A Review of Tropic Thunder

The problem with the people who complain and want to protest the movie "Tropic Thunder" is that they just don't get the movie. Yes, you SHOULD be offended by the way the characters act. Why? Because the entire movie is about how actors are so self-centered and so concerned with winning awards that they portray ethnicities and mentally-challenged people just to stroke their own egos and win Oscars. Therefore, they don't think of either the minorities in question or the challenged people they portray as people, but just as a means of winning an award and congratulating themselves. So, of COURSE, they would use offensive words like "retard" throughout the film and play ridiculous version of mentally-handicapped people.

Take a look at one of the movies even mentioned within the film: "I Am Sam." The movie starred Sean Penn as a mentally-handicapped man trying to win the right to raise his "normal" daughter. Penn played the character to the hilt. What is strange about this? Throughout the movie ACTUAL handicapped actors, all of them very capable, are acting RIGHT BESIDE PENN!!!! Yet, despite having a bevy of mentally-handicapped actors that could have taken the lead role, the movie makers decided it was better to have a named star portray the handicapped rather than taking a chance on an actually handicapped person taking the role.

Folks, THAT is offensive. Robert Downey, Jr.'s speech about going "full retard" is only offensive because it is MEANT to be to shining a light on just that kind of ridiculousness that surrounds Hollywood. Therefore, the speech is funny becaus it mocks that thing that it is talking about and it doesn't praise it or glorify it. The people who have this discussion are made to look stupid and that is comedy.

The plot, as you probably know, surrounds three big Hollywood stars who are trying to make a Vietnam war film in the actual jungle. Ben Stiller plays an actor know for his action films who has fallen on some hard times. No one is going to see his action films anymore and his recent venture into "serious" work as a mentally handicapped farmhand who thinks he can talk to animals called "Simple Jack" was a dismal failure. He needs this war movie to work.

Roberty Downey Jr. plays an Australian actors who is know for this "method" acting of getting deep into his roles. So much is he into the role he is supposed to play in this war movie he undergoes an experimental skin-dyeing operation to make his skin appear darker so he can play an African-American. He then launches into some kind of strange white-version of ghetto talk that an actual African American actor on the same movie can't help but mock as often as possible.

Finally, Jack Black portrays an actors addicted to just about every known drug who is known for his comedy movies that center entirely around farting and require him to dress up as multiple members of the same family. Now, he's deep within the jungle and trying not to go through withdrawl and hopefully playing his first serious role.

The problem is that the movie is hopelessly over budget and this leads to one of the funniest scenes you are likely to see about making movies. You probably already know that Tom Cruise plays a studio agent with so much make up on you can only just barely recognize that Tom Cruise nose. He is foul-mouthed and fat and balding and utterly and completely hilarious. This one role could do more to repair Tom Cruise's career than the movie about the members of the Nazi party who tried to assassinate Hitler that is due out sometime later this year.

The director decided to take them into the jungle and convince them that they are in the middle of a war. Of course, the director then steps on a real-life landmine and the actors all think it's just part of his process. Then they run into real-life drug processors and warlords and, well, hilarity ensues.

The movie is skillfully done. There is not a single Hollywood sacred cow that does not get justly and totally slaughtered. Each of these actors is utterly committed to their roles and they are utterly convincing. Even when the comedy gets a little too out there to be believed and it strains credibility, it still manages to be funny and those moments are forgiven.

All of the cast, including supporting actors like Nick Nolte, seem to have bought entirely into this skewering of acting and making movies. By being there entirely for the characters, the movie manages to get funnier.

Some things just deserve to be made fun of. Actors and the falseness and self-centered nature and self-importance of Hollywood is one of those things that deserves to be made fun of and done so as often as possible. "Tropic Thunder," whic was also co-written and directed by Stiller, manages to do it very well and the laughs keep coming. Downey, Jr.'s character is hilarious and it just proves that the talented actor is back and stronger than ever with this one and "Iron Man" all in one summer. That someone that talented has come back from the brink during the same year we lost someone like Heath Ledger, is reason to celebrate and laugh.