Buddy Sis-tem

Paul Feig may not be a household name, but chances are you've enjoyed one of his comedy projects. He's created critically acclaimed shows (Freaks & Geeks), directed well known sitcoms (The Office) and even found himself in front of the camera as well (playing biology teacher Mr. Poole on Sabrina, the Teenage Witch. Feig finally garnered some mainstream success when he directed Bridesmaids, a film that attempted to show that the R-rated comedy is not just a man's territory. In his latest effort, The Heat, Feig once again shows that the ladies can be just as foul as any guy around.

The Heat stars Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy as polar opposite cops who are forced together to bring down a major drug dealer. Bullock is the straight-laced workaholic cop while McCarthy is a foul-mouthed loner cop who just wants to clean up her town. Both of these two have played these type of characters before so they know what to do in order to yield laughs out of the archetype, but I did wonder throughout the film if it would have been better for them to try and play the opposite role instead. My guess is that I would have given the film more credit, but the laughs probably wouldn't have been as frequent.

The buddy cop genre has certainly been around for a while and has always yielded mixed results. For every Lethal Weapon there's an I Spy. Credit to Feig who recognizes that he's mining familiar territory and yet still finds a way to make it work. He knows what tropes to play for parody and which to keep straight in order to make the story still feel like it has consequences. A lot of this is done through the scenes that give us a glimpse into the family of McCarthy's character. The interactions she has with her Bostonian clan produce some of the biggest laughs, as well as a few serious moments.

The one drawback to the film is an issue that plagued Bridesmaids as well. There were too many scenes that forced the agenda that women can be crass as well. To me funny is funny, regardless of who's telling the joke. I get no greater satisfaction seeing McCarthy curse up a blue storm than I would Will Ferrell or any other male comedian. I understand the need to show this off since so few women have actually tried to be raunchy, but I hope this becomes less frequent. Let's the jokes be organic to the story rather than be included simply to try and prove a point.

The good news for The Heat is that for as many forced jokes, there's at least twice as many well earned laughs. Bullock and McCarthy have a good chemistry together to the point where I would actually be interested in seeing them team up again, whether it was for a sequel reuniting these characters or in a completely separate project. The film is also buoyed by the presence of several other funny people in smaller roles including Tony Hale, Jane Curtin, Marlon Wayans, and SNL's Taran Killam. Each of these actors know how to get a laugh out of the character they are playing instead of us just laughing at the mere presence of them showing up in the movie.

The interesting thing about this movie is that I'm not quite sure how it will play with me when I attempt to rewatch it a few years from now. Some comedies like The Other Guys have aged well, while others simply don't produce the same number of laughs when you know what's coming. All I can say is that on my first viewing I laughed a lot more than I expected. The Heat creates another successful entry into the familiar buddy cop genre thanks to the deft directing of Paul Feig and the strong chemistry of its two female leads. Grade: B+

RBR: Women behaving badly

I've been having some computer problems lately so I haven't been able to update this as frequently as I would like, so you get a two-fer here. Thankfully the two films have some commonality. Bridesmaids: Despite all the heaping praise and success that this film earned earlier this year, I was skeptical of its quality. A part of it was that the trailers did not win me over as much as other recent comedies I've enjoyed. But the bigger issue was with the film's star, Kristin Wiig, who in a matter of time has gone from brilliant commedienne to grating personality on Saturday Night Live. While initially fresh, Wiig has become overused and one-dimensional on the sketch show and I was worried that would transition over into this film. Still I tried to keep an open mind and while I was not completely won over by the film, I'll say that it turned out better than I expected. There are several genuine laughs in the film, however, I felt that in an attempt to yield more laughs they dumped on Wiig's character too much almost to the point of making her unsympathetic. The film, given its story, is also way too long and needed some better editing. The one nice surprise for me was Melissa McCarthy's performance. The surprise doesn't come from the character being that funny, but rather that they were able to keep the character in check and make her human. While the trailers made it appear as if she was just some crass, scatological cartoon character, we see that despite her appearance she's more human than half the characters in the film. I'll give it a mild recommendation, just don't believe the hype that this is somehow on par with films like The Hangover or Anchorman. Rating: *** 1/2

Bad Teacher: If I thought Wiig's character came off unsympathetic in Bridesmaids, it goes double for Cameron Diaz's character in this comedy. She's about the least interesting thing about this film. Similar to the problem I have with Community, I found myself immediately more interested in the supporting cast that make up the rest of the staff at the school. The film does a great job of bringing in funny people like Jason Segel, John Michael Higgins, Phyllis Smith, Dave 'Gruber' Allen as fellow teachers. And there's a whole host of other comedians who pop in and out yielding a quick laugh before the film turns back to Diaz to suck the life right back out of the film. She even manages to make the generally entertaining Justin Timberlake come off as boring here. I wanted to like the film more, but it just never found anything to do with its central premise focusing on this crude, apathetic instructor. The kids in the film end up being nothing more than props. Their attempt at trying to humanize Diaz's character by pitting her against Lucy Punch, a perky, overachieving instructor doesn't work and only ends up putting both of them in the wrong. This is not a terrible film just one that fails to live up to any of its potential. Rating: ** 1/2