My problem with Team Tropic from the get-go, weirdly, is the ACTUAL black guy. Maybe because black guys in movies are just so unapologetically "black," in the whitey sense that only us white people could imagine such an emasculated side character. (Post Theatrical Sense of Denouement: rapper in an action movie? Checked box. Clichéd reveal of him being gay? Lame. His one moment of actually getting outraged by RDJr's actor crossing the line? Outstanding. Everything else? Pointless.)
Like Ghostbusters, the fourth guy doesn't add any humor. He's just there to comment. But in Tropic Thunder, it reiterates its own redundancy: There's a black guy providing comic relief for the black guy. Because the real black guy has to be ridiculous in order to reassert that it's okay for a white dude "paying a dude disguised as another dude" to be ridiculous in blackface, because even the ridiculous black guy will disapprove. It's okay! Really!
Hey! Tom Cruise is in this movie. Weren't expecting that, were you? I wasn't either. Seriously, I got nothing.
I've talked about Ben Stiller before, that I feel his being an exaggerated character (Royal Tenenbaums, Zoolander, Mystery Men) works better than his "realism" (Meet the Parents/Fockers, Along Came Polly). Here, it's Jack Black who is just overdoing it - he's taking his persona and turning on the high contrast. How else do you explain the tan/hair dichotomy?
This film wins unequivocably because of ONE thing: no hot chicks! Just stupid dudes. We almost don't need Coogan and his nasty-looking teeth to provide plot. We will readily accept the idea of moronic, overinflated actors - because we don't, NEVER care about exasperated directors with bad teeth. We just want to see the people we worship (and spend our money on) to be the subject of ridicule, even if they go a little easy on themselves.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
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