Robert Downey: Our Generation's Al Jolson
Tropic Thunder
Directed by Ben Stiller
Dreamworks Pictures, 2008
By Rachel West
I’m often suspicious of free preview screenings thrown by the studios and distributors. I’ve seen my share of the great (Into the Wild) and the not-so-great (Vantage Point). It’s always a gamble on whether the movie will be worth the time spent sitting in the darkened theatre, with a mix of special guests, contest winners, and the occasional members of the press. But a free movie is a free movie, right? But my suspicions were confirmed with a free screening of the new Ben Stiller vehicle, Tropic Thunder.
Stiller splits his time behind and in front of the camera as Tugg Speedman, part of a group of hot actors shooting a war film on location in the jungles of Vietnam. The all-star cast for this modern Platoon boasts Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr.), a hardcore Australian method actor who has undergone controversial “skin tinting” procedures in order to play African-American Sgt. Lincoln Osiris, and Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black) who is best known for his comic skills and multiple-role performances in low-brow comedies. Rounding out the cast is Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson), an up and coming actor more concerned with his side projects like his Alpa Chino Chinos line of pants and pushing his energy drink, Booty Sweat. Nerdy young actor Kevin Sandusky (Jay Baruchel) rounds out the jungle cast.
Part satire and part slapstick, Tropic Thunder can’t seem to pick a direction to follow. At times it is a tongue-in-cheek satire of Hollywood phonies, and at other times it is nothing more than fart jokes and pratfalls. Much like the film within a film, it’s completely lost.
Tugg Speedman, a washed-up actor who hasn’t had a hit since Scorcher III, is so involved in filming and out-shining his five-time Academy Award winning co-star Kirk, that he fails to realize his crazy director Damien Cockburn (Steve Coogan) has dropped the cast into a real, live war zone in the poppy fields of the Golden Triangle. What Tugg imagines to be a guerilla-style film shoot turns into a hotbed of action against drug runners. It’s “reel” guns versus real guns. With the help of the on-set special effects guy who has rigged movie explosives, and the on-set writer (Nick Nolte), the band of actors manages to hold their own. They might be up against trained guerillas, but as Lazarus points out, they’re trained actors.
Joining the cast of fakes is a bunch of A-List stars in cameos and supporting roles. Everyone from Jon Voight to Lance Bass pops up on screen at one time or another, with a slick Matthew McConaughey as Tugg’s all-star agent, determined to deliver his top star a Tivo, come Hell or high water. The real scene stealer here is Tom Cruise. Yes, that Tom Cruise. And he’s genuinely funny, in a non-couch jumping, Scientology-rhetoric spewing way. Almost unrecognizable under a bald cap, pudgy skin, and ample arm and chest hair, Cruise has the best expletive-filled lines in the film as Les, the billionaire mogul who is producing Tropic Thunder.
Stiller has already proven that he is a competent director, even if it has been several years since his last stab at directing with 2001’s Zoolander, and his on screen antics are par for the course. Jack Black outdoes himself with what might be his most obnoxious performance to date. Luckily, Black shares the screen with Robert Downey Jr., who is on a roll this year after turns in Iron Man and the less widely seen Charlie Bartlett. While there has been mild controversy over his character in the film — a white actor essentially performing in Blackface — his performance is not meant to be seen as a racist stereotype, but a satirical look at those intense method actors who will go to any length to get into their character (think Daniel Day-Lewis) and believe that they can be molded into any role. Downey Jr. is the cause of many of the films laughs, and like a true method actor, seems to have been absorbed into his role as “a guy playing another guy”, to quote Kirk Lazarus.
As an action-comedy, Tropic Thunder isn’t a bad way to recover from the summer heat waves in an overly-air conditioned theatre, but don’t go looking for anything more than a chance to escape and give your brain a break. The film-within-a-film gets an A for its all-star cast, but the overall experience is a C at best.
Tropic Thunder opens August 15th in wide release.
I totally disagree with your lukewarm reception of this film, I thought it was absolutely brilliant, and is a must see for anyone interested in films because of how it acts to deconstruct several genres. I think you can admit it’s an ambitious film to attempt, and I applaud it.
However it’s Tom Cruise’s intrusion that is the only downside on the picture, it goes way too far and becomes an exercise in pandering to what Cruise thinks is funny, and not what is best for the movie.
Again, love the movie.