In his domineeringly post-modern ironic way (there is a twinkle in his eye from the very moment that he starts in to one of his egomaniacle impersonations), Will Ferrell is a truly commanding stage presence. His performances may occasionally misfire (Anchorman, I'm looking at you), but his inner-spirit of jacked-up free-wheeling comedy shines through in nearly every frame of his movies. With his latest, and most blatant, star vehicle Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, Will Ferrell has perhaps made the greatest movie of his career...or at least the funniest.
Written by Ferrell and directed by Anchorman header Adam McKay, Talladega Nights is a nearly hypnotic satire that in its very stabs of American Goodness, worships it. The movie succeeds because at the end, through all the ridiculous hoo-blah, you are rooting for Ricky Bobby, a NASCAR driver who Ferrell plays with all his old-quirks and some blazing new passion.
Ricky Bobby (Will Ferrell) is at the top of the NASCAR ladder (here it's overgrown from a mere minor American Sport to a near cultist fascination). He has a smoking hot wife (Leslie Bibb), two "adorable" (read: gutter mouth poets) kids, and a best friend (John C. Reilly) who is more than content to let him win every single race. What threatens to usurp him from his throne? The answer is two-pronged - and perfectly suited to an age where The O.C. has made irony ironic. It is a gay Frenchman (Sacha Baron Cohen) who knocks Bobby down to size but it also Ricky Bobby's inner-awakening, his veins are slowly coming to truly pulse with the old-fashioned American-ism!, that proves troublesome. The one-two punch is too much and Ricky Bobby leaves racing a sad sack of a man who's ever increasing bag of troubles are pulled of with sly panache by McKay.
Though his redemption is the plot of the movie, it his the sense that nothing here is truly being mocked - save for the utterly fake spirit of NASCAR coolness - that is the film's feel-good triumph. In the spirit of a Christopher Guest spoof, McKay and Ferrell are as much in love with their almost-always-funny jokes (and here in this oversized man-boy playground of plastic consumerism, everything is joke material for a good satire) as they are the impassioned hearts of their characters. In truly inspired trick after trick the movie manages to one-up itself in a dizzying uproar of laughter and glee. You may leave wishing to have tasted a more complete flake of a comedic treat, but I was pleased they took the trouble to bake it at all.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment