items tagged with Comedies

THE EXPENDABLES 2

If home viewings of The Expendables 2 are one day turned into a drinking game, and I pray that they are, one of the rules has to be that you chug every time the film employs a thudding cliché from the ’80s, either directly or indirectly. A plot involving stolen weapons-grade plutonium? Drink! A team of he-men astonished that a new female recruit can actually do something? Drink! Dolph Lundgren wrestling with a Rubik’s Cube? Drink twice!

THE CAMPAIGN

As the movie’s trailers have been running since what feels like the last presidential campaign, it’s understandable if viewers enter the Will Ferrell/Zach Galifianakis political spoof The Campaign worried that all of the hilarious bits have already been spoiled for them. The wonderful surprise of director Jay Roach’s comedy, however, is that they haven’t – not unless viewers have somehow been privy to a trailer that lasts 85 minutes.

TOTAL RECALL

Beyond its rather stunning scenic design, the best thing about director Len Wiseman’s new Total Recall update is Kate Beckinsale, which is pretty surprising, considering that this admittedly capable, inarguably gorgeous performer really hasn’t been the best thing about any of her previous movies.

THE WATCH

A buddy and I caught a Friday-morning screening of The Watch along with roughly a dozen others, and before the end credits rolled, only four of us were still in the auditorium. Professional obligations were keeping me at director Akiva Schaffer’s comedy and I was my friend’s ride, but for the life of me, I can’t fathom what prevented those other two patrons from bolting. Lethargy? Politeness? Morbid curiosity?

ICE AGE: CONTINENTAL DRIFT

With Ice Age: Continental Drift, we are now four movies into the apparently never-ending 20th Century Fox franchise, and it might finally be time to ask: Has there ever been a less animated animated lead than Ray Romano’s woolly mammoth Manny?