Cedar Rapids

My first 2011 film. It's a pretty unambitious comedy, but it survives because of a fantastic cast. Too fantastic, really. I have to wonder what drew them to this rather middling material. Ed Helms (of The Office and The Daily Show) stars as a sheltered insurance salesman from a small town in northern Wisconsin who is drafted by his boss (Stephen Root) to go to an insurance conference in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He's pretty inexperienced with life outside his own little bubble, and he gets led astray by troublemaker John C. Reilly. The film also co-stars Isaiah Whitlock, Jr. (who co-starred in HBO's The Wire, a series for which the character espouses a lot of love), Anne Heche (extremely good - probably the only good thing I've ever seen her done), Sigourney Weaver, Alia Shawkat (of the TV series (not the rap group) Arrested Development) and Kurtwood Smith (of That 70s Show and RoboCop). I wanted to see this one because of its Midwestern setting. Part of me was afraid that it would be Hollywood making fun of Midwesterners, but it's pretty gentle. Helms may play a sheltered small-town guy, but it's just him (Reilly's character is from Steven's Point, WI, and he's not a rube; he is a drunk, though). The film actually has a lot of affection for the Midwest, and it has a lot of heart.

I have to admit that when I saw the poster for this, I thought it looked lame. I then checked out IMDb and saw it had 7.2. I still wasn't convinced. I then only watched it because it was the only film on at the time I wanted to go out. And I'm glad I did. This film is gem - a mix between an indie film, dark comedy and farce. It kind of reminded me of Napoleon Dynamite but not as quirky. This film is funny and really enjoyable on so many levels. The cast is perfect - all performing above and beyond. John C Reilly is a legend in this film and just about steals the show from Ed Helms. I suggest you go watch this film expecting very little and you'll come away feeling like you've just been given a free gift, unlike most films which rob you!

Expected to kill 90 minutes and probably not even finish watching 'Cedar Rapids', BUT Ed Helms led the highly capable ensemble cast of John Reilly, Signory Weaver, Isiah Whitlock, and Anne Heche down the rabbit hole to his world of dweeb awkwardness, and the result is a satisfyingly sweet little guy wins comedy. Well written and paced.

Recommended viewing when you think there is no comedy you haven't seen before that would be a deemed worthy of your time. Earns my Two Diamond Award for being such a nice surprise.

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This film got reasonable reviews so I decided to make the effort to check it out, not least of which because of the cast that features quite a few names and faces that I know from either being instantly recognizable (Weaver, Reilly, Heche) or from their work on other projects that I like a great deal (The Office, Arrested Development, The Wire etc). The plot here is fairly straightforward, a small-town insurance salesman has to replace a colleague at a regional conference in Cedar Rapids and win the prestigious award that his company has won many years running. It is a simple idea and much of the comedy will come from the sweetly naïve Tim having his eyes opened to a wider world while also trying to keep his principles in place. Like I say, a basic plot and it very much depends on what the script does within that frame.

There are plenty of ideas here and plenty of set-pieces but the problem is that the film doesn't really deliver any of them really well. On one hand we have aspects of it that are the rather awkward naïve comedy that Helms does with his character in The Office. This manifests itself in his relationship with an older woman (she is having fun, he is deeply in love) or his inability to know a prostitute when he sees one. On the other hand we have the more exaggerated adventures he gets drawn into, these involving sex, drink and drugs. Neither of these two aspects is particularly strong either individually or together and, at best, they produce amusing moments and the occasionally laugh but nothing particularly engaging nor particularly funny. Instead what we get is plenty going on in terms of noise and activity and perhaps this is enough to distract and, for me, mostly it was. The actual plot is quite obvious and heads to a sort of solid ending but I was quite surprised by how lackluster much of it was.

The cast are perhaps part of me being disappointed in the outcome but all of them are capable of more. I liked Helms and he played the lead role well, just the material didn't play to his strengths as well as it suggested – it is like it put him between the awkwardness of The Office and the crude slapstick of The Hangover and he didn't sit comfortably between them. Reilly appears to offer the more boisterous side of things but again the film doesn't follow through on what he brings. Heche is a nice touch in casting and works well but Whitlock is wasted; his only contribution of note is to make a great little in-joke where he does an impression of The Wire's Omar (a TV show he was in) – it is funny but it is ruined within seconds since the film feels the need to explain the reference to the viewer. Various other faces do solid work without ever having too much to do, so while some are good, the overall feel is that a great cast don't have much to do. This feeling covers Smith, Shawat Corddry, Root and others.

In the end Cedar Rapids is an OK film that never gets close to delivering on anything it puts on the table. It has an odd mix of styles but it doesn't do any of them really well, which leaves a film loaded with recognizable faces and names, none of whom really excel because the script doesn't either. A solid so-so but no more than that.

In all fairness I've never seen any other coming-of-age films for 40 somethings, so it's not much of a competition. But if this movie is any indication, there should be more.

"Cedar Rapids" is the story of a 40 something small town insurance salesman "Lippe" (Ed Helms) who leaves his small town for the first time. He travels to Cedar Rapids for an insurance convention in what turns out to be sort of a spring break for grown ups. And amidst all the hijinks he realizes some startling realizations about the real world which you & I might take for granted, but as seen through the eyes of a sheltered overgrown boyscout like Lippe, these realizations take on new meaning.

Yes, it's a comedy, but don't expect a raucous madcap misadventure like your standard teen coming-of-age flick. Instead what sets this apart is its level of maturity while being wacky. Lippe isn't stupid, he's just sheltered. So he learns quickly, and that's the power of this story. A plot like this could've easily been played for cheap laughs, but instead it forsakes the predictable cartoonish gags in lieu of something more like real life. That's not saying it's boring or dry (Lippe has his first exposure to alcohol, skinny dipping, prostitutes, drugs and fights, not to mention his hilariously awkward first time meeting a black man) so there's plenty going on. But it's all handled very tastefully--almost charmingly--rather than silly. And yet you still laugh because it's just so bizarre.

At the heart of the film is a timeless revelation we all can appreciate: what happens when the protected bubble you've lived in suddenly pops? Whether you're a kid learning there's no Santa Claus, or an adult learning that your idealistic view of the world was naïve, the feeling is the same, and this movie captures that feeling in a great way.

The entire cast is spectacular with a stand out performance by John C Reilly (you might recognize as "Dewey Cox" in Walk Hard) who plays a despicable cheeseball "Ziegler" whom you come to love. Isiah Whitlock Jr plays "Ronimal", Lippe's first black friend, who is almost as clueless as Lippe but stay tuned as he does an awesome parody of the gritty tv show "The Wire" (which Whitlock starred in). Rounding out Lippe's circle of new misfit friends is Anne Heche who plays "O-Fox", sort of the convention slut.

"Cedar Rapids" is a really clever and entertaining story that doesn't sink to crass humor to make its point (ok maybe there's 1 fart joke during the end credits). In a weird way it reminded me of "Planes, Trains & Automobiles" or maybe the hilarious indie real estate comedy "Open House". I never thought I'd sit through a 90 min movie about an insurance convention, but this one really surprised me.