Movie Review: "MacGruber"

I'll admit I had very low expectations walking into this movie. SNL hasn't been funny or made funny movies since I was in diapers (that was more recently than you'd expect). In fact Andy Samburg may top my list at the 'entertainer' I hate the most in the world. He's clearly an idiot and the people that think he's funny are what's killing the intelligence of our nation. I'm tempted to make another graph here about what's rotting American youth. Even previously funny SNL stars and writers have turned to movies like Land of the Lost and the worst of the worst, Step Brothers. I rant more about Step Brothers here. I'm not allowed to say anything else negative about it however so lets move on. 

Logically there is no reason to believe that a movie written by people from SNL, starring people from SNL, and directed by a writer of SNL would be anything better than the worst thing ever. So, I was pleasantly surprised when it wasn't the worst thing ever. It was, in fact, rather hysterical and so stupid it's almost brilliant. There is quite the fine line between satire and spoof: satire is Shaun of the Dead- smart, clever, and subtle while spoof is Scary Movie 4- loud, obvious, and making quite sure everyone including the dimmest of people get the jokes they're trying to make. I like satire. I think it's more what comedy should be. But some of the greatest comedy films in history are spoofs (namely Airplane! and Monty Python and the Holy Grail). Good spoofs these days, however are like unicorns. I'm here to say that Macgruber is a good spoof. Everything going on in it is incredibly ridiculous, yet it is performed with such sincerity. Characters in a comedy should never know they are in a comedy. That's the golden rule and Macgruber follows it. I enjoyed myself and laughed a lot. It wasn't a great movie, but it was a good ride.

B