The Reel Critic Tropic Thunder

Author: Jason Guitierrez

Ben Stiller has always been hit and miss as an actor (hilarious in films like "Dodgeball" but does anyone remember 2003's "Duplex"? I didn't think so) and a director ("Reality Bites?" Not so much). So it is with his latest offering, the ninety-two million dollar war comedy "Tropic Thunder," a film of gut-busting hilarity one second and infuriating inanity the next.

To call "Tropic Thunder" a spoof would not really do justice to the film, which revolves around a simple and intriguing "what-if" scenario: what if a group of prima-donna actors making a war film found themselves dropped in the middle of a jungle by a director who has found himself at his wits' end? What if this jungle was also the home of a heroin cartel that mistakes the actors for real military forces? That's the set-up. The payoff is watching Stiller (playing a beefed up action star), Jack Black (the comedian and heroin addict), and Robert Downey Jr. (the method actor in black face) try and make it work. The results are hit and miss, although they do hit far more often than not.

The film's highlights are almost entirely due to the cast members whose names aren't up on the marquee. Nick Nolte is hilarious and looks crazier than ever before as the real life soldier upon whose story the film-within-a-film is based. Steve Coogan is at his deadpan best as the film's frazzled director, and Judd Apatow regular Jay Baruchel is perfect as a young actor in a cast full of overpaid blowhards. I am reticent to mention one performer because the surprise of seeing the actor is half the fun, but I will say that a very well-known star in very good makeup is given the opportunity to go on the best profanity-laced diatribes I've seen in a while, and that alone is worth the price of admission.

The real showstopper, though, is Robert Downey Jr., who embraces what could have been one of the more offensive roles in recent memory with such infectious energy that it is impossible not to get caught up in the performance and laugh. Downey Jr.'s career has been on an upswing recently with his star remaking roles in last year's "Zodiac" and one of this summer's other blockbusters, "Iron Man." "Tropic Thunder" is one more sign that the once troubled star is back in top form.

But, unfortunately, "Tropic Thunder" is far from the perfect comedy. Jack Black is an enormous comedic talent, but he was given far too little to do. He does get the film's best line, but his participation in the film was wasted on a character that is whiny and irritatingly unfunny.

The film tries to walk a very fine line between being a comedy and being a war film, with all the explosions and action that entails. The problem is that these integral parts of war films threaten to overtake the comedic aspects of the film. Stiller doesn't seem to be particularly interested in lampooning war films, so much as making a comedy that incorporates the generic trappings of war films. It is tricky business that doesn't always work as successfully as one might hope, as the film threatens to overload the senses at times, thus relegating any humor to the background.

Another problem arises when Stiller & Co. attempt to lambaste the Hollywood machine. It is funny, but there is also a smack of disingenuousness about the swipes at Hollywood and the enormous egos that create the fantasies they market to global audiences. "Tropic Thunder" is a big budget feature that had the backing of a large studio. This is a product of the very machine Stiller so wants to critique. I don't mind him biting the hand that feeds, nor do I see anything particularly hypocritical about it, but occasionally you get the sense that Stiller doesn't really believe the satire he's selling, and it's at that point that the message becomes muddied and stops being funny. To top it off, many of the Hollywood jokes are so topical that they won't be funny six months from now, and some aren't even funny now because the zeitgeist has already moved on.

Really, though, those moments are few and far between. Most of "Tropic Thunder" is funny and monstrously entertaining, but my advice would be to catch it quick before the jokes get stale and it stops being a comedy that is part war film and starts being a war film that is funnier than the standard war flick.