I can appreciate a comedy differently. It's suppose to make you laugh, but which it did quite consistently but, when its not making you laugh it really drops the ball. Time wasters are usually in the C- to B- range for me. I couldnt' believe it was only 85 minutes long.

The fight scenes were brilliant. There was some Oldboy, some Watchmen, and some Step Brothers all crammed in there. I need to see this again.

Observe and Report has set the bar pretty high for 2009 comedies, even if its not a comedy in the strictest sense of the word.

Observe and Report is the second comedy in as many weeks (the other being Adventureland) to unfold much differently than its ad campaign would suggest. As many of the reviews have said, this is a dark and at times harsh comedy, but also a particularly interesting one for both its main character and some stinging satire in the mix. Seth Rogen steps outside of his likeable comfort zone as the bipolar mall cop Ronnie, a delusional and violent man who desires to fulfill his thirst for aggression by becoming a real cop with a gun (or, essentially the antithesis to Kevin James' good-natured Paul Blart). Rogen does some of the best work of his career as Ronnie, with much of his success coming from playing up Ronnie's delusions with a straight face. Ray Liotta is also a lot of fun to watch as the cop who (rightfully) holds a strong dislike for Ronnie, and Anna Faris effectively makes her ditzy, slutty blonde act look easy. The laughs come frequently, and many of them come from such perverse material (like a gang altercation and outbursts of violence and physical assault) that the movie is bound to also turn off some viewers. It's also a much more violent movie than a viewer might expect, and it's easy to see where director Jody Hill might be making a statement about audience tendencies by presenting all of it in a comical light. The last ten minutes are also hard to forget (and you will not, I repeat, not see the onset of it coming) because they go balls-out (literally) and deliver perversely humorous material, a confirmation of Ronnie's absolutely fucked-up state of mind, and satire on the vastly different ways that nudity and violence are viewed in the media. Through Ronnie, it also takes an interesting look at how we respond to the anti-hero: Will most audiences buy into Ronnie's delusions and cheer him on, or shake their heads at how he can honestly believe that he's doing good? It's a funny movie, but also a far more interesting and thought-provoking one than a viewer might be led to think from the trailer and TV spots, and for that, it's well worth checking out.

B+

It has some problems but the darkly satirical undercurrent running through Observe and Report actually works pretty well. This movie is macabre, more than the advertising seemed to indicate, and writer/director Jody Hill certainly has guts in making it. Seth Rogen successfully tries something new with his character, a mentally disturbed individual who actually succeeds in making the viewer uncomfortable. Anna Faris is perfect as the slutty blonde type, while Michael Pena is surprisingly funny, Celia Weston gets plenty of amusing material and Ray Liotta's highly over-the-top performance fits right in. This is not a great movie but it's a daring dark comedy, one that will inevitably divide viewers but should be commended for containing more substance than initially meets the eye. B

Jesus Christ this movie was the most painful thing to watch since Lady in the Water for me... Way to over the top in its dark tone and just plain fucking aggravating... D-

More to come with my review this Tuesday...

No thanks!

I loved it. Not as great as Pineapple Express which I thought was brilliant. I don't have TV and didn't see any marketing beyond the trailer and commend this film for going in unconventional directions. Should have seen it coming after the Crossroads scene.

I prefer these types of films to Superbad because I found Supervad cliché and boring. Superbad relied too much on how many times it could say cock or fuck in a scene... And that's not funny in itself anymore.

Also Think there are lots of movie connections here besides Taxi Driver.

The Michael Pena stuff at the end > Shawshank redemption.

All those fights, beating the sht out of the kids > Clockwood Orange plus others...

The switch off between girl friends > too many times to count.

and many others including this years Paul Blart!!!!!!

funny you mention Shawshank... After Pena leaves I was guessing during the film that it could go that route. Would have been a decent ending to, but I like the one we got

I thought this film was finished before Paul Blard.

Haha, too bad!

***/****

Had some hilarious moments. And I loved the bread/coffee girl

Some of it missed, but not too much.

I liked this ending also. Shawshank would have just been cute for a minute.

and on Paul Blart, I was just joking about that but it had some similarities and my friend like PB better.

As promised!!!

http://nevadasagebrush.com/blog/2009/04 ... -comedies/

i cant decide how i feel about it. some parts were great, others were meh, while others were just plain bad. in the end, the good did out weight the bad.

B

I love you man was far superior.

Saw this again and loved it even more. Sure to be one of the year's ten best.

I admired the persistence of it's skew.

O&R is on the outer fringes of what some people call "entertainment", yet right in the heart of what others call "reality" - - it's an odd hybrid of spun energies not usually explored in the cinematic realm.

For those who loved The Ringer, well... this is kinda The Anti-Ringer. Damaged people becoming the heroes of their niche.

For the first time ever, I was convinced by a Seth Rogen performance. Hoorah! He played this complicated role perfectly. Forget Heath Ledger's simple bad guy performance last year - - this is acting. Anna Faris, unfortunately was relegated to practically a cameo role - - still, she brings her comic charms in her brief prescence. The supporting characters were all great - - notably Celia Watson who plays "Mom" - - she was hilarious here. And Ray Liotta, good of course, though underused perhaps. Michael Peña as "Dennis" - - -YOW! Plus, Collette Wolfe as handicapped "Nell" doing her bit.

I can't say I'm surprised that O&R didn't storm the box office, this movie's never gonna be the majority of people's idea of fun - - it turns the bend and then gets more twisted until it's entirely bent...

Actually, it's rather perverse - - but luckily in the case of O&R... that's a good thing!

I'm going to be forced to recommend Observe And Report to many, many people down the road; aka: living in the future; ie: inhabiting this particular planet; eg: you.

out of

Well... that gets my vote for Most Bizarro Comparison of 2009!!!

That's really out there, man.

Apples and oranges.

Observe and Report is a wildly uneven film. It had moments of hilarity, mediocrity and awfulness. This film re-enforced two things for me; one, I really dislike Seth Rogen. I honestly think he is one of the worse actors working in comedy today, I don't see why people find him so humorous. And two, Anna Faris is an underrated God and is never given what she is deserved. Besides Seth Rogen being quite terrible, the supporting cast is great. Anna Faris is wonderful as the slutty blonde character and is incredibly underused. She couldn't have had more than twenty minutes of screen time. A major kudos to Michael Peña. I've never really seen him in anything (besides World Trade Center) and he really impressed me here. He was really, really funny. Celia Weston was also hysterical as Ronnie's drunken mother, who has quite a few of funny one liners. When any of those three characters are on screen, the film really shines. When they aren't on screen, besides a few moments, the film falls on it's face. Seth Rogen's Ronnie was an incredibly unlikable character. I found him to be incredibly aggravating and annoying. All in all, I didn't hate the film but it wasn't exactly something that I "liked." If you want to see it, I'd say to rent it. What works is because of the wonderful supporting cast.

6/10 (C+)

Eh.

I went in knowing I was in some dark, Taxi Driver-esque viewpoints on humanity, but I still wasn't too keen on it. Like, I have respect going where it goes considering it was backed by a major studio, and some of the shit that makes you laugh here is really unexpected, but there still isn't THAT much new here, outside of the more comedic tone and maybe the (very) ending, which is either absolutely ridiculous or based off the theory that Taxi Driver ends with Travis Bickle dreaming (I'll go with the latter).

Rogen is pretty good though, and Faris does well with a really shallow character (Which is the point). Celia Watson is also rather uncomfortably funny (The best kind of funny on display here). And Collette Wolfe is really cute.

But yeah, this is kinda overrated, but I do want to check out more of Jody Hill's stuff now. He seems to have a wicked sense of humor.

**½

Jon, I think you nailed it when you said this is the sort of comedy you admire more than you laugh. The concept was great, the film was well done, but I resorted to trying to laugh on numerous occasions. This may be Seth Rogen's finest hour if one wants to critique his range, but I'd rather he keep his goofball stoner persona if the rest of his asshole schtick is filled with this much dead space.

So dark I expected the Sun to die. Overall a great film and I have admire those how wrote this script and managed to get the financing because this was never going to make money.

The load WOKJ blows over Rogen is astounding. Some people really need to grow up and accept that not all that happens in the fucking movie is a revelation or original or OMFG it's like Rorschach *orgasm* Taxi Driver *orgasm* Shawshank *orgasm*.
It's like fucking literature. You can analyze and everything can be argued but 99% of the time what you've argued is not what the author/poet/director/etc intended. They have their purposes but it's never that fucking deep. However there are some loser fanboys, most evident here, that believe everything Rogen does is the work of God. Grow up.
If there's ever an overrated actor here it's Rogen. Just because in his movies he does things you'd love to do doesn't mean they're excellent.
I don't think the movie is horrible it's an entertaining flick and I'm giving it a B however the amount of love and intelligence that is heaped upon this movie just like every other Apatow and Apatow related film is excessive, unnecessary and unfounded.
Maybe you think you're cool if you like R rated movies, excessive sexual humour, vulgarities, drugs, violence etc but it's just a fucking movie. Don't have to try and justify it for things it doesn't do or have. Sheesh.

I thought this could of been better than Paul Blart but its about on the same level. Once again, the film has trouble finding its center switching around between too many plots. Seth Rogen's character starts out a bit likeable but his scenes just drag on and on and on which is sad since the film is under 90 minutes. There are some laughs here and there and Anna Faris and Collette Wolfe are the only likeable characters throughout. The film did save itself however with its last 15 minutes which were hysterical. Seth Rogen though needs to find a different direction to go in, maybe something like his role in Funny People which wasn't too shabby. *1/2

Hopefully this puts this final nail in Seth Rogen's career coffin after Zack and Miri and Funny People. He's just not funny anymore. I don't want him to be one of the new generation comedy stars. But even besides Rogen, the movie was still weak.

C