by Larae Meadows

Created on: August 13, 2008   Last Updated: August 14, 2008

Tropic Thunder is a movie about making a movie by not making a movie. It is a wild romp through joke-infested jungles that occasionally steps on a comedy landmine.

Director Damien Cockburn (Steve Coogan) assembles a star studded cast of actors to grace his war movie. Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller) is the group's action star, Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black) is the drug addicted comedian, Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr.) is the award-winning Australian actor, Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson) is the rabble's rapper-turned-actor and rounding out the group is the geek Kevin Sandusky (Jay Baruchel). During filming the actors can't work together, can't get their lines out, and can't be directed at all. Facing pressure from the financial backer of the movie, Cockburn listens to Four Leaf Tayback (Nick Nolte), the author of the book the movie is based on, and sends the group out into the jungle with no way out. Instead of shooting a war flick gorilla style, they end up shooting guns gorilla style.

Tropic Thunder opens with a group of fake commercials and trailers. My best guess is that it is Ben Stiller's way of letting us get to know the characters a little better before the opening of the movie. It is kind of a cinematic prologue. The commercial is funny but the last trailer is by far the funniest of the opening sequence.

After the faux trailers, it takes a while for Tropic Thunder to regain that same level of comedy. It isn't until the team is dropped in the jungle that the audience's patience pays off during one of the most OH MY GOD moments I've seen in a long time. So stunning and surprising, it is so wrong that your laughter feels dirty, which makes it that much more hysterical.

Jack Black probably could have been replace by any Saturday Night Live cast member, past or present, without much difference in quality. Ben Stiller earned a couple of chuckles from me. Robert Downey Jr. delivers lines like "Never go full retard" so seriously, it is impossible not to laugh. Downey Jr. isn't irreplaceable, though.

The real stars of Tropic Thunder were the supporting actors. Brandon T. Jackson, Jay Baruchel, Matthew McConaughey, and Tom Cruise give the rumble to Tropic Thunder. They are so outrageous and deliver the outrageousness with such conviction, it is impossible not to believe them and nearly impossible not to laugh.

It isn't all chuckles in Tropic Thunder. There are times it drags jokes too far and breezes too quickly through those scenes that should linger. The personality flaws of the characters are dull and unoriginal. Tropic Thunder offers nothing smart under the layer of stupidity; it is just a juvenile comedy.

Sometimes, occasionally, every so often, maybe, it's ok to watch a movie that doesn't challenge the mind, it just tickles the watcher a little. Tropic Thunder tickled my funny bone.

Tropic Thunder is a head-slapping, head-shaking comedy. Tropic Thunder is like an unfunny uncle who tries to do funny things to make their niece laugh and those things aren't funny but the niece can't help but laugh at him because he is trying so hard to be funny.
If I was washing the dishes and needed some light background noise to listen to, I'd pop in Tropic Thunder. It isn't one I'd run out to the theater to see, but I might rent the DVD.

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