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Caller From LA Catwalks With ZOOLANDER!!
Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.
I've got buddies who are in this one, and I certainly hope it turns out to be good. However, the word so far is mixed, and I know they've done a lot of reshooting and tweaking. Ben Stiller is one of those guys I always root for, so I hope Caller From LA's muted response to the film is just a case of different tastes. Anyway... check out what he has to say on the subject...
Here is a non-spoiler review of Zoolander.
A previous reviewer wrote that "Zoolander is the next big thing." I'm glad the reviewer enjoyed the film, but for me, it was more like Zoolander is the next Mystery Men - a great premise with a flawed delivery, but still it's an okay comedy. The best gags in the film are only slightly better than the ones in the trailer, but the problem is that the jokes are too far between each
other.
The Setup. Zoolander (Ben Stiller) is THE male supermodel of Manhattan. Writer Matilda (Christine Taylor) has shown that he is vain and extremely stupid in her TIME magazine article. Upstart model Hansel (Owen Wilson) is on all the hot fashion 'zine covers. And if that's not bad enough, Mugatu (Will Ferrell) is an evil designer who brainwashes Zoolander to kill the president of Malaysia. Yes, that IS what I wrote.
The Good. Owen Wilson had some of the best lines with his Dennis Hopper / L.A. surfer / model character, and the film's best points occur when he's in the story. Overall, I can think of three sequences in the film that provided big laughs. Chuckles were disbursed every two minutes or so.
The Flawed. Let me compare this to another recent film, the delightful Rush Hour 2. While RH2 is a comedy-action (in that order), Zoolander is a comedy-blah. The 'blah' parts are given to the straight characters to move the plot along, jokes that go on too long (a Stiller staple), and about 30 cameos just for the sake of having cameos. I give exception for 2 smartly cast cameos that actually got clapping applauses at their moments.
Part of my problem is that I don't want my Ben Stiller to be stupid. Stiller is the intelligent, insightful comic who caught my generation's eye with his wit and cultural knowledge. And there's not nearly enough of Will Ferrell.
Directed by Ben "Cable Guy" Stiller. Written by Ben Stiller and Drake Slather (first produced screenplay) and John "Meet the Parents" Hamburg. IMDB gives a U.S. release date of September 28.
Cheers,
--Caller From L.A.
Small plug: For AICN's own FilmFemme, frequently seen in the chatroom, whose short film "Mary Holy" is now at IFILM. You can GET IT HERE!!!
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and then it's all downhill from there. This is the most ill-conceived movie I've ever heard of. But then, what the hell, just throw in some fart and poop jokes and spread on some bodily fluids, trim it just enough to get Joe Lieberman's blessing, and it will probably haul in the allowances from the nine-year-olds.
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Ok folks, we all know that Ben Stiller can be very funny sometimes (Meet The Parents, ..About Mary, Keeping The Faith), very pop culturish (Reality Bites), very off balance (The Cable Guy), or just NOT FUNNY (Mystery Men, MTV VIDEO MUSIC AWARDS '98). Why must he use his rising star power (from last fall's Meet The Parents) and capitalize it with ZOOLANDER, clearly an SNL-type skit that debuted at the VH1 Fashion Awards. We all know that skit-movies killed Tim Meadows (The Ladies Man), Chris Kattan & Will Ferrell (Night At the roxbury), Molly Shannon (Superstar), and yes, even Mr. Franklin (Stuart Saves His Family). Maybe I'm being biased since I haven't even seen the film yet, but hell, we all know what direction these films go in: 20 minutes of laughs (take off 19 1/2 if it's an SNL movie), then an hour of dead air. To Ben Stiller: Zoolander isn't going to get you the star power you want and need to become a major player in Hollywood! Zoolander will kill your career, just like Mystery Men almost did for all involved! There has never been a "great" skit movie and there probably never will be...
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Don't forget the Blues Brothers. They started the routine as a sketch on SNL and it made a damn funny movie. However, since this is the only skit turned movie that I can think of that has been good I believe your point to be correct. I did like Mystery Men though but the concept for Zoolander just doesn't sound promising.
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i don't know.
is it me?
i liked 'mystery men',
i liked 'meet the parents',
i liked almost everything that ben stiller's done -
but i saw this preview a while back,
at one of those deals where they make you watch on goggles,
in the middle of a shopping mall, with the promise of five bucks?
and i was disappointed. heavily.
uninspired tripe.
i can only hope that stiller wises up.
please, please god, let him wise up.
i love everything but this, is something wrong? -
Aug 05, 2001 10:19:05 PM CDT
The traier for this movie got big ass laughs, movie looks hot
by sierramountain
Will Ferrell, David Duchovny acting like a retard, Owen Wilson, come on, it's gonna be great.
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In a mall. Watching the movie through googles. Submerged in a giant fruit smoothee. Breathing through a snorkel. In front of Payless.
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I got a hell of a discount on my pair of Patrick Ewing sneakers at that store. Anybody remember the episode of the Conan O'Brien show where they had Marky Mark and the Helena Bonham Carter Ape on If they Mated? well the offspring was good ol Ben Stiller, HAR HAR HAR. If Ben Stiller can bang a hottie like Christine Taylor then I'm pretty sure I could bone Holly Valance on a daily basis, Three Cheers for Me!
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speaking of snl spinoff movies that were good: waynes world and coneheads. course others might not've liked em, but i did. i also liked superstar and night at the roxbury, crazy enough. zoolander has owen in it, and him and stiller have had good results so far, so i'll see it. i thought cable guy was vastly underrated, and by far jim carreys best. but that's my opinion, so peace.
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positively/negatively I really don't know how to gauge what business Zoolander's going to do when its debuts nationwide... I agree 100% with this articles
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"Highlander" in a zoo? Now I'm bummed...
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Aug 06, 2001 4:37:59 AM CDT
I could just hear the Paramount execs: "Please God, let this be
by lance rock
If the trailer is ANY indication, this looks slightly lame. Bring on Meet the Fockers!
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Talk about bad casting. Most models don't look like a monkey and don't look like they've been bashed in the face with a frying pan.
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Aug 06, 2001 6:37:39 AM CDT
That movie sounds Darn Right Funny. I was even laughing at the r
by napolean solo
In the eighties in London, our newspaper was called The Daily Mirror. On the T.V guide page, 1 star meant an awful film and 4 stars meant excellent.
However, When they used to review college/teen movies me and my friends used to look for 3 things.
firstly it had to say; 1 star
Second it had to say; Patrick Dempsey
Thirdly it had to say; Cheap Porn.
These three ingredients meant it was going to be an all time great. This Zoolander review was one of those. I was actually laughing at what the writer put. And Ben Stiller wasn't intelligent in Mystery Men yet I thought it was hilarious. The reason I don't think that film did well is because it is a comedy about abunch of B Rate super heroes. Alot of people don't see that as an attractive magnet to pull them towards the cinema. I saw it on video and to this day I regret it. I loved that movie. Ben Stillers mister Furious was a work of genius and he wasn't intelligent (In The Slightest).
In conclusion, I am looking forward to seeing this joint TWICE!!!
Love is Love -
Aug 06, 2001 7:07:51 AM CDT
Cable Guy is a brilliant comedy and one of the most under-rated
by jefferylebowski
I believe in Ben Stiller as director. The Cable Guy is a comedy classic, written off by the media and public forever because it didn't make $100,000,000. Fuck American audiences if they prefer him as Ace Ventura or the Grinch. The Cable Guy is exceptional.
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Will Farrell is one of the most supremely untalented comedians working right now. What the hell is he doing in this movie... or Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back for god's sake. Please stop putting him in movies!! Joe Piscopo was never this annoying.
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To be quite frank, this looks awful. I have to agree with the sentiment that treating your audience like idiots is not the way to go, even if it does get the cheap laughs. I perhaps may be one of the few who liked "Mystery Men". I do enjoy parody, but I don't think I could watch Stiller for two hours as a male model and be nothing less than unconvinced, let alone entertained, which is a shame.____________________________
This aside, what's the deal with beating up on Will Farrel? He's hilarious because of the annoying characters he plays. I will readily concede not all his material is winning (see the abysmal cheerleader skit on SNL.) but for the most part he has a great sense of timing and can play a wide variety of unsettling yet hysterical characters._______________________As for SNL-skit based movies (for which I'm not so sure why the topic took off this talkback) consensus pretty much remains that besides "Blues Bros." and "Wayne's World", the rest remain fairly lackluster, if not forgetable (Coneheads, Wayne's World 2, A Night At the Roxbury, It's Pat, Stuart Saves His Family, Superstar, The Ladies Man...need I go on with this holocust list?). -
I saw this preview in a packed theater before the excellent Planet of the Apes and it got practically no laughs whatsoever. It just looks terrible. However, Stiller and Owen Wilson have made some funny movies - Cable Guy - "What's the story with our eggs? Have they hatched yet?" I am laughing now just thinking about him in that movie. However Meet the Parents was utter crap - I swear I really wanted to enjoy that movie and it hardly made me laugh at all. Mystery Men sucked and Permanent Midnight was entertaining but not great. I really like both these actors but they really need some better material.
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Hey Coolmoe...
You can't handle the whole weight,
Skin need lotion, Teeth need Colgate,
Wise up you little burnt up french fry,
I'm that type of guy!!!
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