TROPIC THUNDER

Written by Justin Theroux and Ben Stiller
Directed by Ben Stiller
Starring Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, Jay Baruchel and Steve Coogan


Tugg Speedman: Are you really just going to abandon this movie? We're supposed to be a unit.
Kirk Lazarus: Suck my unit.

Hollywood is hilarious. They’ve got agents ready to cover up dead hookers upon demand and actors with mandatory Tivo in their contracts. They’ve even got heads on the ends of rifles and people biting into live bats. Wait. That isn’t funny. It’s just plain dumb. There’s a fine line between crazy funny and scalping a panda you just killed to wear on your head. TROPIC THUNDER never figures out how to walk that line, falling on either side of it for some pretty uneven results.


In his first directing gig since the, and I can’t believe I’m writing this, infinitely more cohesive, ZOOLANDER, Ben Stiller takes a bunch of pampered actors and drop them in the middle of Vietnam so that they can shoot the greatest war movie ever (as if APOCAPLYPSE NOW would just crawl into a ditch with a live grenade or something). It’s funny in theory, sure, but even Stiller drops the concept early in. With the plot left behind, the men are left to trip over each other in the jungle, which is occasionally cool given that Robert Downey Jr. and Jack Black are fine company to keep but mostly it’s just meandering. I think they’re trying to make it home but who cares really when we keep cutting back to a bald headed, furry-chested, Tom Cruise as a Hollywood executive who just loves telling people to (bleep) themselves whenever he feels like. (Seriously though, he’s pretty funny.)


Thank you, Ben Stiller, for showing me just how hilarious Hollywood likes to think it is and for reminding me just how far out of step it is with the rest of the world. One minute, you’re laughing hysterically at them. The next, they’re the only ones in on the joke and they’re laughing all by themselves. Lucky for them, most of their laughing happens all the way to the bank.

Black Sheep Previews: HAMLET 2

HAMLET 2. The concept is hilarious. Didn't everyone die at the end of Shakespeare's timeless classic, you might ask. Well, yes, they did. It was a tragedy, after all. No matter though as this is not exactly a sequel to the bard's work. Nor is it a sequel to the Mel Gibson or Ethan Hawke film versions from recent years. In fact, it is not a sequel at all. The name, HAMLET 2, refers to a musical that is to be performed, and from the looks of the previews, performed very badly, by the hopeful high school students of a Tucson drama club.

HAMLET 2 stars British actor/comedian, Steve Coogan, as a washed up actor who has decided to turn lemons into lemonade by teaching the young about the craft. While this is all very noble, the underlying problem is that he is just as good at teaching as he was at acting, which is to say not at all. Coogan strives to be the kind of teacher that makes students stand up on desks and salute him or rip out pages from great literary classics to follow in his protest but he is far too deep into his own delusions to see that he is a complete mess. His swan song is to be this great musical but all he musters is controversy. I suppose he should have seen it coming with numbers like, "Rock Me Sexy Jesus."

The cast is rounded out by Catherine Keener, David Arquette and Elizabeth Shue (in a hilariously self-referential turn as herself in present day, having left the craziness of Hollywood and started a new life as a nurse at this Tucson school). The potential is in place and with Pam Brady, co-writer of TEAM AMERICA and the SOUTH PARK movie assisting writer/director, Andrew Fleming, the possibility for laugh out loud hilarity is even greater. Who knows? If it does real well, we could be seeing HAMLET 3 before you know it.

HAMLET 2 is in theatres August 22.

Click here or any of the links above to see "Rock Me Sexy, Jesus" and the HAMLET 2 trailer.