Metacritic reviews

Generates enough inspired lunacy to sail past the arid stretches and provide a welcome splash of breezy, at times jaw-droppingly bizarre summer fun.

It's hard to say whether Anchorman is the funniest movie of the year - it has enough offbeat and gut-busting moments to make it worth consideration in that category.

Does make you laugh even if you hate yourself for doing so. A creation of former "Saturday Night Live" colleagues, the comedy plays like an extended skit with bits of improvisation and several slightly extended sequences.

In McKay, Ferrell has found an unusually simpatico collaborator for the type of humor that's made him a comedy force: outsized, unexpectedly sweet, and unrelenting.

At its best it plays like modern-day Marx Brothers in which every single thing that happens makes no sense and serves no purpose and nothing happens for any reason at all. It exists solely to get a laugh, not to make a point.

The movie is funny when it's nasty, as when Ron and Veronica trade insults at the anchor desk. Most of the time, though, it's not nasty enough.

As parody, it's toothless and often smug, but as random Ferrellspeak generator, it has its delights.

A lazy, self-satisfied piece of work -- a comedy made by people who think so highly of themselves, they assume they'll get a laugh just by showing up in front of the camera.

Anchorman has one amusing character, a dumb weatherman played by Steve Carell, and a nicely observed set piece about what newscasters really say to one another when they're shuffling papers between segments. Otherwise it's a long string of heavy-footed sight and sound gags.

Imagine a movie where every character is more self-centered than Ted Baxter in "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" of old, add a caboodle of idiotic jokes, and you have some idea of this ugly, unfunny farce.