Kevin's Watch

I saw this in a nearly empty theater with my wife and younger son (13). We are huge fans of the first Anchorman, and big fans of Ferrell in general. This movie wasn't quite as funny or nearly as quotable as the first installment, but we laughed our asses off during many parts ... often the only people laughing in the theater. It's a bit slower, or perhaps more hit-or-miss, but the story was fairly interesting and it actually tried to say something critical about the news media evolving into entertainment. Each main character (the news team) got a hell of an introduction. We could not stop laughing at Champ's "chicken of the cave" bit.

I didn't like the first film when I initially saw it. I didn't hate it, but it disappointed me. Then it started percolating in my head....."milk was a bad choice"......"I'm going to punch you in the ovary"......and so on.

So I watched it again, and it got better. By the 4th time or so, I thought it was genius.

I'm hoping all the mediocre reviews of this one are due to the same phenomenon.

Saw it with my daughter last night. Freaking loved it. We had a decent-sized crowd of mostly high school kids, which may have helped a bit. Though we were the only ones laughing at most of the media-centric jokes (and no one in our theater got the BP joke).

It's also a vicious takedown of 24-hour cable news. Much more in-your-face than The Other Guys was regarding the financial sector.

And of course, there was another brawl.

The brawl was over the top, but that's how it was supposed to be, of course. When the Wes Mantooth music started playing, we all lost our shit. You knew he was coming before you saw him.

Yeah, the media-centric jokes were a nice surprise. It didn't feel preachy, either, as it easily could have, going in that direction. It was just the backdrop of the character arcs. Well done.

I haven't seen the movie yet, but my wife and I were discussing how it seems we are the only ones laughing in the movie theaters lately. Which reading this makes me wonder if it is really true, or if the sound system makes it so that you don't hear others. Either that or the damn kids of today have no sense of humor, or at least the ability to express it other than by typing "LOL" into their newfangled mobile cell-phones.
Sorry, I was having a "git offa mah lahwn" moment.

We saw Step Brothers in the theater, and I can honestly say that was the hardest I've laughed in a theater since This is Spinal Tap. The rest of the crowd was (as is happening with depressing frequency) much younger than us, and they were yukking it up pretty well too.

We had a similar crowd for Anchorman 2, and they were relatively lively. The funny thing though was that they missed most of the topical jokes, and the skewering of cable news went right over their heads.

Yeah, Cag, it seems that we're the only ones laughing quite a lot lately. You might be on to something with the cell phone comment. My wife and I don't have smart phones, so we spend no time staring at a little screen every where we go. Maybe with so many people feeling isolated in public--plugging their ears with earbuds, surfing on their phones no matter where they are--maybe they're just not as comfortable sharing a laugh out loud with a crowd anymore. Maybe the technological buffers we depend on to give us a sense of anonymity are dulling our capacity to be with each other.

People sure as hell seem oblivious, as long as they have that screen in their hand. At the Hobbit midnight double-feature, opening night, you'd expect people to be into the movie. But after the little cartoon that playfully warns people to put up their phones, and even the explicit threat booming though the sound system, "Don't be the guy we escort from the theater, because we will," there was still this one guy down in front with his massive smart phone dazzling everyone's eyes in the dark. The movie started, and I could feel my blood pressure rising. I decided to give him a few minutes to put it away, but he didn't, so I went down and asked him to please put it up.

You want to guess what this guy was doing? Playing Monopoly on his phone. At the Hobbit. Who the *%# pays $20 to see a double feature at midnight, then spends his time playing freakin Monopoly on his phone?

Then I realized this is probably how he spends all his time. That's how he watches TV, spends time with his family, and probably drives down the road.

People bug me.

Zarathustra wrote: People bug me.

Welcome to the club.

Hashi Lebwohl wrote:

Zarathustra wrote: People bug me.

Welcome to the club.

seconded, or third/