Killing is funny when these bosses are the targets
Published on Tue, Oct 4, 2011 by Bob ConnallyRead More Arts & Entertainment
"Horrible Bosses"
(Now Avail. - R)
According to the Flaming Lips, "You hate your boss at your job...but in your dreams you can blow his head off." For three friends, Nick (Jason Bateman), Dale (Charlie Day), and Kurt (Jason Sudeikis), these words truly resonate.
Kurt loved his previous boss, but now that his cokehead son Bobby (Colin Farrell) is in charge and demanding that Kurt "fire all the fat people," things have decidedly changed. Dale is a dental assistant who is happily engaged to Stacy (Lindsay Sloane), but unhappily working for man-eater Julia (Jennifer Aniston), whose advances are most unwelcome. Nick, meanwhile, has been passed over for a promotion several years in the making by the truly despicable Dave Harken (Kevin Spacey).
One night as the three best friends try to drink away their sorrows, they discuss "hypothetically" killing their bosses, something Dale is uncomfortable even joking about. That is until the next morning when Julia takes things way too far. From here the three decide that their lives would all be better without their bosses in them and they're going to make that dream a reality.
Written by Michael Markowitz, Jonathan Goldstein, and John Francis Daley, "Horrible Bosses" is a dark comedy that emphasizes the comedy. Thanks to its script, Seth Gordon's direction, and the uniformly terrific cast, it's just ceaselessly funny.
Bateman, Day, and Sudeikis play off of each other so well you'd think the three really had been best friends for years. There's a chemistry in their scenes together that just couldn't have worked any better. What the writers and actors also do here is keep these characters likeable in spite of what they plan to carry out. If that had faltered, this movie wouldn't have been able to sustain its premise.
As the horrible bosses in question, all three performers shine. Aniston delivers a performance far better than is typical for her. Generally her blandness sucks the life out of everything around her, but she's very funny here. Farrell, meanwhile, is obviously having a ball playing Bobby and he's every bit as much fun to watch. Spacey's character and performance are notable because of how not funny they are. Not in a flat, painfully unfunny way, but due to how genuinely risible Harken is. From the get-go, he is clearly the most horrible of the three to the point where you can't even laugh at the bile that spews from his mouth. This is a choice, however, that ultimately works.
There are also some wonderful cameos throughout the film that don't call unnecessary attention to themselves, and Jamie Foxx is a riot as the man the gang hopes will carry out the jobs for them.
"Horrible Bosses" is well written, well-acted, and directed with a soft touch by a man who was best known before this for making the documentary "The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters." You think it's going to run out of steam before the end, but it doesn't. This is a very funny film. 8.5/10.
(Now Avail. - R)
According to the Flaming Lips, "You hate your boss at your job...but in your dreams you can blow his head off." For three friends, Nick (Jason Bateman), Dale (Charlie Day), and Kurt (Jason Sudeikis), these words truly resonate.
Kurt loved his previous boss, but now that his cokehead son Bobby (Colin Farrell) is in charge and demanding that Kurt "fire all the fat people," things have decidedly changed. Dale is a dental assistant who is happily engaged to Stacy (Lindsay Sloane), but unhappily working for man-eater Julia (Jennifer Aniston), whose advances are most unwelcome. Nick, meanwhile, has been passed over for a promotion several years in the making by the truly despicable Dave Harken (Kevin Spacey).
One night as the three best friends try to drink away their sorrows, they discuss "hypothetically" killing their bosses, something Dale is uncomfortable even joking about. That is until the next morning when Julia takes things way too far. From here the three decide that their lives would all be better without their bosses in them and they're going to make that dream a reality.
Written by Michael Markowitz, Jonathan Goldstein, and John Francis Daley, "Horrible Bosses" is a dark comedy that emphasizes the comedy. Thanks to its script, Seth Gordon's direction, and the uniformly terrific cast, it's just ceaselessly funny.
Bateman, Day, and Sudeikis play off of each other so well you'd think the three really had been best friends for years. There's a chemistry in their scenes together that just couldn't have worked any better. What the writers and actors also do here is keep these characters likeable in spite of what they plan to carry out. If that had faltered, this movie wouldn't have been able to sustain its premise.
As the horrible bosses in question, all three performers shine. Aniston delivers a performance far better than is typical for her. Generally her blandness sucks the life out of everything around her, but she's very funny here. Farrell, meanwhile, is obviously having a ball playing Bobby and he's every bit as much fun to watch. Spacey's character and performance are notable because of how not funny they are. Not in a flat, painfully unfunny way, but due to how genuinely risible Harken is. From the get-go, he is clearly the most horrible of the three to the point where you can't even laugh at the bile that spews from his mouth. This is a choice, however, that ultimately works.
There are also some wonderful cameos throughout the film that don't call unnecessary attention to themselves, and Jamie Foxx is a riot as the man the gang hopes will carry out the jobs for them.
"Horrible Bosses" is well written, well-acted, and directed with a soft touch by a man who was best known before this for making the documentary "The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters." You think it's going to run out of steam before the end, but it doesn't. This is a very funny film. 8.5/10.