obviously strong women she has played in the past. Paltrow has a great physical sense when she plays meek or shy and the role is well-developed by her.

As for Jack Black and Jason Alexander, who play Hal and Mauricio, one wishes that they could endorse the roles as great acting on the part of either one of them. Black does a good job, not overemphasizing his usual manic on-screen nature. But Jason Alexander is presented here as more a bit of decent casting than great acting. There are far too many similarities between Mauricio and Alexander's famed character George Costanza to see Alexander as doing much more than reprising his best-known role in some crucial scenes. Alexander does open up the body language of Mauricio more than George ever did, so there is that, at least.

That said, Shallow Hal is a decent Sunday afternoon movie. When you're done running errands and want to sit and watch something and be entertained, this movie will fit the bill. It is not a great film of enduring quality that holds up over hundreds of viewings, but it is entertaining and it works well to make the point it sets out to make. And with that, I shall return to my smoking hot fiance, uncaring of whether it is her physical beauty or personality I am seeing!

For other works featuring Gwyneth Paltrow, please visit my reviews of:
Contagion
Glee: The 3-D Concert Movie
Glee - Season Two, Volume 1
Iron Man 2
Iron Man
The Royal Tenenbaums
Bounce
Shakespeare In Love

5/10

For other film reviews, please be sure to check out my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing of all the films I have reviewed!

© 2012, 2008 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Hall Pass Might Not Be The Hangover, But It Is A LOT Of Fun!

The Good: Very funny, Moments of acting
The Bad: Characters follow very predictable arcs, Jokes are better than the whole.
The Basics: Hall Pass has charm and is funny, but many of the jokes work as well independent of the movie, which strains very hard to keep itself together and be fresh.


March is finally here and with it comes movies that might not necessarily suck.  I say that as I sit to review Hall Pass, which my wife and I took in last night because it was the final big film of the February Doldrums and it did not, rather nicely, suck.  February tends to be a dumping ground for terrible movies, but Hall Pass actually amuses more than it disappoints, which is probably why it is doing so well with critics and moviegoers.  But while I am able to recommend Hall Pass, it is tough to do so when March's early blockbusters are right around the corner.  Hall Pass is a fun flick, but it's not one that truly uses the canvass of the big screen especially well.

Hall Pass is exactly what it appears to be; a "guys night out" comedy flick which, ironically, my wife laughed at more than the five frat boys with whom we shared the theaters.  The humor is generally relationship and gross-out humor, as one might expect from Peter and Bobby Farrelly and their writing partners for the film, Pete Jones and Kevin Barnett.  The film is a big step up from last year's Hot Tub Time Machine (reviewed here!) which fills the same essential niche and was released around the same time.  But for those who are looking to go out to the movies to see something essential on the big screen, it is easy to pass Hall Pass by.  This probably could have been a straight-to-DVD release and not lost any real effect.

Rick and Fred are best friends living in suburbia as a realtor and insurance agent, both married to great women who don't understand quite why their eyes stray, even if they never cheat.  Inspired by a doctor friend of theirs, Maggie and Grace consider giving their men a "hall pass," a week off from marriage.  The idea is that because they married young, they didn't have the chance to "sow their wild oats" or they have forgotten the pain and rejection of dating their marriages saved them from.  So when the guys are touring a rich associate's house and end up on camera insulting the daylights out of all their comrades, the Maggie lets Rick out of their marriage for a week.  Shortly thereafter, after an embarrassing incident with the police and his car, Fred gets a hall pass from Grace as well.

With Maggie and Grace out at Cape Cod for a week, Rick and Fred begin to check out the social scene. The early days of their hall pass are spent dining well and falling asleep, getting wasted on pot brownies and getting rejected.  But as the week comes to a close - and the women find temptation in the form of a traveling baseball team on the Cape - Rick makes a move on Leigh, the barista at a local coffee shop and Fred falls into an initially appealing situation which takes a bizarre turn.

Right before watching Hall Pass, my wife described Why Did I Get Married? to me.  She described that movie as a film about a bunch of guys who sit around kvetching about how bad their wives are and wishing for the good old days of being single.  By the end of the movie, they apparently realize how great their wives are and take it all back.  Before seeing Hall Pass, we pretty much figured that would be what the flick was and it was.  The only substantive difference seems to be that Hall Pass opens with two guys who truly love their wives and who don't seriously consider cheating; they just want a little more sex in their lives, so they look at and think of other women from time to time.

Thus, it is pretty surprising it takes until late in the movie before Maggie realizes just how the idea of the hall pass is working for her and not for Rick.  Rick and Fred are exactly as hapless as Grace originally predicts and watching them becomes more painful than actually entertaining.  Their foibles are hardly as funny or even interesting as the setup insinuates it might be.  Instead, this is a film where the guys try to be something they are not and it becomes gutwrenching to watch in the middle act.  Fortunately, the big finish is worth sticking around for and the scene midway through the closing credits finally gives Steven Merchant a time to shine.  But in between, Hall Pass goes from being a relationship comedy to a pretty lame buddy comedy film and it is unsurprising that the laughs fall off for almost a half hour in the middle.

Ultimately, Hall Pass does not stand up as an even noteworthy character study largely because the characters travel along surprisingly predictable lines.  Rick is loyal like he appears at the outset, but curious about what might be available to him and Fred is jusy lame on the singles scene.  They are ably played by Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis, respectively.  Neither gives a particularly surprising performance, though Owen shows depth one usually associates with Luke Wilson as Rick has the epiphanies about his relationship with Maggie that his character made explicit pretty early on in the movie.

Hall Pass is dominated on the acting front by the strength of the supporting performances.  Steven Merchant is charming in his usual goofy way as Gary and Jenna Fischer and Christina Applegate give solid supporting performances.  But when Richard Jenkins finally appears as Coakley, that is when Hall Pass illustrates some genius in the casting department.  Jenkins, who usually plays dignified and articulate is perfectly smarmy as Coakley and he steals the late scenes of Hall Pass with no real effort.

There is enough in Hall Pass to enjoy, but it is not much more than an HBO-style comedy for the big screen.

For other films in theaters, check out my reviews of:
I Am Number Four
Unknown
The Green Hornet
Black Swan

6.5/10

For other film reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011 W.L. Swarts.  May not be reprinted without permission.

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