| The reason I say dollar movie OR cable is that the previews tacked on to this, Bob Saget's directorial debut, are really great. I am very excited about everything coming out except the movie that follows the previews. Are you really shocked? I was a little surprised at how little I enjoyed this movie - it had funny parts, but it was not a funny movie. But Norm MacDonald is funny, I thought. So, sauntering across the lobby without a ticket, I slipped into the sparsely populated theatre with my partner in crime, and settled in to another post-Lorne Michaels mishap. Apparently, any SNL vet is required to use at least 3 fellow alumni in his movies, under pain of turnaround. Why cable? Why not avoid at all costs? I don't know, a weakness. |
| Now, over the past 25+ years that SNL veterans have entered the cinema firmament, many have churned out some respectable product, as we all know. Many have not. A friend of mine recently added one film to my memory banks which I found to be substandard in the same way that Dirty Work was, which is a good germ of an idea, taken through the system quickly, and spit out the other end all tacked together. |
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| Dirty Work has two friends opening a revenge for hire business, which sounds like a really funny movie, but even the good idea gets lost in the random spurts of an actually semi-convoluted (for a movie like this one) plot line. |
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Now, I have loved movies that throw random silliness at you - Monty Python has made the practice into a high art form, but the randomness must be interesting and/or serve the story in some way. Dennis Miller, also a master at pulling disassociativeness out of his butt, manages to tie his stuff all together and make it a post-modern bit of irony. Ben Stiller (safe from Lorne's reaching claw) can take an image we have long forgotten and jab us with it and make us giggle. These men are not involved in this movie. Dirty Work merely annoys and confuses. A comedy, or any movie, must adhere to the rules of the universe it presents us with - even the Weekend at Bernie's movies are more consistent (and, frankly, better staged) - and Dirty Work is a pure hack job. All arc leaps and unrelated images thrown together - maybe the set crew was cracking up, maybe it's all an elaborate inside joke. But throwaway humor has only one end. |
| Bob Saget, clearly ruined by years of Mary Kate and Ashley, not to mention America's Most Painful Videos, operates his set clumsily, interprets his script weakly, and generally makes a mess out of a molehill. |
| It is painful to watch people who I know are funny (anyone you recognize from TV, even Chris Farley, exhibits pain here) muddle through a paycheck. Jack Warden, a respectable comic actor, grumps his way through an embarrassing litany of impotence jokes and a weird irrelevant parentage sub plot. Norm MacDonald helped write the script, I am sad to say, and the incisive bitterness for which I love him so has been replaced by a series of prostitute jokes. Well not jokes per se, just vociferous repetitions of the words "prostitute" and "whore." I don't get it! |
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| Oh it's sad but I guess I am not surprised. Not even disappointed per se, just exceedingly bummed. |
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I don't care if you see it, just don't contribute any money to the studio, please. Stop Saget's career in the DGA while you can.I hate being mean to a first-time director, but it just seems wrong that someone given a good budget (and, to be fair, some really excellent stunt men) would fritter it away in such a manner as this. I suppose I could not do a better job, but that is beside the point, isn't it? I am here to protect your delicate sensibilities and your precious paychecks. |
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