Superbad (2007)

Had heard many good things about this - essentially a familiar sounding teen movie about three hapless guys looking to score with the ladies and the catastrophic chain of events that befall them as they try to make their way to a party in order to achieve the above - but I’m not sure it quite lived up to them. Sure, in parts this is very funny and it plays, again in parts, like a classic Fawlty Towers episode, where things just degenerate from bad to worse for the protagonists but you’re still left clinging to this bizarre sense of sympathy for the characters you’re never quite sure is fully deserved. This aspect it did very well.

However…

Oscar Reaction

Little late with this but...

The Good:

Tilda Switon winning Best Supporting Actress. Good speech too.

Javier Bardem showing a lot of class whilst accepting Best Supporting Actor. I prefered Casey Affleck but I'm not complaining at all about Bardem's win at all since he was outstanding.

Jonah Hill and Seth Rogen 'filling in' for Halle Berry and Judi Dench. That bit was funnier than anything Jon Stewart managed, aside from the pretend snide 'so arrogant' remark about Glen Hansard's Best Song win.

Marion Cotillard showing how much she cared about her Best Actress win but not breaking down in hysterics a la Halle Berry.

The Bad:

Why invite The Rock aka Dwayne Johnson to present an Oscar? Rubbish.

Why invite some girl no-one's ever heard of to present an Oscar? Double rubbish.

Me correctly predicting an upset in Best Actress but picking the wrong upsetter. I went for Ellen Page but Marion Cotillard got it. I actually predicted she'd win just before it was read out but too late to count.

Jon Stewart as host. Not bad per se but just not in the league of Steve Martin who anyone with taste must recognise as easily the best host of recent years.

The Ugly:

The cinematographer Roger Deakins has been nominated 7 times in his career. He's yet to win. He was nominated twice on Sunday and still couldn't win. His The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford work was the best of the year. How on earth was he snubbed yet again? This was a complete travesty. When Robert Elswit's name was read out Deakins just nodded as if to say "thought so". The man's cursed.

Superbad

Jonah Hill and Michael Cera in Superbad

The best comedy of the year in a year that's had more than it's fair share of better than fair comedy fare. Hot Fuzz was great as was Knocked Up but this wins hands down. Not perfect - a little too much downtime here and there - trim 10 minutes and I believe it would have been stronger. That said I enjoyed it immensely and I'm really seriously considering the possibility of Christopher Mintz-Plasse finding a spot on my top 5 actors comes year end for his terrific creation of McLovin'. An absolutely terrific debut performance.

Superbad is a high school teen movie, but one with brains and wit and a heart. Michael Cera pretty much reprises his Arrested Development persona but does so very well - he does the awkward teenager as well as anyone. Jonah Hill, who also appeared in Knocked Up, plays his best friend, and the film explores their last hurrah as high school seniors. It's one day in the life of two high school guys trying to get laid but if that doesn't sound particularly original then I'm doing it a disservice because you don't need originality if you do it this well.

Highly recommended. Go see it. Can't imagine anyone not enjoying it.

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