OBSERVE AND REPORT

WARNER BROS 

RELEASED 24 April 2009

Ronnie Barnhardt (Seth Rogen) is the head of security at the Forest Ridge mall. His team consists of a lisping, camp Hispanic called Dennis (Michael Pena) and the chubby, bespectacled Asian Yuen brothers (actors actually called the Yuan Brothers, John and Matt!). This security outfit don’t so much patrol the mall as wander it like leery teenagers, eyeing up female shoppers, being unprofessional with shop staff such as make-up counter girl Brandi (Anna Faris), and utterly failing to apprehend a flasher. When Detective Harrison (Ray Liotta) of the Conway Police is called in to investigate, Ronnie takes umbrage, at the same time wondering whether he could answer a higher calling and be a cop.

This is a dark comedy. It’s ‘Taxi Driver’ played for laughs, with Seth Rogen stepping into Robert DeNiro’s shoes. The longer it goes on, the more you come to realise the main character has no idea what’s morally correct. It’s un-PC, and there’s a particulary questionable sex scene that contains a joke during what could be constituted as date-rape. It’s also extremely uneven, with much of the humour being based around the F-word. However, the first fifteen minutes are funny, and the last ten minutes are funny, but the sixty minutes in the middle seems to drag and become repetitive. Standout bits are a ‘swear-off’ between Ronnie and an Asian shop worker (they say ‘F*** you’ back and forth in different ways and varying volume), and there’s a great homage to ‘Flash Gordon’. You know the bit where Flash plays American Football with Ming’s bodyguards, to the strains of Queen’s music (track ‘The Hero’)? Well Ronnie fights the cops in the same way to the same music. If you’re a ‘Flash’ fan, you’re going to love this bit. 

I was looking forwards to enjoying Liotta in a comic role, but he’s barely given anything amusing to say. Rogen plays the same character he always plays, although admittedly a slightly more unhinged version. Michael Pena is unquestionably the hit performance of the movie, delivering a laugh with everything he says.

Written and directed by Jody Hill (The Foot Fist Way), ‘Observe and Report’ seems determined to be an anti-Hollywood comedy. It positively revels in it’s socially inept characters, and the ugliness of what they think. I would be lying if I said I didn’t find the film funny in parts, but I didn’t really like the film very much. It seemed quite nihilistic. Ronnie does hard drugs, beats up teenagers, shoots someone, and has sex with a barely consensual woman. Put like that, does this entertain you?

TWO OUT OF FIVE