Tropic Thunder

Tropic Thunder is a comedy inspired by what goes on behind the camera, and having a laugh at the vanity, greed, shallowness of the industry. It's funny, but I had a feeling that because many of the jokes are based on life in front of the camera, industry jokes, it might be funnier for hollywood professionals than for joe blow movie fans. You don't have to be a car washer to get the humor in Car Wash, and that's because the humor was about common human foibles. The problem with Tropic Thunder is that the humor is not aimed at human vanity or egos and is very specific to actors and the movie business. This creates a distance with the audience, a sense of sharing the experience with what is happening on the screen. This is why you root for a character or boo them. Because so much of the story is specific to the Hollywood experience, rather than human experience, Tropic Thunder has a difficult time engaging the audience. I think this is why critics have given it less than unanimous praise. However, even with it's flaws the movie is better than many comedies of the last few years, including several starring Ben Stiller himself.

What is going on with this movie?
This movie was written and directed by Ben Stiller and Etan Cohen. It's based on an idea that Stiller has been kicking around for two decades. The movie is a satire of the movie industry and of actor's vanities. Curiously it's also about personal identity being overtaken by situations the characters fine themselves in. Somewhere in there is a message about societal roles and the fight back to the person we really are. The major characters cycle through different personas and possible personas as the movie progresses until the end where they arrive at who they really are. Except Tom Cruise's character, the only one in the movie who is exactly who he presents himself to be. Ironic because Tom Cruise himself is unrecognizable in a fat suit, monstrously large prosthetic hands and a bald head.

Will you enjoy this movie?
The beginning of the movie is a blast because it features fake trailers from movies made by the actors portrayed in the film. Robert Downey Jr. plays a method actor named Kirk Lazarus who takes on the role of a black man. The comedy comes from his determination to inhabit the role even off camera, going so far as to undergo a surgical procedure to turn his skin black. Reportedly this quirk of inhabiting a character was inspired by Downey's habit of doing so. His character, Kirk Lazarus, has a fake website too. As of this writing the trailer is not online. Visit the Kirk Lazarus website and be sure to click on the link to the Satan's Alley website. It's the site for his fake movie about a medieval monk caught up in a "sinful" affair. The trailer's hilarious and perhaps it's a good thing they didn't upload it to the fake movie site. There's another trailer in there with the memorable quote, "You make my pee pee maker tingle." Is that line supposed to be juvenile? No, it's a satire. This seems to have been lost on some audiences and critics.

After the trailers the movie becomes a matter of taste. I tend to laugh out loud and perhaps I was the loudest in the theater. There were times though when it seemed others in the audience weren't getting some of the humor. That might be because while there's a fair bit of gross out humor, there may be some cultural and cinematic touchstones that may fly over the heads of some audiences. I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. It's not perfect, but it's far from boring.