Thus far, 5,000 people have voted this movie as a 9 or 10 star rating. There's really, honestly only one explanation for this: These people were associated with this movie and have something to gain by its being rated high enough to dupe people into buying it.
For a movie that was reviewed as being "Uproariously Funny" and "Hilarious" that has a cast of comedians, is located in the comedy section, and is called "Funny People" one would expect something along the lines of, oh, I don't know, a comedy.
Instead what you get is a two and a half hour long, poorly directed drama about a man who finds out he has a rare form of leukemia, has a 92% chance of dying, so decides to go on a last stand-up comedy tour but has lost his "funny." So he hires an aspiring stand-up comedian to do his writing for him.
It was as if they were trying very, very hard to show just how un-funny starting comedians were. In the scenes where some stand-up was seen, this would have been the opportune time to inject some comedy into this otherwise depressing and pointless movie. Instead, you get bad jokes, vulgar jokes, and groaners.
So the main character (George Simmons) begins talking to his (now married with two children) ex-girlfriend who was the "love of his life" (that left him because he cheated on her). Later discovering that he has miraculously beaten the odds, and is in fact getting better, the "love of his life" decides she will leave her husband, keeping the two children, and live with George. Ultimately, having already cheated on her husband and slept with George, she decides that he hasn't really changed all that much, and no lessons are learned by either party. She goes back to her husband attempting to lie about having slept with him. Yes... Really... This is the 2.5 hour plot.
The closest thing to "funny" in this movie was a very short fight scene between her husband and George that happens at about 2 hours and 15 minutes into the movie. There was also a ton of cameos of various comedians, and on all parts, they either failed to even have dialog, or their dialog was utterly pointless, and non-humorous. In fact, the funniest cameo in the whole movie came from a 10 second bit with Eminem. That should tell you something.
This movie would have deserved a 5 if they had cut out some of the completely undeveloped sub-plots, some of the inane, and incredibly long dialog, and made it a decent 1 hour, to 1.5 hour movie. However, after sitting through 2.5 hours of this move in the hopes that SOMETHING would climax and make me feel like it wasn't a complete waste, by the end, I was left feeling that this was yet another 2.5 hours of my life I would never get back.
To reiterate, there was just no comedy in the movie. Even the humor you see in the trailers, when actually put into context with the actual movie, still ends up being depressing.
The "40 Year Old Virgin" was brilliant, and I loved it. Don't let the fact that the same director was involved in this crap-storm fool you into buying it. If you must see it, rent it, or better still, con a friend into renting it so you at least won't be out the money.
-Javin
For a movie that was reviewed as being "Uproariously Funny" and "Hilarious" that has a cast of comedians, is located in the comedy section, and is called "Funny People" one would expect something along the lines of, oh, I don't know, a comedy.
Instead what you get is a two and a half hour long, poorly directed drama about a man who finds out he has a rare form of leukemia, has a 92% chance of dying, so decides to go on a last stand-up comedy tour but has lost his "funny." So he hires an aspiring stand-up comedian to do his writing for him.
It was as if they were trying very, very hard to show just how un-funny starting comedians were. In the scenes where some stand-up was seen, this would have been the opportune time to inject some comedy into this otherwise depressing and pointless movie. Instead, you get bad jokes, vulgar jokes, and groaners.
So the main character (George Simmons) begins talking to his (now married with two children) ex-girlfriend who was the "love of his life" (that left him because he cheated on her). Later discovering that he has miraculously beaten the odds, and is in fact getting better, the "love of his life" decides she will leave her husband, keeping the two children, and live with George. Ultimately, having already cheated on her husband and slept with George, she decides that he hasn't really changed all that much, and no lessons are learned by either party. She goes back to her husband attempting to lie about having slept with him. Yes... Really... This is the 2.5 hour plot.
The closest thing to "funny" in this movie was a very short fight scene between her husband and George that happens at about 2 hours and 15 minutes into the movie. There was also a ton of cameos of various comedians, and on all parts, they either failed to even have dialog, or their dialog was utterly pointless, and non-humorous. In fact, the funniest cameo in the whole movie came from a 10 second bit with Eminem. That should tell you something.
This movie would have deserved a 5 if they had cut out some of the completely undeveloped sub-plots, some of the inane, and incredibly long dialog, and made it a decent 1 hour, to 1.5 hour movie. However, after sitting through 2.5 hours of this move in the hopes that SOMETHING would climax and make me feel like it wasn't a complete waste, by the end, I was left feeling that this was yet another 2.5 hours of my life I would never get back.
To reiterate, there was just no comedy in the movie. Even the humor you see in the trailers, when actually put into context with the actual movie, still ends up being depressing.
The "40 Year Old Virgin" was brilliant, and I loved it. Don't let the fact that the same director was involved in this crap-storm fool you into buying it. If you must see it, rent it, or better still, con a friend into renting it so you at least won't be out the money.
-Javin