“Sssshhh. I was bad yesterday. After Hope Springs, I jumped theaters to The Campaign. It’s only the second time I ever do that. But last time I went to the Common, I never left the halls so my second ticked didn’t even get ripped. I did spend a few bucks playing a crane game, but then I won a little alligator so maybe I did end up costing them money. Oh well AMC deserves it for closing Harvard and making me go to the Common.
The Campaign. Will Ferrell vs Zach Galifianakis. Two actors I respect, but have mixed feelings about. I’ve pretty much got Ferrell figured. When he has boundaries, I love him. If his character is more realistic/sincere/grounded I like him. If he’s over the top, then it works best in small doses. Here, he approached over the top a bit, but for the most part was on the real side of the spectrum, and his outbursts were contained. In other words, it worked. Galifianakis plays a certain type of role real well. He had a different characterization of that oblivious but well meaning strange person, but at its heart, its still the same of what he does best (only?).
For me, the real win of this movie was the campaign managers. They were pretty. Zach Galifianakis had a smoldering Dylan McDermott, cooly watching everything from the background with a piercing gaze. His humor came more from his placement or small mannerisms, and it was a nice subtle contrast to our larger than life leads. Will Ferrell’s wingman was Jason Sudeikis. I’m really getting a crush on that guy, he’s so cute and charming. He also was a good contrast to his more blatant counterpart, with smaller scale gages but more clever one liners.
I did find myself laughing a bit more than I usually do for these guys’ films, but still not quite as much as I would for the more dialogue driven comedies that I love. And of course I dont need to point out the obvious timeliness of the film given elections later this year. Certainly fun to to be able to put a movie like this in current event context.
The Campaign – \m/ \m/ \m/