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| James Franco (left) and Seth Rogan star in the now infamous "The Interview." |
If you haven't been living in a cave the past two
months, chances are you've heard all you need to know about "The
Interview," the political satire about an assassination plot against North
Korean leader, Kim Jong-un. When Columbia cancelled the movie's wide theatrical
release out of safety concerns, the news ignited a media storm of social
outrage that seemed to force the studio to reverse course, eventually allowing
the film to play on a limited number of screens as well as online.
The film was co-directed by Seth Rogan and his buddy
Evan Goldberg and features Rogan as a producer of one of those kitschy
Hollywood tabloid shows. His star is a flamboyant, obnoxious blowhard named
Dave Skylark (James Franco, overacting to the point of caricature), who has
achieved celebrity status by getting guests to spill outrageous secrets, such
as Rob Lowe being bald and other yawners.
Soon an attractive CIA agent (Lizzy Caplan) arrives to
pitch a covert plan to send the two characters to the reclusive nation to
poison the supreme leader. But the mission proves complicated for the
buffoonish pair, who encounter myriad suspicious guards as well as a fawning, duplicitous
Kim (Randall Park), friendly and accommodating as long as you avoid digging too
deep into the whole evil dictator thing.
Ultimately, little of what happens throughout the
picture is very funny, unless your idea of comedy involves a steady stream of
expletives, infantile anatomical references, bodily functions, crude jokes about
women and sex, or uninspired slapstick violence. The movie’s sense of humor,
like its main characters, seems designed to appeal to beer-quaffing frat party teens
and dimwitted man-children.
When “The Interview” finally premiered on the big screen
last month, many people came out to see it not so much to be entertained than
to be a part of a noble but confused pro-America narrative about supporting
free speech. That's probably just as well, since the experience of actually
watching the movie is dreary, tedious and not much fun.
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