Tuesday, October 09, 2007

MR WOODCOCK is a big shiny formica coffee-table of nothingness

You must like getting spanked, Farley. I guess it runs in the family.MR WOODCOCK is a really mediocre comedy. Note that it's not actively piss-poor. It doesn't try hard enough to fail that spectacularly. It's all shiny surfaces and slick production and low on genuine belly-laughs. Billy Bob Thornton does his usual schtick as the eponymous mean, angry sonofabitch. Back in the day, he tortured a kid called John Farley. Years later Farley (Seann William Scott) is a successful author of self-help books and returns home to pick up a prestigious prize. Much to his horror, not only is the bullying Woodcock being feted as the "Educator of the Year", he's also dating Farley's mum. Farley and his best mate (Ethan Suplee) try to frame Woodcock as an adulterous bastard, but basically the son and the lover have to agree to disagree and keep Susan Sarandon's long-suffering Mrs F sweet. Billy Bob is on auto-pilot. Sarandon and Suplee are way too good for this nonsense. And Seann William Scott needs to graduate to proper rom-com roles. This movie, sadly, is too obviously filmed and written by newbies who have yet to get a clue.

MR WOODCOCK is on release in the UK and USA. It inflicts itself upon Singapore on October 11th; on Iceland on November 2nd; on Finland on November 30th; on Turkey on December 28th; on Argentina on January 3rd and on the Netherlands on February 14th.

No comments:

Post a Comment