Etan Cohen, the writer of comedic gems like Idiocracy and Tropic Thunder, has decided to make his directorial debut and to do this he enlisted funnymen Will Ferrell and Kevin Hart to join him on this quest. Their new film, hilarious titled Get Hard, is about millionaire James King (Ferrell) who is convicted of fraud in the stock market and is granted 30 days to get his affairs in order before being sent to the notorious San Quentin prison. In order to prepare himself, he makes a deal with Darnell Lewis, the owner of the car wash located in the parking lot of his office building, to teach him how to “get hard” and not “be somebody’s bitch” over those 30 days but, unbeknownst to James, Darnell doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing.
When I sat down to watch Get Hard, I thought there was only two ways this film could go, it would either be ridiculously funny or utterly terrible but, surprisingly, it ended up being slightly above average on the funny scale. Get Hard is actually a pretty entertaining movie, one that’s mindless, very politically incorrect and a film that’ll manage to offend everyone on some level, that is, if you care about offensive jokes. This film isn’t made for those that are easily offended so if you couldn’t handle a film like Tropic Thunder, then don’t expect to like this one at all because offensive humor and stereotypes are utilized to the max.
What’s great about the film is that this is one of the rare instances where playing off of stereotypes the entire time pays off. You’ve got Darnell, a nice, hardworking black man going against type, trying to portray a tough thug that’s gone to prison even though he’s the exact opposite of that. He’s pretending to be that stereotypical character meanwhile you have James King who is the whitest rich man you can imagine. He can’t fight, takes no consequences for his offensive actions, is very polite yet uses stereotypes for the basis of his reactions to those that aren’t. If you’ve ever seen an episode of The Chappelle Show where Dave is dressed as white man then you know exactly the kind of person James is, he’s a waspy son-of-a-b and that’s exactly the point. This combination of characters works out pretty damn well even if it’s not as good/funny as the combination of Ferrell and Wahlberg in The Other Guys.
With regards to some of the downsides of the film, if you saw the trailer you could easily figure out the types of jokes you were in for, especially when you get a look at the cast list. I’d say about half the jokes you expected while the other half were brilliantly set-up and completely unexpected. Even the set became a great running joke and that’s something that rarely happens. The only thing I wish they scaled back on, just slightly, was the use of the phrase “get hard.” Shockingly, they don’t overuse the joke but when the phrase is used, it’s used over and over and is said one too many times during those instances.
If a stronger comedic director like Adam McKay had directed this film, I think Get Hard could have been a much funnier flick, but for his first go-around I’d say Etan Cohen did a pretty good job. I laughed consistently throughout the film, encountered a few surprises that were both good and bad for the sake of comedy, and I got to watch a story that was either a fun twist on one of my favorite movies growing up, The New Guy, or a better version of a Rob Schneider film that no one’s ever heard of called Big Stan. I may not have had the belly laughs I was hoping for but Get Hard gave me a good amount of pleasure the night I saw it.
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