Funny People Throws Expectations Out the Window for Adam Sandler and Seth Rogan.

Posted by ScuzzBuster

August 7, 2009

funny1sheet The marketing for Funny People has to be the biggest act of cowardice in a movie marketing campaign in 2009. The trailers are desperately trying to sell this film as an Adam Sandler, Seth Rogan crazy laugh fest. There are plenty of laughs in the film, but the truth is that this is a serious, thoughtful character study that may be Judd Apatow’s best work as well as one of the best film’s I’ve seen this year, certainly not something I expected to say coming out of an Adam Sandler film.

funny4 Funny People slams the lid shut on the crazy comedy aspect in the first 10 minutes as the film opens with middle-aged comedian George Simmons, played by Sandler, getting the news that he has a terminal illness that’s already in advanced stages. Simmons’ career is very much a giant mirror held up to Sandler himself. He’s a stand up that launched into a massively successful film career playing wacky, but pretty unsubstantial roles in films worshipped mainly by the unwashed masses of film goers and kids. In a haze of uncertainty, the news drives Simmons to show up one of the comedy clubs where he got his start where he takes the stage and gives a morose, unfunny, and disturbing set.

Seth Rogan plays Ira, an average joe who spends his weekends hanging around the comedy club taking the chances he gets to plug holes between sets from the the paid comedians. Make no mistake, Ira is dreadfully unfunny as a standup. His material is not terrible, but he’s so uncomfortable and unsure of himself that he only manages to make any impact on the audience by dragging Simmon’s weird and depressing off-the-cuff performance around for a few cheap zingers.

One thing leads to another and Simmons, realizing that his head is in no place to craft new standup material, calls Rogan to write some jokes for him for a corporate gig and ends up offering him a weekly fee to hang around with him to do some joke writing as he decides to take the last weeks or months of his life to go back to his roots and do stand up. The truth is, Sandler’s character is just paying Rogan to be a payroll friend and assistant.

funny2 There are several layers to the story and it takes some interesting and unexpected turns. The screenplay is damned solid, but Rogan and Sandler’s chemistry together is unexpected and brilliant. Sandler gives a serious performance that quite honestly blew me away. As a seasoned veteran, it’s not really that big of a surprise to see Sandler have this role in him, but on the flip side of that coin, Seth Rogan gives the best performance of his young career. This is not just lip service for Rogan, either. He’s not just acceptable in a demanding role, he’s downright outstanding.

What Funny People ends up coming down to is a competent script with two surprisingly good lead actors driving it home. In this sense, the marketing of this as another “Sandler” or “Rogan” film in their list of wacky comedies is completely off the mark. Most of the laughs in this film come from the stand up bits that are interspersed with the narrative or the characters trying to one up themselves.

If there’s any sin in this film is that it’s probably a bit longer than it needs to be and it seems to suffer from an extended third act. About two thirds of the way through, there is a major unexpected twist that completely changes the face of the narrative and turns all of our leads motivations and actions on their heads. It’s at this point where the film either has the chance to collapse or reveal what it’s really been about from the start. Sandler’s Simmons has spent the film facing down death’s door and Rogan’s Ira has been burdened with Sandler’s illness on multiple fronts. How each of these characters grows and changes from these events is surprising, but probably as about as real as life gets.

funny1 strong>The backdrop of this relationship and dealing with terminal illness is the growth of Rogan’s Ira, who at the film’s opening seems hopelessly inept in his quest for having any chance at a paying career in comedy. Working with Simmons and because of the opportunities Simmon’s gives Ira over this period we see him grow and develop into a competent showman. Funny People doesn’t start out as a story about a couple of fill in stand ups brimming with potential just not getting their shots. Ira is downright terrible at the start. In fact, all of the post midnight fill in stand ups featured in the opening scenes are pretty much awful. This quest is what really fleshes out the film to allow it to begin to work on multiple levels.

Funny People is ends up coming down to a set of uncomfortable and awkward circumstances that quickly spiral out of control driven by some poorly thought out and selfish decisions by one of our main characters in the final act of the film. All this leads to a test of principles for each of our leads. This section of the film may be what really ends up stretched a bit too long, but that’s really a nitpick criticism of a film that works mostly without fail from beginning to end.

funny3 I’m not one to disregard how important expectations going into a film ultimately color my final assessment of how much I enjoy it, and to be fair, I expected to head into Funny People for a light couple of hours that would hopefully cause me to crack a few smiles. What I got was so much more that I couldn’t help being incredibly satisfied. Funny People is one of the freshest surprises of the year for me. It manages to deliver on much of the laughs promised by the rather misleading ad campaign while still giving us a substantial, thought-provoking story accented by two incredibly thoughtful performances by it’s leads.

This film definitely gets a hearty recommendation from me. Don’t let this one pass by if you’re still waffling on whether it’s worth the trip to the cinema.

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