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Mac & Devin Go to High School (2012)
One of the worst films I've seen in recent memory.
Note: Not that it genuinely matters, but the follow contains spoilers for the entire film.
Mac & Devin go to High School is a truly remarkable human achievement. Never before have I seen a collective group of human beings manage to take nearly half a million dollars and somehow transform that into some of the worst 75 minutes in cinematic history, looking cheaper and more amateur than many budgetless shorts I've seen on youtube. You'd also think that a film made by musicians wouldn't contain at least 7 royalty-free midi sound files populating the supposed "soundtrack", but it simply serves as testament to how absolutely little anybody working on this project gave a f***.
Starring in the film are rappers Snoop Dogg and Wiz Khalifa, Snoop Dogg playing himself, but essentially as a creepy 35 year old man still in high school, and Wiz Khalifa playing as a "stuck-up" nerd, suspiciously wearing a long sleeved, button down shirt for most of the film to hide his tattoos. Andy Milonakis also makes a cameo appearance as a wheelchair bound, fart sucking cripple, proving that it is actually physically possible for a human being to sink lower than rock bottom.
The viewer is immediately greeted by a talking, time-traveling CGI joint from 1996, possibly once a banana on a stock model website, recolored white and given eyes and a mouth. He informs the viewer that it is near mandatory to watch this film while under the influence of marijuana, suggesting a parallel between seeing it uninebriated and watching a 3D film without the glasses. This should be the first warning sign to any rational human being to proceed no further, the fact that the writers are literally admitting that you have to be mentally stunted to appreciate the film's attempts at humor.
I understand that this is a "stoner" film, as begrudgingly I am to acknowledge that as a genre, but even a film like Half Baked doesn't required one to forcibly drop their IQ to appreciate at least a portion of the film's humor.
"So what?" you might, suggest. "It is just a crappy stoner comedy. It isn't trying to act like anything more." and I would completely agree with this sentiment if the film wasn't such a bitter, morally reprehensible affair.
A supportive girlfriend who dares suggest that she wishes for her Valedictorian boyfriend, the film's main character played by Khalifa, to attend Yale after finishing school is mocked as a "controlling b****". Snoop Dogg, on his 15th year of high school, manipulates the main character into consuming a cannabis brownie, transforms him into a lowlife hood, and decks him out in full body and face tattoos, (say goodbye to Ivy League or an actual job for that matter)and we are supposed to like and support both of these characters. Late in the film, Khalifa's girlfriend is shocked and dismayed at her Valedictorian boyfriend's new appearance and lifestyle (man, what a controlling b****) and in retaliation, our courageous protagonist cheats on her by having sex with a hooker.
After both get arrested, I suddenly start to think "maybe the makers of this film aren't complete sociopaths at all. Maybe we'll see our protagonist realize his fall from grace and try to redeem himself." Nope. They both get out of jail and neither face any consequences for their actions. Khalifa graduates valedictorian, rapping a song instead of giving a speech, his girlfriend falls for him once again, and Snoop Dogg cheats on a math test, finally graduating from high school and banging a substitute teacher who for some reason spends the whole movie in revealing dresses= and heavy makeup.
The film then returns to our CGI banana joint friend, who so eloquently enthralls the viewer with the film's thesis. "A lot of totally smart people smoke weed and it gives them inspiration and stuff. So it totally shouldn't be illegal, man," If this film is supposed to be exemplary of the intelligence level of the average marijuana user, I can only hope it stays illegal for a very, very long time.
Knights of Badassdom (2013)
Absolute Shlock
Knights of Badassdom continues the seemingly undying trend of out of touch writers throwing together stories of young, attractive people acting as supposed "nerds" while blurting out cringe worthy "geeky" pop culture references or dated nerd stereotypes in order to appeal to a crowd of teenagers who think playing Angry Birds on the phone for a whole 20 minutes straight makes them a "total geek xD". This is the audience that has kept The Big Bang Theory running since 2007.
This time around, these writers have aimed their crosshairs at LARPing. You know, that thing they do at the end of that movie Role Models with the grown men talking in made up fantasy D&D blabber and hitting each other with foam swords? What nerds! The first forty or so minutes of this film seems to have been a contest between what writer could come up with the most mind numblingly stupid and out of touch "nerd" dialogue imaginable. ("Cast a level 12 summoning spell!") True Blood's Jason Stackhouse takes center stage here, and unlike his role in said show, his phoned in performance here was about as wooden and charismatic as the trees that make up most of this film's forest backdrops. But it is perfectly understandable why, considering how little material he was even given. I'm still trying to figure out what his purpose for being in the film was besides to drag along the paper thin plot into the madness that is the second half of the film. In fact, he hardly even speaks here, only occasionally muttering some disgust in reaction to his wacky companions going too far in their nerd hijinks or when he has to blurt out exposition for why the stupid crap happening is happening.
And then (spoilerz) the film becomes a slasher out of nowhere. The sad part is, when I think of "LARPing idiots meet monster slasher film" I can only imagine that this could have made for some grade A shlock in the right hands, something along the lines of Ramirez's "From Dusk 'till Dawn" with the shock of the genre flip hitting you in a flash and everything just going balls to the wall for the remainder of the film. Unfortunately, Knights of Big Bang Theory lacks any of the directorial skill exuded by FDTD, and while my interest actually became piqued once the revelation that this was a slasher film came to light, the novelty soon wore off as it devolved back to its plodding pace and cringe inducing dialogue and I remembered there was still about an hour left of this crap to go.
The weird midget from game of thrones, the weird incestuous brother from Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and that weird unfunny guy from Strange Wilderness who seems to have acted out every line of dialogue while stoned (Sorry, I just described the whole cast of that shitpile) are all here as well, and while they're not pulling any amazing performances, they look like Oscar nominees comparing to Jason. I'd like to applaud the talent director however, for their brilliant idea of hiring a 14 year old boy who saw five youtube tutorials on Adobe After Effects to do all of the film's CGI work. Good on them for building a work ethic in our youth. I think it may have been the very same young man who did Machete 2's botch jo-CGI work.
The most incredible part about my experience watching this turd was coming onto this website afterwards and seeing review after review lauding it for its supposed brilliance. My only two hypotheses are that someone promoting the film set up a bunch of fake accounts to write glowing reviews, or the "Big Bang Theory" effect is setting in, where literally bare minimum nerdy pop culture references are considered comedic gold. Just look at all the idiotic headlines of the reviews here ("The geeks will love it!") who think they're "in" on the joke.
Please don't see this film. It is not even one of those "so bad it is good" films. The premise sounds great but the result is just a boring, plodding mess that leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth. See From Dusk Till Dawn instead. It is absurd shlock done right.