The Interview (2014)

The Interview is written and directed by Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen.  Rogen stars as an entertainment producer Aaron Rapaport who produces a show for a Piers Morgan type of interview named Dave Skylark (James Franco).  After 1000 episodes of interviews where celebrities revealed shocking secrets Rapaport wants Skylark to do a real news interview and hears that North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un is a huge fan of the program.  Skylark is excited by the prospect of the interview until the CIA knock on his door and ask him to covertly assassinate the dictator.

Rogen and Franco have been a formidable team ever since they did Pineapple Express.  This outing is their third film together it’s their funniest film but also their most diluted.  It’s almost like they drew a rough outline and said what disgusting joke can we put in here so that people will laugh?  Some of the laughs to be had in the film work and most of them come from the dialogue between the characters in the film especially when you talk about Rogen and Franco or Rogen and Park.  This film is really a showcase for how funny Franco can be given the right material.  His character is a man child who hates the idea of being responsible for everything and everyone.  He wants to be appreciated without all the work but with every bit of the credit.  Rogen plays the same character he does in every movie.  He is the chubby friend who has trouble asserting dominance over any situation and will let his friend be the deciding factor in every decision he makes.

The revelation of the film is Randall Park’s portrayal of Jong Un.  He really infuses his portrayal with a great level of sass and crassness while also managing to get across why the dictator isn’t the man that people should trifle with.  The interactions Jong Un has with Skylark are really what sells the film.  The funny things those two characters do together are typical but also makes complete sense based on who the characters are.

The main issue I have with the picture has to do with the physical comedy of the film.  Usually the physical comedy was just unfunny.  *I really feel like the writers just played a game of darts after smoking weed trying to figure out which comedy gag would work with the characters they were given.  None of the physical jokes are remotely funny at all.  The only real goal the jokes achieved is the fact that the jokes help their characters look more clueless and lifeless as human beings.  Interactions with other military figures or CIA personnel proves a pointless exercise in making the story feel like it has stakes and this mirage is what the movie works to sell itself on.

Honestly this film’s concept had so much promise to it.  The potential was squandered by poor attempts at humor.  This film would have probably been better suited in the hands of Simon Pegg and visual director Edgar Wright.  I wish The Interview had been cancelled because the world would have been better without it.