Comedy | www.jaredmobarak.com

REVIEW: Allison [2012]

2012/07/092014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“I’m already doing 90%. Not going to do 95.” After what appeared like full-blown retirement from the industry, writer/director Paul Brickman of Risky Business fame has been lured back by the WIGS network of female-centric short films. Building his tale around the stereotypical nagging wife trope, Allison subverts the usual comic portrayal of an over-zealous matriarch by putting her in a situation that earns the attitude. Containing a healthy portion of sarcastic humor, we empathize with this breadwinning, headstrong woman and completely understand her struggle. If husband Jerry (Joel Johnstone)…

REVIEW: Denise [2012]

2012/07/062014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“I get along with girls better …” As evidenced by In the Company of Men and The Shape of Things, no one does scathing social commentary like Neil LaBute. So, after the rather questionable decisions to helm remakes of The Wicker Man and Death at a Funeral, it’s good to see the playwright going back to what made him a filmmaker to keep tabs on over a decade ago. His script for the short film Denise—a part of the WIGS series from Jon Avnet and Rodrigo García—takes a discerning look…

REVIEW: Independence Day [1996]

2012/07/032014/05/19 Jared Mobarak

“We will not go quietly into the night” The man who proved we could only take so many disaster films and yet still made more, Roland Emmerich shouldn’t be denied the astronomical success of the one that jump-started the genre’s big budget revival in the first place. After giving us the rather smart science fiction actioner Stargate, he and writing/producing partner Dean Devlin came up with the treatment for Independence Day as a response to the constant questions about their opinions on alien life. Wanting to take a step back…

NYAFF12 REVIEW: Saya-zamurai [Scabbard Samurai] [2011]

2012/07/012014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“Why did it have to rain?” Sometimes foreign language films simply exist across an insurmountable cultural divide that renders them indecipherable here. Hitoshi Matsumoto‘s Saya-zamurai [Scabbard Samurai] perfectly exemplifies through an obtusely constructed first third before hitting its stride. Comically uneven at the start, I was left scratching my head and wondering if I was missing the joke. An old, toothless samurai with an empty scabbard breathlessly and wordlessly runs through the Japanese countryside with his young daughter following closely behind as three assassins—introduced in freeze-frame—arrive to inflict what should…

REVIEW: Balls of Fury [2007]

2012/06/292014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“I’m going to Disneyland!” With the appropriately titled book Writing Movies for Fun and Profit: How We Made a Billion Dollars at the Box Office and You Can, Too! under their belts, one could easily make the case for Balls of Fury being Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon‘s cornerstone in screenwriting profiteering. A sports redemption tale set inside the seedy underbelly of elite ping-pong, the premise is laughable as a comedy skit let alone a feature length film. But this is what Garant and Lennon—comedians and creators of “The…

REVIEW: Magic Mike [2012]

2012/06/262014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“He didn’t like breakfast food?” One doesn’t necessarily see a guy wanting for anything when looking at the life of Channing Tatum. Getting his start in Hollywood less than a decade ago with a mix of tough guy roles and dance, he’s quickly become a leading man, producer, and collaborator to some of cinema’s most revered luminaries. So, his serious desire to delve into the life of a male stripper—a label he wore for eight months of his nineteenth year—only elicited chuckles from me. I couldn’t help but think ideas…

REVIEW: Ted [2012]

2012/06/252014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“Thanks for creeping up my night” If you looked at the trailers for Seth MacFarlane‘s Ted and thought it would be a full-length, live action riff on his popular animated television show “Family Guy”, you wouldn’t be wrong. However, if your assumption also carried the thought such a result would end up overlong, obnoxious, and too weak to sustain its one-note joke, get ready to be pleasantly surprised. I won’t say this crude, R-rated fantasy about a teddy bear come to life will be for everyone, but MacFarlane and “Guy”…

REVIEW: Grandma’s Boy [2006]

2012/06/182014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“Sweetie, don’t curse. You’re better than that.” Looking at the list of films Happy Madison Productions has made since 2006, I can honestly say dramatic oddities Reign Over Me and Funny People prove to be the only entries more watchable than the unbridled insanity of Grandma’s Boy. And this is coming from someone who ignored the comedy for six years before watching it less than a week after the excruciatingly horrible That’s My Boy almost forced me to swear off Adam Sandler‘s shingle once and for all. It’s stupid, crude,…

REVIEW: Moonrise Kingdom [2012]

2012/06/152014/03/17 Jared Mobarak

“He left me a letter of resignation” Five years removed from his last foray into live action filmmaking—although Fantastic Mr. Fox is much more akin to his sensibilities than a normal animated children’s movie should be—writer/director Wes Anderson returns with what could be his most storybook piece yet. So far removed from our reality, Moonrise Kingdom fits firmly into the auteur’s world of meticulously detailed constructions and manufactured quirk. Subtly surreal in its tale of lost innocence, the characters populating the small island of New Penzance exist on the fringes…

REVIEW: Galaxy Quest [1999]

2012/06/142014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“Never give up. Never surrender.” What would happen if William Shatner were beamed into space for real—tracked down by a group of aliens indecipherable from the litany of cosplaying fans clamoring for his autograph at one of the infinite Comic Cons held around the nation? This is the question stuck in screenwriter David Howard‘s head as he put Galaxy Quest to paper in order to imagine the possibilities. A lush with a bigger head than when the titular show was on air, Jason Nesmith (Tim Allen) encourages fans with a…

REVIEW: That’s My Boy [2012]

2012/06/132014/04/23 Jared Mobarak

“Secret tickle time” Just when you thought Adam Sandler had hit bottom and could only improve upon a lackluster string of film’s that have to make you question the quality of his earlier gems, he proves it can always get worse. From Sean Anders (the director of Sex Drive) and David Caspe (creator of “Happy Endings”) comes one of the most unoriginal comedies in years. Recycling the ‘disastrous wedding’ trope that I’m sad to say was actually done better in Meet the Parents—a film I also abhor—we’re made to watch…