REVIEW: Tropic Thunder1

So I saw the new action-comedy “Tropic Thunder” last Tuesday, and here’s my review of Ben Stiller’s rendering of a bunch of really strange (but recognizeable) actors going to a real warzone to shoot a movie. It stars Ben Stiller (who also directs and produces), Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. – as well as a few other familiar faces. More on that later though! Let’s just dive straight into the review – which is kept relatively spoiler-free.

I remember seeing the first trailer pop up for this film way back in March, around the same time “Iron Man” (which also stars Downey Jr.). I’ve probably seen the red-band trailer for the film a hundered times, so I was pretty hyped to see this film – perhaps even more so than I was when seeing “The Dark Knight”.

Well, the story is pretty simple, but quite genius. The main story is about an up-rising director, Damien Cockburn (Steve Coogan) who has set out to do the most spectacular war movie ever. When we join the production, the entire team is in Vietnam, shooting scenes for the film. The film stars three vastly different actors, the Sylvester Stallone-inspired action movie hero Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller), the Australian five time Academy Award winner Kirk Lazarus, who underwent an entire skin pigmentation change just to be able to play the platoon’s african-american sergeant (Robert Downey Jr.) and the heroin-addicted comedy actor Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black). Because of the actors’ differences, the film is pretty much ruined from the get-go, and when getting threatened by the supervising studio that film needs to either get itself together or be shut down, the war veteran whose book the film is based on, Four Leaf Tayback (Nick Nolte), suggests to the director that the film will be much better if shot guerilla-style in real warzone locations. With no real other choice, our director Damien Cockburn agrees and just so, him, Four Leaf, the main actors and the pyrotechnics expert on the film fly to a jungle a few miles away where the actors are asked to shoot the scenes neccessary, as the director has “rigged this entire valley of death with hidden cameras”. By circumstances I can’t say in this review, the actors are left to their fate and just relying on their script, have to find a way to get out of the forest, while avoiding guerilla soldiers who believe they are real American soldiers. I really liked the story of the film, as it’s pretty much laugh-out-loud funny pretty much constantly. There’s no slow periods in the film, and it’s all good fun. I’d really like to se Ben Stiller do an all-out action film though, as the action sequences in this film are really, really cool.

This really is Robert Downey Jr.’s year, as he’s equally, if not more, good in this role as he was in “Iron Man”. He plays the role of Kirk Lazarus – the extreme method actor who by no means will drop his character “before the DVD commentary”. In some aspects I think the writers have looked towards another famous Australian method-actor, whose not afraid to beat down press photographers (which also Lazarus does in the film)…going to leave it unsaid, but I’m pretty sure you know who I’m talking about. While both Stiller, Downey Jr. and Black are great in their roles, the best character and performance is by far given by Tom Cruise, who plays the really temperamental studio executive in charge of producing the film. It’s been a really long time since we saw him in anything funny, albeit anything at all, so it’s really cool to finally see him back in a big film (also, he is my favorite actor so I might not be entirely objective). Make sure you don’t just walk away when the credits start rolling, as if you’ll do, you’ll miss what I think is by far the funniest scene.

One thing which I thought was really cool was the production values of the film. For a comedy, I’m pretty sure this must’ve been one of the more expensive ones. The opening scene from the “film” are really cool, and show special effects of caliber we usually only see in real war films. The sound design and music are equally great, with each action scene being accompanied by classic themes from old films. Can’t wait to see this again, either in cinemas, or on Blu-Ray (hopefully before christmas!).

So, while this really isn’t up there with “The Dark Knight”, which still is this year’s best film, it’s a really fun ride and pretty much a must-see for anyone who likes to laugh!