Is the Gervais Craze Over?

Review: The Invention of Lying

2 stars

I must say I'm rather disappointed by Ricky Gervais’ lacklustre directorial debut.

There are only so many mistakes a comedian can make before they lose momentum and fade sadly away. How far along this path of mediocrity they may tread without causing permanent career damage depends on the heights their previous work has reached. Luckily for Ricky Gervais, the first phase of his career was an unblemished period of comedy genius, giving us two of the best sitcoms of the century. And now, as he stumbles through the Hollywood phase of his career, he is beginning to run out of good will. This poor film serves only to deepen my sense of disillusionment.

After his supporting role in Night at the Museum was followed by the lead in the enormously cheesy rom-com Ghost Town, Gervais needed this one to be at least a solid comedic effort. It is not.

The premise of The Invention of Lying, as you might infer from the title, is that there is a world where the concept of lying does not exist. As such, Mark Bellison (Gervais) suffers constant jibes about being fat and small from brutally honest associates. The idea of a completely truthful society is executed well at times, with the occasional funny moment. However, the main joke is pretty familiar territory: Gervais sits there looking uncomfortable whilst other people describe how unattractive they find him, or how stupid he looks. This particular joke persists throughout, and gets tiresome rather quickly.

Plot comes in the way of a flimsy romance story between Gervais and the glamorous Anna (Jennifer Garner). This, however, is entirely dull and does little to provide warmth or comedy.

One scene in particular kills the film off completely. You’ll know it when it comes because it is unforgivably corny. Much of our investment in the film hinges on that scene and it’s just disastrously poor. Gervais, talented comedian as he is, is not a believable serious actor, or at least not yet.

The most entertaining thing about this film is genuinely the cameos. Rob Lowe and Jonah Hill are integral members of the supporting cast who help to keep the film alive, whilst Philip Seymour-Hoffman and Ed Norton’s more subtle appearances are enjoyable distractions. Shaun Williamson and Stephen Merchant are given a token few seconds and though they deliver their lines well, their appearance is a pointless indulgence.

There are only so many mistakes a comedian can make before they lose momentum and fade sadly away. How far along this path of mediocrity they may tread without causing permanent career damage depends on the heights their previous work has reached.

Luckily for Ricky Gervais, the first phase of his career was an unblemished period of comedy genius, giving us two of the best sitcoms of the century. And now, as he stumbles through the Hollywood phase of his career, he is beginning to run out of good will. This poor film serves only to deepen my sense of disillusionment.

After his supporting role in Night at the Museum was followed by the lead in the enormously cheesy rom-com Ghost Town, Gervais needed this one to be at least a solid comedic effort. It is not.

The premise of The Invention of Lying, as you might infer from the title, is that there is a world where the concept of lying does not exist. As such, Mark Bellison (Gervais) suffers constant jibes about being fat and small from brutally honest associates. The idea of a completely truthful society is interesting and sometimes funny. However, the main joke is pretty familiar territory: Gervais sits there looking uncomfortable whilst other people describe how unattractive they find him, or how stupid he looks. This particular joke persists throughout, and gets tiresome rather quickly.

Plot comes in the way of a flimsy romance story between Gervais and the glamorous Anna (Jennifer Garner). This, however, is entirely dull and does little to provide warmth or comedy.

One scene in particular kills the film off completely. You’ll know it when it comes because it is unforgivably corny. Much of our investment in the film hinges on that scene and it’s just disastrously poor. Gervais, talented comedian as he is, is not a believable serious actor; at least not yet.

The most entertaining thing about this film is perhaps the cameos. Rob Lowe and Jonah Hill are integral members of the supporting cast who help to keep the film serviceable, whilst Philip Seymour-Hoffman and Ed Norton’s more subtle appearances are enjoyable distractions. Shaun Williamson and Stephen Merchant are given a token few seconds and though they deliver their lines well, their appearance is a pointless indulgence.

What Gervais does next in Hollywood is vital. Another duff, bland attempt like this will surely kill off his movie credentials. Cemetery Junction, a genuine collaboration with Merchant out next year, will hopefully prove a return to form. If it does not, Gervais may not get another chance.

Indecently Bad

Review: The Proposal
1 star

Yes, I know it’s my own fucking fault for going to see it but for God’s sake sometimes you have to just accept it: if you take your girlfriend to see creepy-little-girl-psycho horror flick Orphan you just aren’t going to get laid.

For anyone who has seen this film advertised (and I refuse to accept there is a single person, sentient animal, or furnished table in the U.K. who has not; it’s actually everywhere) The Proposal is exactly as you expect it to be. In fact, it’s not just as you expect it to be from seeing the trailer; it actually is the trailer. When the hell did this happen? Who gave the folks who produce trailers licence to reveal literally everything that happens in a film in a succinct ninety-second mini-performance? You really gain nothing from going to see this film in the theatres: all the good jokes are in the trailer, all the required characterisation is in the trailer, and just watching the trailer instead spares you paying the best part of £10 to sit and watch a film which goes exactly where you expect it to, at the pace you expect it to, with all the jokes you already know the punchlines to.

Sitting near to us in the cinema was a girl who, and this is no exaggeration, gave a very audible response to everything that happened in the film. It was like having my own personal canned laughter track playing incessantly throughout. All the saccharine love scenes were met, to my right, with a capacious “Awwww!” Sandra Bullock throws a sassy ‘don’t mess with me’ look and she’s like “Uh oh!” Sandra Bullock falls off a boat into the sea and she gasps with shock. Genuinely, she gasped with shock. That scene, like all the scenes of note in the film, is in the bastard trailer. How can you possibly be shocked?

This got me thinking. Why do these films keep being made, and why do people keep going to see them? Well the second question answers the first, I guess: there’s demand for this trash, so the films keep getting made. Fine. But why is there demand? How can people enjoy a film which would be disgustingly predictable anyway even if it hadn’t had its entire plotline revealed in the trailer we’ve all seen?

The girl in the cinema answered my question about halfway through the film when I caught her mouthing along to a particular line, some throwaway joke about towels. This girl had seen this film before, and had clearly paid to come and see it again. Given her knowledge of the frankly forgettable dialogue she may have even seen it more than once prior to this showing. When she walked out (I noticed, on her own) as the credits rolled, I must admit to feeling a pang of sadness; a certain sympathy for her. I realised though, that this experience clearly made her genuinely very happy and as such, to an extent, I envied her. Some people just don’t demand anything more from a film than a happy ending and some easy comedy along the way, no matter how clichéd or predictable or charmless it may be. This girl was the paradigm case of the ‘easily pleased’ cinemagoer. She was not a critic, she was just a consumer absorbing some warm sentiments on a simple journey which made her feel good. People keep going to see these films, and they keep being made, because some folks - perhaps even most folk - are blessed with a lack of cynicism, and for them it's an easy way to soak up, like a sponge, some of the positive emotions which may be lacking in their lives.

On some level, I do wish I could have enjoyed The Proposal as the girl in the cinema so clearly did. But, at the end of it all, as far as I’m concerned, the film was a total pile of wank.

Origins: The beginning of the End For the X-Men Franchise

Review: X-Men Origins: Wolverine

(Note: An old review, obviously.)
2 stars

Some blockbuster action films you see and you think that maybe, just maybe, they were made for art. X-Men Origins: Wolverine is not one of those films. After two sequels the producers have decided to set the ball rolling on a multi-series of prequels. For everyone involved, the franchise really has finally stepped over from credible cinema to the shameful reservoir of stagnant creativity and lazy moneymaking.

The premise for the first Origins instalment is that Wolverine (played with remarkably macho gruffness by the impossibly rugged Hugh Jackman) used to be a little less indestructible and a little more Canadian. As Jackman wanders round chopping trees in his lumberjack’s boots, pouring Maple syrup on his bacon and refusing to fight with the American army, a mad bloke is trying to convince him to re-join his group of superhuman war-winning foreigner-slaughterers.

After several twists and turns involving Jackman’s character and his brother, Sabretooth, Wolverine is eventually ‘born’ as Jackman is transformed through some kind of Cold War military experiment which involves turning his skeleton into metal, or something.

The plot is largely uninteresting and for the most part all you really want is to see Jackman roar, flex his oily muscles and tear the head off the nearest enemy with his death-claws. However, too much of the film is spent trying to get us to understand Wolverine’s emotional journey, a task director Gavin Hood completely fails to accomplish: any scene that isn’t either confrontational or a fight is, unfortunately, utterly corny.
Origins excels only really during its action scenes, which are overall pretty decent. The main thing is that Jackson’s Wolverine is pretty cool and extremely hard. Wolverine and Sabretooth versus a whole army squadron with automatic rifles? No worries. Wolverine versus two tanks and a helicopter? Easy money.

It might lack much originality, artistic merit, decent dialogue, or soul, but if you’ve got an hour and a half to spare, there are worse ways to spend it. The sad thing is that the first two X-Men­ films are actually pretty good. It’s a shame that the producers are prepared to suck dry a series which showed so much promise. If they continue with these prequels then the franchise will doubtless descent further into mediocrity. Oh well, at least we’ll get to see more of Jackman and his sideburns.