Year One (2009)
★ / ★★★★
“Year One,” written and directed by Harold Ramis, was another one of those movies that looked really funny on the trailers but was actually devoid of laughs in the actual film. Jack Black and Michael Cera star as Zed and Oh, respectively, as they traveled from their village to many different places mentioned on the Bible. It also had other references from the Bible such as the forbidden fruit and popular characters such as Cain, Abel, Isaac and others. As a Bible farce, this was extremely disappointing because there were so many things that the filmmakers could have done to make the story funny and smart. Instead, it degraded itself into slapstick comedy and we literally see the characters urinating on themselves, tasting feces, and other things I won’t mention. Don’t get me wrong–I think Black and Cera are usually very funny comedians but I don’t know what they were thinking when they decided to sign up for this movie. Just the script itself was so bad; it was random, it lacked energy, and it didn’t have a powerful enough story to drive it forward and for us to ultimately root for the characters to succeed on their mission. At times I wondered whether the actors were literally making stuff up as they went along. The constant winking at the camera annoyed me greatly, which was tantamount to that pesky mosquito that kept buzzing at your ear when you’re trying to sleep. The only thing I liked about this movie was Paul Rudd as Abel, but he was in it for barely two minutes. Other actors such as Vinnie Jones, Hank Azaria, David Cross and Olivia Wilde didn’t add much to the picture because their characters were also one-dimensional. I really wanted to like this movie because every time the trailer was shown in theaters, it never failed to bring a smile to my face. Unfortunately, it was just so mindless to the point where I thought the director didn’t care about his movie. If the passion is absent, why then should the audience care? When I say that this movie is bad, consider it an understatement. Save your precious time and watch or do something else. I wish I did.
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