Superbad, and very good
INFO
Superbad
4 stars
Directed by Greg Mottola. Stars Jonah Hill, Michael Cera. Rated R. Opens Fri., Aug. 17. At area theaters.AUDIO
Superbad contains, along with a big heart and a dirty tongue, the funniest running gag of the year. As if imitating an early 1980s sex comedy, two high school friends, Seth (Jonah Hill) and Evan (Michael Cera), seek to buy beer and hook up with comely classmates at a party. They rely on an even bigger geek (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) with a fake ID, but are aghast to see that the driver's license gives their friend the one-word name "McLovin."
The "McLovin" jokes never stop being funny, as characters wonder whether the name sounds more like an Irish R&B singer or a sexy cheeseburger. In Superbad's secondary story, "McLovin" falls under the wing of a pair of cops ("Saturday Night Live's" Bill Hader and Superbad co-writer Seth Rogen) who defy the image of policemen as upright citizens. When Creative Loafing recorded a podcast interview with four of Superbad's stars, Hader suggested the "McLovin" arc wasn't just a perfectly executed bit of comedy but a narrative journey parallel to director Hal Ashby's The Last Detail. The Last Detail proves far more bittersweet than Superbad, but the similar plots take equal delight in chewing on profanity.
Hader's analogy raises the question of whether Superbad producer Judd Apatow is poised to become the Hal Ashby of this generation. Initially, the comparison seems like a stretch. Ashby was something of a hippie humanist with a reputation for such cult comedies as Harold and Maude (1971) and Being There (1979). So far, Apatow's smaller body of work and fondness for using phrases such as "cock-block" as punch lines make him seem an unlikely heir.
But Apatow's similarities to Ashby explain why he's one of the most loved and respected of today's comedic filmmakers.
Apatow produced Superbad but did not write or direct it, so it may also be stretching it to group the movie with the ones he has directed: 2005's The 40-Year-Old Virgin and the recently released Knocked Up. Superbad fits perfectly with Apatow's comedic sensibility and comes directly from his creative circle. Director Greg Mottola helmed multiple episodes of Apatow's college TV sitcom "Undeclared." Co-writer/co-star Seth Rogen has been virtually joined to Apatow's hip, starring in that show and "Freaks and Geeks" (for which Apatow served as a writer/producer) before graduating to Apatow's films.
In a weeklong diary for Slate in 2005, Apatow talked about how his greatest teachers were the artists who inspired him, starting with "Hal Ashby – Being There, Harold and Maude, Coming Home, Shampoo, The Last Detail. It is incredible that the same man made all of these films. They have such vitality. He is the bar that I always dream of reaching." (Apatow's oldest daughter is named Maude.)
Ashby made the leap to directing after winning the Oscar for editing In the Heat of the Night in 1967. The counterculture of the 1960s and early '70s influenced his best work, which shaped the culture in return. Ashby's films often centered around hedonists, as dedicated to pleasure as Apatow's scruffy, porn-obsessed young guys. Shampoo followed the sexploits of Warren Beatty's put-upon Casanova/hairdresser, while Harold and Maude captured an unlikely romance between a vivacious, life-affirming octogenarian (Ruth Gordon) and a deadpan, morbid young man (Bud Cort).
At times Ashby's films imply that pleasure is overrated. In The Last Detail, two seasoned military police officers (Jack Nicholson and Otis Young) give an inexperienced young prisoner (Randy Quaid) a night on the town on the eve of an eight-year sentence, but their joyous send-off has a rude awakening. In Being There, Peter Sellers' TV-addicted simpleton seems happier and wiser than the able-minded "normal" people. It's not that different than the way Steve Carell's 40-year-old virgin ends up being better at relationships than his horndog buddies. Superbad reaches its emotional high point not through drunken hookups, but at Seth and Evan's boozy declarations of undying friendship.
So far, all of Apatow's films and much of his TV work recount coming-of-age stories, with juvenile men earning hard-won maturity. In Knocked Up, Rogen's slacker dad-to-be moves out of his friend's apartment/clubhouse, while Superbad's pals acknowledge that when they go to college, they may face the end of their friendship.
Both filmmakers show a generosity of spirit that makes their work critical favorites – and viable date movies. Ashby and Apatow show comparable warmth for their actors and characters, a willingness to let them breathe and give the audience a chance to get to know them. Similarly, in Superbad Jonah Hill's uncensored appetites and Michael Cera's wide-eyed meekness make the pair such a perfect match, it's like watching a veteran comedy team.
Apatow has the capital to take on a serious project comparable to Ashby's heavyweight Vietnam War drama Coming Home (1978), but seems more focused on furthering his earthy brand of humor. Nevertheless, the raunchiness of Apatow's films can be misleading. When a character such as Superbad's Seth sums up his sexual history with a girl as "two dozen handjobs and three-fourths of a blowjob," he may be expressing more than just lust. It may be a lust for life.
COMMENTS
RE: Superbad, and very good
Posted by Hiram on 08.18.07 @ 06:26 PM
Great article on Superbad. I have a website on SNL comedian Bill Hader. Check it out: http://www.billhaderonline.com