Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Get Him To The Greek

This film is about a half an hour too long, and feels the need to force in some unearned sentimentality and life lesson which tend to diminish whatever comic momentum is being generated. That said, I did laugh and the two leads (Russell Brand and Jonah Hill) do have some moments together. If they had tightened the story up and gotten rid of some unnecessary characters it might of been more than just a mildly diverting satire of the music industry.

The other thing the film does is show the true genius of Spinal Tap (and to a lesser extent Tenacious D). In Spinal Tap the songs actually stand on their own as well as being devastating parodies. I'm not claiming that they'd chart but they are catchy and can be listened to independent of the film. I can't say that about any of the numbers in Get Him to The Greek. They generally work as bits in the film, but none of them stuck with me after it ended. This isn't a knock, its just shows you how tough it is to write truly memorable songs (thank you captain obvious).