Other than a couple of exceptions, I've never been a big fan of Jack Black. He's okay, I guess; School of Rock is pretty good. But, in general, he usually comes off as either trying too hard (Tenacious D) or not trying hard enough (any kids movie role he's ever been in). This definitely falls into the latter category, and while it's certainly not all his fault (there's plenty of blame to go around), that sort of "Eh, I don't care" attitude shows throughout the whole film.
In fact, no one in this movie is really trying. It's pretty much the definition of phoned in; it lazily plods from scene to scene, not really caring much about an overarching plot, or anything other than some cheap jokes. It's all dumbed down to the lowest common denominator so even the most idiotic of little kids can still enjoy it. Granted, the source material isn't the most high brow of stories, but the point stands that peeing on someone's head just can't be made funny.
And that's all there is to it, really. The performances are all pretty lazy, with the slight exception of Jason Segel; you can tell that he's almost trying, although I don't know how his accent is worse than Keanu Reeves's in Dracula, but he pulled it off. Everyone else, however, is just looking for a paycheck, and that's kind of all this movie is: a cheap cash-in adaptation that doesn't try because it doesn't have to. Kids have bad taste.
No comments:
Post a Comment