Talladega Nights 2006
I rented this one with low, but hopeful expectations. I’m sure the producers thought they couldn’t miss by combining immensely overhyped Nascar with the immensely overhyped Will Ferrell. He was funny in Elf, so I was hoping for something like that. This movie was pretty much in line with my expectations, not my hopes. The movie stays entertaining throughout, but if you don’t like the base humor, you will want a lot more. The scenes with the kids threatening their grandparents were probably the only ones that really made me laugh out loud. Other parts brought smiles or chuckles at some nice observation or a one-liner (like when a doctor says an illness is psychosomatic and John C. Reilly’s character says “You mean he can start fires with his mind?” The DVD extras have eight different variations on this, which are all pretty good, and better one after the other.) It’s a story of two idiots, like Dumb and Dumber, and most jokes are at their expense. At about the midpoint the movie gets hung up in its own tedious plot. The main villain, a gay frenchman played by the British Sacha Baron Cohen (who would hit gold with Borat later in the year), is a waste of time. He’s kind of like Jacques Clouseau from the Pink Panther, but a little more offensive to french people. And again, not really that funny.
Anyway, watch it if you must. Some people might love every line of this movie, but I thought it was kind of forgettable. C+.