Anyone looking at this weekend’s films probably thinks Resident Evil: More Zombies Dying would be the big winner. I thought so too, until I realized that Dane Cook has a film opening. It’s too easy. It’s one-deck black jack with both dealer’s cards up.
Let me start with Resident Evil and get that out of the way. Did you see the first two? Did you like them? Do you want to see that again, but this time in a post-apocalyptic Las Vegas strip? Well there ya go. I’ll grab this on video, not because I particularly liked the others, but I am a big time sucker for post-apocalyptic films. The filmmakers know what they’re doing and they aren’t trying to go out of their comfort zone. Expect more death, more bullets and more crappy one-liners.
Now, for Dane Cook. He’s huge in stand-up. His last album sold more than any comedy album in 15 years. He had an HBO show – sure it was awful and had dismal ratings – but did you have an HBO show? He’s also a terrible comedian, not even really telling jokes, but just making references that his core audience remembers. That’s of course the jokes he actually writes. Here’s a youtube clip juxtaposing three separate Louis CK bits with strikingly similar a Dane Cook bits. If you further feel like following some Dane Cook bashing, then I encourage you, but this isn’t about his stand-up material – it’s about how likely his movie is to be bad.
To me, Good Luck Chuck looks awful. Certainly all of it cannot be blamed on Cook, since he neither wrote nor directed it, but I would certainly be more likely to give it a try with a different lead. Jessica Alba hasn’t really shown any great acting ability, but she sure is pretty, so I have no problem there. This kind of high-concept premise is very common, and often works out despite rarely rising above totally mediocre, but this seems to be one of those times all the laughs are in the preview.
A guy who sleeps with a woman only to have her then immediately find the man of her dreams? Then, the shallow guy meets the girl of his dreams and he can’t be with her for fear of losing her. Really? Is it just me or does that sound like the fantasy of two lonely drunken losers who decided to write a movie.
Let's not even mention Cook's last movie - Employee of the Month. Slacker guy / hot girl who makes him want to be better than he is. Ninety minutes of preening and smirking and...Bah.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Have you seen the original dead series by George Romero? The resident evil themes are almost identical.
Night of the living dead, people get attacked by zombies in an enclosed space. Everyone dies.
Dawn of the dead, people get attacked by zombies. This time the space they're in is a bit larger, they can run around, but overall they’re still trapped.
Day of the dead, post apocalyptic world, where pretty much every human on earth is turned into a zombie save for a few people.
Resident evil just ripped pretty much straight off the dead series. Not saying I didn't enjoy the RE flicks, cause I did, and in fact I'm playing RE4 right now, but none the less...rip off...
I'm right there with you on Good Luck, Chuck. Dane Cook is hysterical in his stand-ups, but I'm just not feeling him as a comedic actor. And Jessica Alba, as gorgeous as she is, does not strike me as the funny type. Even though she supposedly hates being casted as the sexy girl in films, it works for her.
Can't wait to see Resident Evil: Extinction. I wanted to hate the first two movies because I didn't care much for the games, but I really enjoy them.
Mellyagaunce:
The plots are very similiar, and few could deny that Romery single-handedly redefined the Zombie genre and virtually every recent zombie movie ties directly to his work. However, zombies have a Looooong history in film (http://imdb.com/keyword/zombie/) dating back to the 1920's. It's a classic movie villian like vampires and ghosts.
But - Romero did it best - no dounbt at all about that.
I saw the first Resident Evil flick in theaters, and got the second on Blu-Ray for free (as part of a promotion), but haven't watched it yet. I like the franchise, but where the games took a turn for the better (Resident Evil 4 being epically awesome), the movies seemed to take a crazy apocalyptic turn.
On the other side of the post, Dane Cook. I enjoyed him near the beginning of his popularity, but nowadays? He has way too much of the frat boy college crowd, and factor in the aforementioned joke copying... yeah, I'm not too big a fan nowadays. The movie does have some very hot Jessica Alba scenes, which is always good.
Post a Comment