Tag: Ricky Gervais

Extras (2005) s01e04 – Les Dennis

The episode starts with Ricky Gervais visiting agent Stephen Merchant—who may or may not have a new hair cut, which may or may not be silly—and then they go off to a theater to get Gervais a proper acting job. Well, the genie in a production of “Aladdin.” But he’s got lines.

There’s a lot of jokes at Gervais’s expense about his weight and appearance. Not so much about his acting ability, which the show has until this point implied is shitty. They meet Les Dennis, who’s a British TV host and standup comic or something. Apparently it’s odd episodes where Gervais is trying to target non-British audiences, even ones where it’s UK-only.

I mean, when “Extras” aired in 2006 or whatever… there was barely even YouTube. How would you find out about Les Dennis? Left with the show’s impression of him he’s a very sad guy who’s dating a younger woman, Nicky Ladanowski, who’s going to take him for his money. He’s not funny anymore and he whines a lot. The episode is about fifteen minutes of him whining to Gervais, whose character has become downright cuddly by episode four. Gone are most of his previous obnoxious traits.

He does still make fun of Ashley Jensen for not being smart, but it’s pretty much just that one joke. The rest of the time he’s just listening to the whining. Meanwhile, Jensen—who doesn’t appear for so long into the episode I had started panicking she wouldn’t appear; the prospect of “Extras” without her is a daunting one—anyway, she’s got a subplot with Rebecca Gethings and Gerard Kelly. Gethings is one of the dancers, Kelly is her dad and the “Aladdin” producer. He’s gay—Gervais and Jensen are sure—but he’s got a daughter and they don’t understand.

Instead of it being he’s bi or something, it turns out he’s long in the closet with a suffering wife at home and so on. But, you know, it’s funny.

Because Jensen goes to a party at the house and very strange hijinks.

There’s a level of competency to the episode but it’s not very good. Even for “Extras.”

Extras (2005) s01e03 – Kate Winslet

I can’t imagine Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant had to take notes “Extras” but thankfully some little angel plopped between their shoulders and whispered the right things in their ears for some course correction.

No more is Ashley Jensen marriage and man hungry, now she’s got a regular man, John Kirk. So then Jensen’s subplot instead gets to be she’s not into talking dirty on the phone, which Kirk expects from his ladies, so of course she’s fretting about it because despite being a regular she’s got no character.

Neither does Ricky Gervais, so it’s not like the show’s playing favorites. Merchant’s agent is back. He’s got so little character that lack of character is part of the joke.

Merchant’s pretty funny though.

And Gervais.

Gervais and Merchant also seem to have realized by giving most of the extreme stuff to the guest star—in this episode, Kate Winslet—they get to make Gervais more sympathetic and the celebrity seem even less like a rational human being. Albeit a hilarious less than rational human being. Because Winslet’s fantastic. Just superb. She’s a foul-mouthed, foul-minded, racist bigot who doesn’t learn from any of her mistakes, which somehow makes her less than Gervais in the end.

There’s a subplot involving actress Charlotte Palmer, who Gervais is interested in… romantically. Gervais’s character having any romantic interests whatsoever is kind of new so… whatever. It’s funny. Especially since she’s a Catholic and he’s an atheist.

But then it turns out her sister, Francesca Martinez, has cerebral palsy, which means Gervais is of course going to make fun of her. To her sister. And it’s not going to go well.

The show plays a little loose with one of its punchlines, dragging it out for effect when it doesn’t make any sense as far as the character. Gervais has a pretty solid scene in a Catholic prayer group where they slowly realize he’s an unbeliever.

What’s weird about the atheism subplot is Gervais comes off as a prick about it. Gervais is, off-screen, a somewhat prominent atheist. It’s like he wanted to double-down on mansplained atheism or something.

Still. Really funny stuff. Good for easy, privileged belly laughs.

Extras (2005) s01e02 – Ross Kemp & Vinnie Jones

This episode introduces co-creator, co-writer, and co-director Stephen Merchant in an acting role, presumably a regular. He’s Ricky Gervais’s agent. Gervais is mad because he can get any parts whereas Merchant is mad Gervais can’t get any parts; no one wants Gervais is the idea. Certainly not on the movie he’s working on, a period piece starring Ross Kemp.

Who’s Ross Kemp? He’s a British TV action star, which is apparently a category of acting pursuit….

Gervais sucks up to Kemp, who’s fixated on his ability to beat up other men. He wants to be a real-life “hard man,” like Vinnie Jones, who was a footballer, and is filming a movie across the alley.

Shaun Pye, who I thought was the best thing in the show last episode for his thirty second opening scene, is back again with a lot more to do. And he’s definitely the best thing. Because Gervais’s character is too ill-defined when it comes to his experience of the absurdity around him. It initially appears he’s above the movie star nonsense, but then it seems like he’s abjectly credulous, which puts him below it, making it less about a commentary and more about positioning the show for laughs from punching up and down.

For example, Ashley Jensen’s subplot. She’s man-hungry once again and sets her sights on actor Raymond Coulthard. Their entire arc involves Jensen thinking she’s too stupid for posh Coulthard and Coulthard being the perfect guy… until just the right moment to wound Jensen the most. It’s a thing to do I guess. Not really a flex just… a waste of Jensen’s time and everyone else’s.

Coulthard played young Scrooge in Muppet Christmas Carol, in case you’re having trouble placing him.

It’s got some okay laughs but not very many. It’s nowhere near as funny as last episode, not even once Gervais fumbles his way into escalating tensions with Jones (on Kemp’s behalf).

Clearly the guest stars matter.

Extras (2005) s01e01 – Ben Stiller

It takes about halfway through the episode to learn both leads’ names. One is Ricky Gervais, I mean his character name. Ashley Jensen is the other lead. They’re both movie extras, working on the set of a serious Ben Stiller genocide movie. When the episode starts, it’s them after a shot and they’re talking to another extra and it’s unclear in that moment he’s not a lead. Shaun Pye, I think. He’s funny. For a while I was worried the show wasn’t going to be funny without him around.

I was wrong.

Lots and lots of funny in “Extras.”

Writers and directors Gervais and Stephen Merchant slowly reveal the extent of the heroes’ character defects, whether it’s Gervais manipulating still-grieving genocide survivor Boris Boscovic into a speaking part in the film or Jensen deciding a guy just isn’t for her based on a physical characteristic she hadn’t noticed. But it’s not a sitcom about the situations they naturally find themselves in, it’s one of those British sitcoms where the nasty characters gin up their own situations. Gervais and Jensen do a great job ginning up trouble for themselves, particularly—it turns out—when they’re together.

After trying to get out of Liza Sadovy’s birthday party, both Gervais and Jensen end up wanting to go for different reasons. The evening concludes with Gervais and Jensen being really racist in front of a bunch of bigwigs. It’s hilarious. But it’s a really easy joke. “Extras” seems to be very much about amping up easy jokes to get the biggest laughs or biggest surprises, like how Ben Stiller is a completely self-absorbed asshat who can’t shut up about his box office grosses. He’s got some absolutely phenomenal monologues.

The end of the episode even hits a heartfelt note, which sadly seems appropriately optical for Gervais—turns out he and Jensen are better people even if they’re proudly ignorant racists versus being closest elitists.

Sure, Ricky. (He totally voted leave, didn’t he?)

Show’s funny though.

Stardust (2007, Matthew Vaughn)

Stardust has a problem with overconfidence. The overconfidence in the CG is one thing, but would be easily excusable if director Vaughn didn’t double down and go through tedious effects sequences. Ben Davis’s photography keeps Stardust lush, whether in the magic world or the real world–but that lushness doesn’t help with the CG. The CG is excessive and exuberent–it’s always supposed to be obvious–it’s just not good enough. The CG, technically, isn’t there.

The other overconfidence is the stunt casting.

The film starts in a prologue setting things up. England. Nineteenth century. There’s a small English town with a nearby wall. No one can cross the wall. There’s a nonagenarian (David Kelly) who wields a staff to keep people away. One day, intrepid young man Ben Barnes crosses the wall and gets seduced by a mystery woman.

Nine months later, he gets a baby. Eighteen years later, the baby has grown into “protagonist” Charlie Cox. Stardust, from its narration (by Ian McKellen, natch), is going to be about Cox embracing his destiny as a hero. Until then, he’s just going to make a fool of himself for town beauty Sienna Miller. Cox wants to marry Miller, Miller wants to marry Henry Cavill. But then they see a falling star and Cox gets Miller to promise to through Cavill over for him if he gets her the star.

Except it’s not just a falling star, it’s also the ruby necklace of the King of the magic world, called Stormhold. Stardust doesn’t get into the nitty gritty, like how can this magical world exist across a wall in England and what would’ve happened to it in the hundred years between the movie’s present action and its release date. Because it’s just fantasy. Vaughn and co-writer Jane Goldman don’t have to take any responsility for character if they keep it just genre.

The scene setting up Stormhold is where the stunt casting starts. Peter O’Toole is the dying king, Rupert Everett is his presumed heir. Presumed because O’Toole’s sons have to kill one another for the throne. The ghosts of the defeated princes hang around and watch the film’s events, sometimes offering commentary. They’re fun ghosts, even if they were all trying to kill one another and the film’s heroes.

In the biggest of the prince roles is Mark Strong. He’s not stunt casting. He’s got Inigo Montoya’s hair and Count Rugen’s personality.

So the star falls. Except since it lands in magic land, it’s not a hunk of space metal, it’s Claire Danes. Stars are sentient and they watch the earth because human beings’ love is unique throughout the cosmos. Vaughn and Goldman’s dialogue, which is so entirely expository it’s an accomplishment, is about as obvious and artless as that sentence. Vaughn seems to think he can get away with it because of Davis’s photography, the CGI, and Ilan Eshkeri’s enthusiastic, original, and not great, not bad score. He’s wrong.

Anyway. Cox finds Danes and kidnaps her. He’s going to let her go after he brings her to Miller. Danes points out the questionable behavior of kidnapping someone for a gift, but Cox doesn’t care. His character to this point is: half-prince of magic land, personal failure (he wasn’t good in school at anything, including fencing), and just fired shop boy. Cox doesn’t even get to dwell on being half-magic. He’s too busy dragging Danes through the woods.

Oh, and Danes has the necklace.

So Strong and the other princes are looking for the necklace. Because O’Toole says they don’t just need to kill each other, they also have to get the necklace.

And then Michelle Pfeiffer is a witch looking for Danes to kill her and eat her heart to make herself young. Pfeiffer’s got two sisters, Joanna Scanlan and Sarah Alexander, who ought to be stunt casting and aren’t. The makeup on the witches is decrepit faces, but not overly so on the bodies. Like Vaughn didn’t want to be too gross. The witches get played for laughs occasionally, so they can’t be too visually unsettling.

Pfeiffer is terrible with Scanlan and Alexander. Maybe she can’t figure out how to act under the makeup. Once she gets out on her own (and out of the makeup), she slowly gets better. By the end of the movie, she’s almost good, even with some makeup back. She has zero chemistry with Scanlan and Alexander, which doesn’t help things.

Of course, Vaughn doesn’t direct for that sort of thing. Chemistry. Pah. Danes falls for Cox after he saves her from Pfeiffer’s inital trap and Danes decides to help him win Miller’s hand, delivering herself as a gift. Because she really, deep down, loves Cox. Danes, I mean. She’s sacrificing herself. It might make sense if Danes had her stars watch earth because of perfect human love monologue early on, but it’s end of the second act stuff. She’s just making poor choices as far as anyone knows until then.

She also has a unicorn for a while.

Eventually Danes and Cox end up on Robert De Niro’s sky pirate ship. De Niro should be Stardust’s stunt casting at its worst. He’s a closest, effeminate, aging, anglophile gay sky pirate. He has to hide everything from his crew of tough sky pirates. They mine lightning to sell to Ricky Gervais (who’s actually the worst stunting casting). They capture Danes and Cox and De Niro confides in the young couple.

He teaches them to dance, he teaches Cox how to sword fight, he does a makeover on Cox, giving him some romance novel cover hair. He also gives them new outfits.

So then they’re ready for the multiple showdowns–Strong and the princes, Pfeiffer and the witches, Melanie Hill’s traveling salesperson witch who has enslaved Cox’s mom (Kate Magowan). But Cox isn’t look for his mom, because he forgot about her once he kidnapped Danes and he never comes back to it.

Cox is a bad kid. No spoilers, but Nathaniel Parker (as the grown-up dad) gets a shockingly thankless part. You’d think being raised by a single dad in nineteenth century small village England would have an effect on Cox’s character, but since he doesn’t get a character until he gets the hair cut… you’d be wrong.

There’s also a thing where Vaughn’s “magical” direction of magic land is exactly the same as his idealized English village. Cox is just traveling through Disney movies, one without magic to one with magic.

Cox never gets to be the protagonist. Top-billed Danes doesn’t either. They both play second fiddle to the bigger name stars, Pfeiffer and De Niro. Where it’s unfair is how Strong gets to do his own thing without Pfeiffer or De Niro and isn’t even a serious antagonist.

Cox and Danes are fine. Their writing is often lousy. De Niro is not fine. It’s an insensitive, if enthusiastic, caricature. Vaughn’s poor direction of actors is most obvious with De Niro. De Niro’s vamping it up and Vaughn directs it all to beg for a laugh. Ha. Robert De Niro is a miserable, closest gay guy who’s worried his only friends will ostracize or kill him if they know he’s gay. But, hey, it’s De Niro in drag.

Then there’s how Danes is a simply damsel, even if she’s an anthropomorphized luminous spheroid of plasma. Cox is the hero prince, even if he’s been passive in every single one of his scenes. Vaughn needed some confidence in his leads.

Stardust is occasionally amusing, when the bad performances and bad writing aren’t too overwhelming. Danes and Cox are quite likable. The movie’s just got a weak script and lacking direction.

1/4★

CREDITS

Directed by Matthew Vaughn; screenplay by Jane Goldman and Vaughn, based on the novel by Neil Gaiman; director of photography, Ben Davis; edited by Jon Harris; music by Ilan Eshkeri; production designer, Gavin Bouquet; produced by Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Michael Dreyer, Gaiman, and Vaughn; released by Paramount Pictures.

Starring Charlie Cox (Tristan Thorn), Claire Danes (Yvaine), Robert De Niro (Captain Shakespeare of the Caspartine), Michelle Pfeiffer (Lamia), Mark Strong (Prince Septimus), Sienna Miller (Victoria Forester), Melanie Hill (Ditchwater Sal), Ricky Gervais (Ferdy), Kate Magowan (Princess Una), Joanna Scanlan (Mormo), Sarah Alexander (Empusa), Jason Flemyng (Prince Primus), Rupert Everett (Prince Secundus), Nathaniel Parker (Dunstan Thorn), Henry Cavill (Humphrey), David Kelly (the Wall Guard), and Peter O’Toole (the King); narrated by Ian McKellen.

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The Invention of Lying (2009, Ricky Gervais and Matthew Robinson)

The Invention of Lying is a 100 minute exploration of a gag. In a world without lying–or any fictive creativity whatsoever–co-director, co-writer, and star Ricky Gervais one day spontaneously mutates and lies. He lies for personal gain, only to discover exploiting people doesn’t make him feel good, so he lies to make himself and others feel good, but it gets him into trouble. It doesn’t get him what he wants and it just ends up making him rich, famous, and miserable.

The film opens with Gervais on a low point. He’s about to lose his job and he’s out on a date with his dream girl, Jennifer Garner, only she thinks she’s too good for him. Because, objectively, his genetic material isn’t good enough to mix with hers. So the other thing this world doesn’t have is any relatable version of love. Gervais and co-writer Matthew Robinson aren’t even comfortable getting into the lust questions, because once they start down any problematic avenue, they run away as fast as they can. It’s like they release they can’t make the joke funny and hightail it away. So why do the joke in the first place?

The film takes place in a small New England town where there is, inexplicably, a movie studio. Except movies are just filmed lectures of history lessons because there’s no fiction and there’s no concept of it. Gervais and Robinson entirely ignore how the world would function and how history would have progressed without imagination or creative ambition. For a while, they just keep falling back on the gimmick–what if everyone just says what they’re thinking, no matter how awful. There are a lot of flashy cameos–Ed Norton is the best–but they can only distract so much. Eventually, the film has to reconcile itself, because Gervais is in love with Garner and Garner doesn’t want him because of his genetic material.

There’s this scene where Gervais explains how he imagines peoples lives upon seeing them and Garner just sees them as fat, bald, nerdy, losers. It comes right after Gervais telling Garner she’s the kindest, best person he’s ever met, which makes absolutely no sense, but whatever, she’s supposed to be angelic.

Eventually, Garner’s part contracts and the movie moves ahead an indeterminable time, becoming just Gervais moping with buddies Louis C.K. and Jonah Hill. By this time, Gervais has increased the scale of his lying, making up God. That subplot is the best one in the film; Gervais and Robinson don’t have to be subtle about their jabs yet still manage subtely in said jabs. It operates on two levels, something the film never does otherwise.

Sadly, it’s not about Gervais inadvertently becoming a messiah, it’s about him pining for Garner. Conveniently, Gervais’s first act nemesis (Rob Lowe, one note as a successful bully) also has eyes for Garner so there’s a love triangle thing towards the end.

It’s a yawn, partially because Garner and Lowe are extremely limited in their roles, partially because Invention can only handle so much emotion. If people can’t have creative expectation, their emotions are stunted. And even when they aren’t, Gervais and Robinson are focused entirely on characters on hand, not this world they’ve ostensibly created.

Gervais drops out during the third act way too much too. He’s the only relatable character in the film; everyone else is a caricature to be mocked. He’s a caricature too (maybe the thinest one), but he’s not supposed to be mocked.

Okay photography from Tim Suhrstedt covers for Gervais and Robinson’s lackluster directing. There are a lot of songs and song montages–including a criminally atrocious Elvis Costello cover of Cat Stevens’s Sitting–and they don’t make any sense since there’s no music in Lying’s world.

Gervais’s performance is fine. Garner ranges from inoffensive to miscast. Hill is an overblown cameo, while C.K. is an underdeveloped sidekick. Besides Ed Norton, Martin Starr’s probably the funniest cameo. Others are earnest but with limited material.

The Invention of Lying would’ve made a great six part sitcom or something, but Gervais and Robinson don’t have a full enough narrative for 100 minutes. It’s not funny enough to make up for all the laziness.

1/4★

CREDITS

Written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Matthew Robinson; director of photography, Tim Suhrstedt; edited by Chris Gill; music by Tim Atack; production designer, Alec Hammond; produced by Lynda Obst, Oliver Obst, Dan Lin, and Gervais; released by Warner Bros.

Starring Ricky Gervais (Mark Bellison), Jennifer Garner (Anna McDoogles), Rob Lowe (Brad Kessler), Louis C.K. (Greg), Jonah Hill (Frank), Tina Fey (Shelley), Jeffrey Tambor (Anthony), and Fionnula Flanagan (Martha Bellison).

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For Your Consideration (2006, Christopher Guest)

Apparently, when Christopher Guest doesn’t do pseudo-documentaries, his films simply don’t work. I didn’t realize For Your Consideration was different in that approach until a lot further in than I should have, probably fifteen minutes or something. As it opens and introduces the set-up (I guess that part would be called the first act, which is an odd thing for one of these Guest and Levy improv films to have), the film’s interesting and sort of funny. Giggling funny. Audible laughter. Then it starts going places–there’s a story and it moves. Instead of being about a movie being made, it’s a narrative about the cast and their Academy Award dreams. Guest takes a mocking approach to the characters, then lays on syrup to make the audience care. It really feels like they started making a movie and realized it wasn’t working, so they made For Your Consideration.

Obviously, there are some good performances. Guest himself, as the director of the movie in the movie, is excellent. Except he’s barely in it. At first I thought he was doing a German director, then I thought maybe Woody Allen, then he disappeared so it didn’t really matter. Eugene Levy plays an annoying agent and he’s only interesting because it’s Eugene Levy. It’s not good because it’s Eugene Levy, but somehow, Levy has become someone who is cast for who they are, not what they can do. Very interesting, but it doesn’t make for a good performance. Harry Shearer is fine. Half of Catharine O’Hara’s acting is good, but when she turns into a silicone Sharon Stone, the film really loses her and she loses her. She starts making fun of the character too, just because there’s nothing else to do. Fred Willard’s kind of funny as the annoying entertainment “reporter,” but even he’s nearing Levy territory. Only Parker Posey is great, but I’m more and more frequently coming to the conclusion she’s always great. Posey’s even good in the scenes where she’s supposed to be poorly acting. Some of it she does get the bad acting down, but there’s a little bit when she’s actually good in this horrible scene.

For Your Consideration is either the end of Guest for a while or he’ll come back real strong next time. But I wouldn’t bet on it. Though, obviously, if it has Parker Posey, I’ll see it.

1.5/4★½

CREDITS

Directed by Christopher Guest; written by Guest and Eugene Levy; director of photography, Roberto Schaefer; edited by Robert Leighton; music by Jeffrey C.J. Vanston; production designer, Joseph T. Garrity; produced by Karen Murphy; released by Warner Independent Pictures.

Starring Bob Balaban (Philip Koontz), Jennifer Coolidge (Whitney Taylor Brown), Christopher Guest (Jay Berman), John Michael Higgins (Corey Taft), Eugene Levy (Morley Orfkin), Jane Lynch (Cindy), Michael McKean (Lane Iverson), Catherine O’Hara (Marilyn Hack), Parker Posey (Callie Webb), Harry Shearer (Victor Allan Miller), Fred Willard (Chuck) and Ricky Gervais (Martin Gibb).

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