Al's Omniflick: Get Hard

Sunday, March 29, 2015

Get Hard

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Etan Cohen/Starring: Will Ferrell, Kevin Hart, Craig T. Nelson, Alison Brie and John Mayer

First-time director Etan Cohen's Get Hard is an intermittently funny raunch-fest and like most Hollywood comedies, it can't establish and maintain a comedic pace that is entirely satisfying. Its failings can't be ascribed to its cast, because the film's strength lay in its two leads; funny men Will Ferrell and stand-up comic Kevin Hart; who know their way around a funny line and a gag. The film does manage to reach for the outrageous at times but more often it settles for quick and easy rather than comically inventive.

The story centers on James (Will Ferrell), a very successful trader who is offered a promotion by his boss Martin (Craig T. Nelson). Success comes at a price, for a disgruntled rival is vehemently opposed to James' good fortune.

The woman behind James' climb to the financial Empyrean is his fiancé--and boss' daughter--Alissa (Alison Brie). Alissa's Lady MacBeth ambitions tolerate no dithering or indecision on the part of her man and she is less than sympathetic when she finds her fiance is under arrest on charges of securities fraud. Slave to the lavish lifestyle she and her husband enjoy, Alissa lets nothing obstruct her pursuit of material needs.

Meanwhile, Darnell (Kevin Hart), a struggling foreman of a car-cleaning service, who wields an irrepressible entrepreneurial spirit, comes into contact with James, whose vehicle is in Darnell's care. Looking for an investor for his own car-cleaning business, Darnell approaches James for $30,000, only to be condescendingly brushed off. It is slightly amusing to see James panic when Darnell knocks on his car window; thinking a robbery is in progress.

After James is sentenced to ten years in San Quentin, he panics, knowing his time in jail won't be served in a cushy Federal prison, but the formidable San Quentin penitentionary. Aware that his chance of escaping rape and violent assault behind bars is very slim, he decides to enlist Darnell's help in how to survive prison life, holding to the bigoted notion that most black men have served jail-time. Incensed, Darnell takes umbrage until James offers money for his services that matches the investment he needs for his business. The wrinkle in Darnell's plan is that he has never been incarcerated. Unwilling to lose the money, he consults a cousin who has served time.

Immersing himself in his mission, Darnell transforms James' lush home into a simulated prison environment. He also has the house staff, who aren't exactly fond of their boss, assume the roles of prison guards and fellow inmates.

This is ripe for comedic plunder but Cohen never fully exploits its possibilities. Darnell spends more time trying to toughen a weak, cowardly James for the eventualities of both anal and oral rape.

In a sequence that shows some daring, Darnell and James visit a gay hangout for the express purpose of James propositioning a man to perform fellatio. Unfortunately, the subsequent scene where James finds himself on his knees before another man in a bathroom stall plays too long and is leached of its humorous potential. While James recoils in fear and loathing, Darnell resists the advances of a man back at the bar. The whole scene smacks a little of homophobia but it earns points for its willingness to pursue raunch to extremes.

The film would like to be about James' gradual conversion from heartless capitalist to hero sensitive to class struggle and racial disparity. Somehow a lowest common denominator comedy featuring a character like James always seems to be somewhat incongruous. Dumb Hollywood comedies would do better to stick to the tasteless jokes and leave socially conscious messages to more sophisticated satire.

So eventually both parties work out their respective issues and a campaign to smear James comes to light; no earth-shattering revelations here. Some gags hit home while others are dead on arrival or delivery. Ferrell and Hart manage to keep it all afloat long enough for the film to reach the end credits. Alison Brie makes an interesting shrew but Craig T. Nelson is unfortunately only asked to hit his marks.

It's interesting to note that a group of teenagers sitting in front of me at the late show were actually smoking weed. The teens desperately fanned the big, billowy clouds of smoke to avoid detection. I don't remember seeing anyone attempt anything so brazen in a movie theater, but I thought, good for them, maybe they'll find the movie uproariously funny now. I wish they had passed their magic wand back to me; I could have used it. No such luck; I was forced to watch it all with my senses intact. Maybe the young folks had the right idea. Keep that in mind if you feel an uncontrollable impulse to see Get Hard.

Or maybe skip the movie and just get stoned.

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On DVD

Fury (1936)

Director: Fritz Lang

Though we might normally think of the films M and Metropolis when director Fritz Lang becomes the topic of conversation, less known is the legendary director's work in Hollywood. Having fled the ever-growing menace of Nazi Germany for America in the early 1930s', Lang eventually found himself under contract for MGM.

Though his work in Hollywood is very uneven, one standout is Fury, from 1936. Starring Spencer Tracy and Sylvia Sydney, the film's condemnation of mob justice seems spectacularly daring now, considering lynching was still a reality in Depression-era America. We don't see one black person in the film entire but we know precisely for whom Lang film is sympathetic.

Spencer Tracy plays Joe Wilson, who is arrested in a small town while en route to meet his fiance, Katherine (Sylvia Sydney). Suspected of being part of a kidnapping of a little girl, Wilson is arrested on the flimsiest evidence. While he sits in cell; angry and indignant, Katherine is puzzled as to why her fiance hasn't arrived at their prearranged meeting place.

But Wilson's fortunes take a darker and more dangerous turn when a mob--already on edge--is roused to anger. Egging one another on, the mob moves on the jailhouse where Wilson is being held. As the angry gathering becomes a mass, drawing citizens of the town into their swelling numbers, a lynch-mob begins to form. The sheriff, determined to see due process take its course, refuses their forceful demands. Becoming angrier and angrier and bolder and bolder, the crowd storms the jail, overwhelming the sheriff and his deputies. Unable to unlock the cell doors to reach Wilson, the mob sets the jailhouse ablaze as an alternate method of lynching.

Katherine, having arrived on the scene, faints when she sees flames engulf the cell where her fiance is held.

In spite of the mob acting as a faceless entity, its principle members are brought to trial though the town and the defendants maintain a conspiracy of silence, hoping to escape convictions and censure.

A sure acquittal seems imminent until damning evidence assures their guilt. When the majority of the members receive death sentences, Wilson turns up at his brothers, having survived the fire. Knowing the public is unaware of his survival, he vows to stay in hiding to ensure the mob conspirators are executed.

The scene where Katherine, nearly insane from grief, comes face to face with Joe is a powerful moment in the film. As she slowly recovers from her state, she realizes Joe's vindictive determination to see the mob hang is in itself a great injustice.

The story climaxes during a stirring courtroom scene that brings the fascinating story to a close.

I would have never expected Hollywood to make a statement as powerful as Fury made in 1936. Given the fact that lynchings in America at the time went unpunished, the movie railed bravely, in spite of the main character being white rather than black, against what was then the status quo. The Oxbow Incident would make a similar and commensurately powerful statement seven years later.

The film's willingness to peer into the darker side of American life could be partly attributed to Lang, who co-wrote the story and who was no stranger to exploring the darker side of humanity. Having seen evil flower in his home country, it makes sense Lang would choose to tell this story.

Spencer Tracy and Sylvia Sydney give wonderful, emotionally layered performances. Katherine's near descent into madness is depicted touchingly by Sydney. To see Tracy's mild-mannered Wilson become angry and vengeful is heartbreaking.

Even watching Lang's film on a small screen does little to diminish its power. Weeks after the viewing, I still can't shake its indelible images or its angry indictment of one of America's great crimes. One couldn't devise a better title than one it was given eighty years ago. Fury indeed.