By now, the infamous “The Interview” is actually underrated. All the controversy and hype—none of it at the level anyone involved with the film ever thought it would be—has actually caused a backlash against the movie. Critics aren’t really getting behind it like they should, and now conservatives are equating seeing the movie with patriotism but concede that they don’t really like it, hate Rogen and Franco, and had no interest in watching this before the hacking scandal. And most of the millennials driving up online sales are expecting something much more outrageous (and stupid) than this comedy was ever meant to be, so they barely wait for the credits to roll before writing “this movie sucks!!!” on any app or site that will let them.
It’s not a movie for patriotic minded conservatives expecting Rambo 5. It’s not a movie that’s so outrageous teenagers feel they must see it. And it’s not a sober minded Oscar-bait movie that would normally play in the non-chain independent theaters (usually places ending in the words “Film Society”) that it’s been forced to take up residence in. So you have a movie where the people most likely to see it are the most likely to leave disappointed, and a lot of people who just enjoy good movies are being scared off by the overly harsh reviews. I’m still scratching my head at why critics are being so relentlessly nitpick-y towards this film. [Where was this need to pick apart scenes that don’t work and jokes that fall flat when they were giving out blanket passes to “Top Five” a week earlier?] It used to be the cool thing to defend controversial movies, not judge them waaay more harshly than any other film in theaters.
What Works: It’s marketed as a semi-buddy comedy with Rogen and Franco, and it is that, but the best relationship in the movie is the one between Franco’s shallow entertainment “journalist” Dave Skylark and Randall Park’s Kim Jong Un. Park (in a great performance) is actually much more sympathetic than I thought he would be, and I would argue he’s more three dimensional than the real Kim is. I was shocked at how complex this portrayal of him was: he’s insecure, vulnerable, isolated, too-easily-wounded, a Messiah figure (North Koreans view the Un family as downright supernatural) with an inferiority complex, cagey, and even strangely…gulp…likable. Sure, it may all be a game of wills with Franco’s Skylark, but when these two are on-screen together the movie becomes the comedic equivalent of a chess match or a hilarious version of Gus Fring and Walter White’s tense scenes in Breaking Bad.
Without their complicated bond, the movie wouldn’t work at all, but Skylark and Un find unexpected common ground as insecure young guys struggling to prove they’re substantial. They’re both misunderstood by the media while also being manipulators of said media, and the movie’s sly joke is that a famous person’s self-consciousness over their image (and need to be liked and/or respected) isn’t much different whether they’re a talk show host or a dictator.
They’re both trying to compartmentalize their inward feelings about each other with the fake “honey trap” they want the other one to fall into, but soon artificial “warmth” becomes real and the film suggests that there’s not much difference for two professional “performers.” Then it becomes obvious why Rogen and writing partner Evan Goldberg picked Kim Jong Un to assassinate: North Korea has bred a sense of “truthiness” so thoroughly into its culture that its reality is as fake as a Hollywood talk show.
What Doesn’t: The movie’s advertisements also play up Lizzy Caplan’s role as a CIA agent, but the true female lead of this is Diana Bang, who is fantastic as a North Korean propaganda minister. Unlike Park—who’s been great on shows like “Veep”—I’d never seen her in anything before, and I hope this leads to more major work for her, but who knows with this controversy?
What I Would Have Done Differently: Does every joke work? No. Are there some saggy sections in the movie? Sure. But why nitpick the most political comedy since “The Campaign?” Shouldn’t we be encouraging more movies that go for something a little bigger, especially comedies? It’s no “This is the End” but in an off-year for big studio movies, it’ll do just fine. Grade: A-
Well said. I totally agree.
Saw on NetFlix, it’s amazing!!
Very relevant atm!!!