Tropic Thunder

It might be your natural reaction, but don’t go screaming and running in the other direction when you hear the names Ben Stiller and Jack Black! This is a movie they can be proud of, and you want to see it ASAP before everyone ruins the best jokes for you.

Stiller stars as Tugg Speedman – a big time action hero whose career is in rapid decline. In a continuing effort to prove his acting ability (or lack of it), he has signed on to star in a true life tale of heroism during the Vietnam War based on the book Tropic Thunder. In typical Hollywood fashion, a cast designed to appeal to every demographic has been assembled including the rap star and mogul Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson), the gross out comedian Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black), the fresh faced rookie Kevin Sandusky (Jay Baruchel) and multiple Oscar winner Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey, Jr.) – an Australian thespian who has undergone a controversial skin pigment alteration to play an African-American character (don’t get too nervous and call Jesse Jackson, it’s funny).

Of course, these Hollywood pretty boys are a little too soft for the hard conditions on location in Vietnam, and their whining is ruining any chance of finishing the movie on time or within budget, so the director (Steve Coogan) decides to drop them in the middle of nowhere to capture their honest reactions to the conditions around them. Little does he know, the director has wandered into a big time opium producing farm and the kingpin fears the stars are law enforcement, the fuzz, the smokies, the dudes with the badges (they need those stinkin’ badges).

Will the Hollywood heavyweights be able to make it out alive?

We have had some classic comedies in the last few years with films like The Wedding Crashers, Superbad and The 40-Year Old Virgin resonating in our funny bones, and you can count Tropic Thunder among them. Shockingly, this is one of the smartest movies of the year as writer/director Ben Stiller not only provides a parody of big action war movies, but also a parody of every aspect of Hollywood itself. No one escapes the mocking including Eddie Murphy, Sylvester Stallone, rap stars, Oscar, Hollywood producers, talent agents, actors, directors and more.

Stiller, along with co-writers Etan Cohen and Justin Theroux, skewer and roast every cliché to a tasty delight as the trio attacks the action genre and the industry with equal ferocity. Tropic Thunder is a movie trying to cause your eardrums to bleed with explosions so loud I’m surprised the Surgeon General doesn’t put a warning on it. Every over used and abused 60’s-era song gets infused into the action to make you laugh at the over familiarity, and the dialogue forces each character to be a complete stereotype for our enjoyment as we laugh at how silly the writing and characterizations become.

Then, Stiller and the team turn their sites on Hollywood with fantastic cameo appearances I am sure you have heard about by now, with a familiar face filling the role of a foulmouthed, vile and vulgar producer as well as another major star showing up as the sycophantic agent willing to do anything to make his client happy. The producer is the one you have heard the most about, but it’s the agent who is funnier.

Finally, the real star of Tropic Thunder is the man who took the most daring role. Downey proves his genius by making what could have been the most offensive character in movie history into one of the funniest. Without his ability to keep the character from being a complete abomination that would inspire picket lines, we are focused on the funny in Tropic Thunder instead of the offensive. With hilarious dialogue that can best be described as the worst jive talking in the history of movies, Downey brings Lazarus to life (yes, I went there).

Tropic Thunder might be the last big movie of the summer, but it was worth the wait.

Tropic Thunder is rated R for pervasive language including sexual references, violent content and drug material.