Horrible Bosses 2

Is there any genre we have a greater love-hate relationship with than the comedy sequel? Sequels to our favorite comedies are often the most anticipated releases of the year. Even just hearing that one is in the works can create as much internet traffic as an oiled-up Kardashian. And yet all too often, the experience of sitting through a comedy sequel leaves us feeling angry and let down. Not unlike after seeing the photos of an oiled-up Kardashian. 

So as I sat in the darkened theatre waiting for Horrible Bosses 2 to begin, I hoped for the best but braced myself for the worst. I enjoyed the 2011 original which benefited from exceptional screen chemistry amongst the three leads (Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis, and Charlie Day) as well as fearless supporting performances from the titular horrible bosses. (Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston and Collin Farrell) For the sequel to live up to the original, it would have to buck a long standing cinematic trend.

I have created four categories that all comedies sequels fall under and the percentage for each. They are:

AS GOOD IF NOT BETTER THAN THE ORIGINAL (7%)

A Shot in the Dark (Pink Panther sequel), Austin Powers the Spy Who Shagged Me, 22 Jump Street

NOT AS GOOD AS THE ORIGINAL BUT PASSABLE (63%)

Beverly Hills Cop II, Wayne’s World II, Anchorman II, Clerks II, Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay

REMARKABLY BAD (22%)

Ghostbusters II, Back to the Future II, Weekend at Bernie’s II, Look Who’s Talking Too, Short Circuit II

A GLOBAL AUTROCITY REQUIRING A UNITED NATIONS RESOLUTION (8%)

Caddieshack II, Blues Brothers 2000, Teen Wolf Too

Just going by the (completely made up and arbitrary) numbers, comedy sequels have a 70% chance of not being truly awful but only a 7% chance of actually being good. It would seem that comedy sequels are why they invented the phrase – Meh, it was okay.

In Horrible Bosses II, Nick (Bateman), Kurt (Sudeikis), and Dale (Day) decide to go into business for themselves after Dale comes up with the idea for The Shower Buddy, a shower nozzle that automatically dispenses shampoo and conditioner. The guys get approached by billionaire Burt Hanson (Christolph Waltz) who wants to be the exclusive distributor for the product and orders 100,000 units. This turns out to be a power play to bankrupt the guys and take over their company. To prevent this from happening, our guys need to come up with a way to make a lot of money in a very short time to pay off their bank loan. They land on a kidnapping plot where they abduct Hanson‘s douchebag adult son Rex (Chris Pine) and hold him for ransom.

This plot device gets the movie where it needs to be – our bumbling leads stumbling their way through a high level criminal plot well beyond their competency. And the role Rex plays in the kidnapping turns out to be a fun aspect as well. However this plotline also exposes the movie‘s greatest weakness. The first movie worked so well because the guys were constantly pitted against and reacting to their horrible bosses. Remove that constant force of antagonism and you’re left with a low rent three stooges dynamic. There are too many scenes of the guys bickering and fighting amongst themselves and not enough really big laughs.

The scenes that were the most enjoyable and really popped off the screen were the brief cameo appearances by the former bosses played by Aniston and Spacey. The bumbling nature of our protagonists only really works when contrasted against the strength and awfulness of the antagonists. I would have liked to see more of Aniston, Spacey and Jamie Foxx who returned as Mr. (shall we say) Jones. Without more of these amazing supporting characters, what plays out for most of the second half is yet another inept kidnapping movie. It’s not terrible but it’s not special either.

To make this movie a real success they needed to follow the path of Austin Powers and 22 Jump Street and make the laughs huge and keep them coming through the entirety of the film. A sequel cannot give us the joy of meeting the characters for the first time as in the original so it needs to hang big laughs on a solid plotline. Fail to do so and what do get?

Meh, it was okay.

The Hunger Games Mockingjay Part I

I want to begin by stating that as a rule, I consider myself a live and let live type of guy. Point of fact, there are only three things that I truly hate with every fibre of my being:

1. People who insist on celebrating the 12 days of Christmas between December 13th and 25th instead of between Christmas Day and January 6th when it actually is. Yes, I get it, all the fun is in the lead up to Christmas but you can’t just alter historic facts to suit your agenda like you’re the Texas Board of Education.

2. Anyone who posts intentionally cryptic and manipulative Facebook posts in a shameless bid for sympathy and attention. Whenever I see someone post Feeling blue :-( I can assure that it is only the rules of polite society and my absolute love of dogs that prevent me from responding with “Good, I hope your pet was hit by a bus.”

3. The latest trend out of Hollywood to produce half-movies. Half-movies are when they adapt a series of novels but break the last in the series into two films. They insist it is so they can give the story the necessary screen-time to do it justice. Of course, everyone except those who recently fell off a truck reeking of turnip knows that it is so they can get my $12.95 twice rather than once.

Without fail, half-movies are the worst films of the series. (The Harry Potter and Hobbit franchises slowly nod their head) To be fair, it’s almost impossible for them to be anything but the weakest. They are asking people to plunk down good money to see only the first half of a story. It would be like if you paid to hear a joke and all you got was A Priest, a Minister, and a Rabbi walk into bar. The Priest goes up to the bartender and says I’ll have a gin and tonic. The end. That will be $13 please. You couldn’t help but feel creatively cheated and completely ripped off. So you can imagine my surprise when I left The Hunger Games Mockingjay Part I  not feeling creatively cheated and completely ripped off.

That is not to say that Mockingjay is a great movie but by even making it a good movie, the filmmakers accomplished a feat just shy of miraculous. As in the book, the movie picks up right after Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) disrupted the Quarter quell which is the celebrity all star version of their annual children-murdering-children festivity known as the Hunger Games. Picture a dystopian Dancing With The Stars – only slightly less cringeworthy. Katniss has been rescued by the rebels as modest uprisings against the Capitol have begun in the other districts. The rebels need Katniss to serve as their propaganda tool but she is reluctant to do anything for the people who rescued her but left Peta behind.

Right here is where this instalment gets off on a much better foot than other half-movies that came before it. Whereas those simply picked up the action where it left off and continued on its merry way, Mockingjay begins with a protagonist called to a mission which she is reluctant to undertake. Only after seeing the horrific devastation of the her home district does she overcome her reluctance and agrees to the mission. Joseph Campbell would be very proud. In that first act, we have the Call to Adventure (Katniss, we need you to be the Mockingjay), the Refusal of The Call (No, go f**k yourself) and Crossing the First Threshold (Look what those bastards did to my home, all right, I’m in)

On to Act Two.

From here the film plays out like a game of cat and mouse between Katniss and President Snow brilliantly played by Donald Sutherland.  Sutherland is able to portray every ounce of Snow’s ruthless and calculating demeanour without ever making it come off as ham-fisted or cartoonish. Snow has Peta held in the Capitol and just as Katniss is being used to ignite rebellion, Peta is being used by Snow to stamp it out. Whether Peta is doing this freely or under duress is not exactly clear. Still, Peta’s pro-Capitol propaganda messages only fuel the desire to extract him from Snow’s grasp.

Another success of Mockingjay is taking us deeper inside the Katniss-Gale dynamic. Gale Hawthorne (Liam Hemsworth) has worked his way into being one of the rebel army’s top soldiers. This gives him more to do than just be Katniss’ shoulder to cry on. This is key because when Katniss does need that shoulder, Gale is no longer viewing events simply through the prism of what is best for Katniss. Now he has to consider what is best for the rebellion and when you mix in his unresolved feelings for Katniss, these scenes play out with more depth and meaning than in the earlier films. This is important because previous fan favourites like Haymitch, Effie, and Plutarch (the late Phillip Seymour Hoffman in his last performance) all take more of a backseat in this one.

The biggest challenge in any half movie is constructing a satisfying third act. In the actual book, everything builds to the big climactic confrontation at the end. Here they have to jerry-rig an “ending” out of what is the middle part of the novel. Again, they are able to do this more successfully than I expected. This third act builds up to a rescue attempt of Peta and the other tributes. All the while, Katniss is trying to play Snow to ensure the success of the mission. Without giving too much away (Peta dies…okay he doesn’t die – relax) we have enough invested that the success (or lack thereof) in the mission is enough to feel satisfying as an ending. We have been waiting to see if Katniss and Peta will be reunited and the resolution to this narrative question works.

If you are a fan of the books and/or the previous films, there’s nothing in Mockingjay that will disappoint you. And I expect you will leave the theatre as I did – feeling, for the most part, narratively satisfied. Which, again, is more than a little surprising. How did I expect to leave the theatre given this is another Hollywood half-movie?

Feeling Blue :-(