Given how incredibly over-exposed celebrities are, especially in contrast to how little work some appear to do, it’s surprising how seldom the darker side of Hollywood is discussed. No, not alcoholism, cocaine binges, and sex tapes. Oscar baiting. Oscar baiting is a difficult topic to bring up because it can result in some politically incorrect opinions. And frankly, sometimes it’s just easier to lie and accept pandering as talent.
Tropic Thunder, however, takes a well-deserved stab at actors who are perpetually searching for Oscar gold not via talent, but via working Academy politics. It’s something worthy of not just mockery, but a flat-out indictment. It’s been done before, to a degree. Kate Winslet’s cameo on Ricky Gervais’ Extras took on the big gun: holocaust movies. Holocaust Oscar-bait is generally the easiest target, but Tropic Thunder director and star Ben Stiller wisely avoids the subject, since Holocaust movies are (regardless of intention) generally not offensive to the subject. The same cannot be said for the Hollywood types that Stiller skewers.
Tropic Thunder opens with fake ads and trailers: always a good sign. Brandon T. Jackson’s Alpa Chino (yeah, I know..) hocks an energy drink called “booty sweat”. Then Stiller’s Tugg Speedman appears in a trailer for the one-liner driven actioner Scorcher VI, which is classy enough to use roman numerals, but stupid enough to be a fifth sequel. The Fatties- Fart Two features Jack Black’s Jeff Portnoy as a host of characters in fatsuits and bad makeup farting perpetually. And finally, One-time Oscar nominee Robert Downey Jr’s 5-time Oscar winner Kirk Lazarus stars as a gay monk alongside Tobey Maguire in the art-house Satan’s Alley.
Cut to an epic battle in Vietnam. Which cuts to director Damien Cockburn having an epic hissy-fit on the set of Tropic Thunder, based on the autobiography of Nick Nolte’s “Four Leaf” Tayback. At the suggestion of Four Leaf, Damien Cockburn decides to send the cast into the jungle and shoot the film guerilla-style with hidden cameras. Hilarity, danger, and self-discovery ensues.
Tropic Thunder works less often that it should. Mainly because it’s trying to be two different movies. It’s a legitimate action flick, despite parodying them, but it’s also a goofy comedy. And while I’ve made no secret of my love for the recent trend of homage/parody movies, the goofier elements of it fall flat. But first the good: Ben Stiller’s not normally known for his directing, but it’s a really impressive feat, given the scale of some of the scenes. A lot’s been made of Robert Downey Jr’s blackface performance, and it’s very impressive. But it’s largely the lesser-known actors who made the biggest impression on me. Jay Baruchel, who starred in Judd Apatow’s Undeclared and Knocked Up, very nearly steals a number of scenes as the only actor in the bunch who actually takes his job seriously. And similarly, Brandon Jackson is able to match Downey in their scenes together. Jack Black and Ben Stiller are in familiar territory, and there aren’t any real surprises from either of them in this one, but they’re not phoning it in either.
The problems come when the story deviates from the actors and crew in the jungle. Stiller cast Tom Cruise and Matthew McConaghey in the two largest support roles, and it’s jarring to switch from Downey et al so immersed in their roles to Cruise and McConaghey effectively just having fun on set. Celebrity cameos made sense in Zoolander, but they just didn’t work in Tropic Thunder. What impressed me in the movie wasn’t how many celebrity friends Ben Stiller could persuade into making an appearance, but how many great performances were found in such a ridiculous situation.
But still, it’s effectively the Robert Downey Jr. show. It takes an incredible actor to achieve subtlety while playing an actor who changed his skin colour for a movie. It’s kind of a shame that Stiller took an easy comedy route by having Tom Cruise yell profanities in a fat suit when there’s so many great aspects that could have been more dominant. But it’s a well-deserved attack on actors and producers who play politics for fame and fortune when it works, it in those instances, it works really well.
B-