Michael After Midnight - Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star
You know what? I’m not even going to dignify this movie with a proper intro. It fucking sucks. And not only does it suck, it sucks in ways that make me genuinely angry.
“Now Michael,” you might say, “I get this is a Happy Madison Productions film, and they’re known for spotty quality when it comes to comedies, but this is what makes you mad? You’ve seen The Love Guru, The Master of Disguise, and a bunch of Seltzer & Friedberg movies, but this one is your breaking point?” Well, here’s the thing: The Love Guru and The Master of Disguise are indeed awful, but they’re at least putting in effort and trying to be funny. The Seltzerberg movies? They’re way too lazy to muster up anger towards (with the sole exception of Disaster Movie) and most crucially, all of those movies have at least a single joke that lands, by accident or otherwise. Bucky Larson, though? It sits somewhere in between. It’s not putting in no effort at all but it's still lazily coasting by on a stupid, juvenile, one-note premise and doing nothing with it to make it worth your time.
Here’s said premise: A small-town manchild decides it’s his destiny to become a porn star after a goon sesh where he discovers his parents were adult film legends in the 70s. He goes to Hollywood and starts doing porn that capitalizes on the fact he has a tiny dick (so tiny he can use a straw as a condom) and that he chimps out and blows massive loads from merely seeing a boob to make people feel better about themselves. It’s like if Ti West ate a bunch of lead paint chips before writing X, basically.
It goes without saying that Nick Swardson is no Mia Goth, though—in looks or talent. Hell, he’s not even beating Rob Schneider in those categories! With his big buck teeth and his “Little Lad Who Loves Berries and Cream”-ass haircut, his Bucky looks like a beaver trying to cosplay Anton Chigurh. I’m sure this is meant to be part of the joke—a guy THIS ugly as a porn star?!—but it fails for a lot of reasons. For one, the idea of a guy like this being a porn star isn’t so unbelievably funny in a world where Ron Jeremy exists. But more importantly is the fact Swardson lacks any sort of talent or charisma to make Bucky’s rise to stardom believable. I get he’s being treated as a freak show, but it doesn’t prevent suspension of disbelief from stretching completely thin when he is utterly incapable of being likable or charming. At best, he’d be a flash in the pan fad who’d garner a bit of curiosity but would certainly not become some porno legend for humping the air and shooting his goo on anything but the women he’s filming with. These problems could have been easily ameliorated if Swardson was funny or engaging or talented or had any screen presence, but he makes Gal Gadot look like Emma Stone in comparison.
Of course, it’s not like anyone else turns in a good performance here, which is surprising because there’s a lot of genuine talent here. In particular there is former Wednesday Addams Christina Ricci as Bucky’s love interest; she’s adorable and she’s trying her damndest but she just cannot for the life of her believably sell being attracted to Bucky. Then there’s Don Johnson as the director who exploits Bucky; his performance has a heartbeat, but it’s definitely not beating like mine because he just is given no good lines or jokes. The rest of the cast fares little better, as they’re either as abysmally unfunny as Swardson or desperately trying to inject something resembling quality into their wooden lines, but they don’t feel like they’re trying quite as hard as these two.
Of course, the bottom line is this: This movie isn’t funny. Not one single joke in this movie lands. I didn’t so much as smile one time during the whole film. I can’t even say the film approaches anything resembling comedy, because it’s all so juvenile and puerile. And it’s not even that I’m above such things! I love Freddy Got Fingered! The fact of the matter is that this movie is just so fucking stupid and childish that it can’t even achieve comedy a middle schooler excels at, let alone a loony genius like Tom Green.
This movie is the comedy equivalent of tipping a single penny. Tipping nothing is rude, and less than 10% is mediocre for sure, but one cent? That’s just spiteful and insulting. And that’s what this movie is, it’s fucking insulting. It doesn’t piss me off because it’s offensive, or gross, or any of that, it pisses me off because it’s doing the bare minimum to get a laugh and failing at it! And Swardson had the gall to say critics were morons for hating this? Let me say this, when this got nominated for Razzies the same year as Jack and Jill, this deserved to sweep over that film. Nothing in this film approaches the brilliance of the Dunkaccino ad.
This is second only to Disaster Movie when it comes to the worst comedies I've ever seen in my life, and that's only because that one makes me angry by being genuinely offensive on top of being beyond lazy. Fuck this movie, fuck Nick Swardson, fuck the Razzies for not piling awards on this shit. This movie is one of the reasons God no longer speaks to mankind; why would He wish to converse with anyone who could make such an affront to His creation?
Looking back at highschool and movies I have to say it's all complete bullshit. My friends and I were never out to get layed. We were basically Bucky Larson and his weirdo friends, except we didn't watch porn together.
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