Review: "Epic Movie" is Epically Bad

You know almost right away how bad "Epic Movie" is going to be. If you've seen the previews (if you haven't you either don't own a television or are unconscious) you know that the film parodies literally a dozen movies from the last year or so. For whatever reason, the writer/director team of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer choose to lay the framework for their spoof based on the hit film "The Chronicles of Narnia," which may have been a big hit but was not exactly ripe for spoofing. The makers of "Scary Movie 4" at least got the premise right by spoofing the underwhelming Tom Cruise/Steven Spielberg hit "War of the Worlds." They failed miserably but at least they choose a good target.

Perhaps it didn't matter which movie they used for the foundation of the film. The makers end up going after every major summer movie you can think of from "The DaVinci Code" to "Snakes on a Plane" to "Lady In The Water" to "Pirates 2" and on and on. The problem is that the jokes are all too obvious and not very funny. Friedberg and Seltzer (who created last year's worst movie, "Date Movie") have a particular fondness for potty humor ad nauseum. It's not enough to have a flatulence joke once or twice but they ram it down our throats until even the kindest audience member is likely to shake their heads.

Three men can be blamed for terrible movies like this and "Date Movie" and at least 3 of the "Scary Movie" pictures and their names are Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker. Back in 1980 they created the enormously popular "Airplane," which set the spoof movies in motion. Since then many have tried to emulate the team but have almost always failed. "Airplane" worked because not only was it clever but also it had a plot that moved forward and wasn't just groundwork for jokes. The men also loaded each scene with gags not only in the main frame but also in the background. You can watch "Airplane" over and over again and still pick up gags you had never seen before. AZZ went on to make the spy spoof "Top Secret" and the enormously popular "Naked Gun" series with Leslie Nielsen. AZZ finally decided to call it quits as a team realizing the genre was a difficult one and one you couldn't hit the bulls eye with every time (which was apparent when they refused to be part of "Airplane II: The Sequel" which turned out to be barely average in its own right). The true sign of a great spoof is when you forget about the films being spoofed and the material becomes the filmmakers own.

New filmmakers have come and gone trying to emulate the success AZZ had in the 1980's and few have yet to even come close. The first "Scary Movie" has a few inspired moments but its three follow-ups all suffer from what ails movies like "Epic Movie," believing any gag is funny. It's as if the makers see all of these other movies and make notes and then simply add someone falling or flatulating to make the bit their own. These people aren't putting any effort whatsoever into truly entertaining its audience.

Another sign of desperation is the casting. It's sad enough to see comic talent like Fred Willard and Jennifer Coolidge (so good in Christopher Guest's mockumentaries) continually waste their time in films like this but how many more times do we have to see people like Kal Penn (Kumar in "Harold and Kumar"), former Saturday Night Live regular Darrell Hammond and Carmen Electra? AZZ struck gold in "Airplane" by taking good, dramatic actors like Peter Graves, Lloyd Bridges, Leslie Nielsen and Robert Stack and watching them seize control of the film by lampooning themselves. Here we get David Carradine, who continues to blow the chances rewarded him by Quentin Tarantino in the "Kill Bill" movies, making a ridiculously brief appearance that is long forgotten. If you are going to use people like Carradine then give him something to do.

"Epic Movie" is a total lost cause. I chuckled once at the beginning and that was at. Thankfully the film clocks in at a shockingly short 80 minutes, which goes to show the makers, were bereft of even one original idea and had run out of other films to lampoon. Unfortunately those 80 minutes is tedious and actually ends up feeling like twice as long.

"Epic Movie" will likely carry one distinction. It is likely to be this year's worst film and that makes it two in a row for Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. The good news is it is virtually impossible for them to get any worse.