Get Hard Review

RYAN: We all find some genres more appealing than others.  I love to laugh; but there are so many various types of humor in movie comedies.  There are the rom coms, the sarcastic, witty quippers, the silly kids stuff and then the super annoying and stupid potty humor, the offensive stuff we call boy movies because they seem like they would only attract the frat boy audience.  Of course, many of them entertain mass audiences and make blockbuster bank at the box office.  As with anything, it’s to each, his own.  And Get Hard is not my kind of comedy.

CARRIE: It’s not my kind either.  I didn’t laugh even once and yet there were people in various sections of the theater that howled with laughter every two minutes.  So it’s clearly very subjective.

RYAN: I didn’t LOL either.  I did find some things amusing and I appreciated some moments – mostly just with Kevin Hart and his family.  And that’s the thing.  The film costars Kevin Hart and ill Ferrell and their comedy really doesn’t mesh.  Kevin is very natural and in the moment.  Will is self-aware and fake and just tries to hard.  Clearly it works for him but it’s actually very bad acting.  Kevin has believability, commitment and intensity.  There’s one scene between them, lit’rally, where Kevin steals the show so hard that Will looks like a deer in headlights.  Kevin is so much more talented.

CARRIE: Kevin is SO much more funny and better to watch in this movie.  It’s also really offensive.  They attack all the uncomfortable stereotypes about white and black people, gay people, even Jews and more…

RYAN: It’s an interesting conversation to have about comedy and what’s appropriate, what’s PC, what you can – or should be able to – get away with using comedy as an excuse.  Some people, like Sarah Silverman get a pass…. and it’s funny-offensive.  But in movies, it’s different.  A direction is the author of the film, then there’s the screenwriter who wrote it, the actors who bring wither own interpretation and perspective to dialogue, the studios behind it, etc.. and it all comes across as more offensive, as a product, than one stand up comic being an equal-opportunity hater, you know?

CARRIE: That’s very well put.  And that may be why I was also very offended by this humor.  The joke is intentional but it doesn’t really play so well for all those cooks in the kitchen and then it is targeted to young boys.

RYAN: The offensive gay stuff worries me becuase they are protrayed as very creepy and as though they’re trying to “turn a straight guy gay.”  That’s such a dangerous message to send, even in jest.  It can create homophobia, you know?

CARRIE: Yes and all the over-the-top stereotypes about white people and black people.  It’s, like, haven’t we all grown past this as a culture?  Is that still funny to dial it back to those hackneyed stereotypes?

RYAN: It’s not – but then again, the audience was rolling with laughter.  It’s a very R rated film that panders.  It’s dirty and they do things for shock value, desperate to create a cinematic moment that will make people talk about it and be like a kind of viral promotion for it.  But the lines these movies cross are just getting further and further.  I don’t want to seem all uptite but it;s true.

CARRIE: Some movies have all black casts and are targeted toward that audience and some are with all white casts than are targeting that community and this one tries to be a crossover by offending both races and dealing with themes, or actually just stereotypes. And so much crude humor – that’s never made me laugh,  I don’t see the humor in it.  It’s not my comfort level.

RYAN: It didn’t make me uncomfortable as much as I see the potential damage in the underlying messages – it propagates the negativity while joking with them.  I will say I loved see Greg Germann play a lawyer in this.  He played Richard Fish in Ally McBeal and it was so great seeing him and in that kind of role again.  That was amazing.

CARRIE: Some of the supporting actors were fine but everyone just turned me off in this movie.

RYAN: There is a full frontal moment.  Again – it speaks to the notion of what’s in good takes and what you can get away with when you justify it as comedy.  Madonna does controversial things some find offensive and then says it’s ironic and meant to be a joke.  But nobody gets the joke – they all are offended.  As for this film, most of the audience got the jokes and loved them.  Just how many jokes can you make about being violated in prison?  Seriously, that was, like, half the movie.  No imagination. Then the last quarter of the movie becomes an action film, clearing his name.

CARRIE:  I only liked Kevin Hart in the movie, the rest of it was not my thing.

RYAN: All the characters were so flat and the plot so predictable.  With minimal effort and creativity, it could have been a lot better.

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