Tuesday, January 26, 2021

the Rise and Fall of Intelligent Design

As 2021 movies go, we are kind of 0 for 3. 

The Prom can breathe a sigh of relief that it will not be the worst move we've seen all year. 

Nope. 

That title now firmly resides with the new Melissa McCarthy vehicle, Superintelligence

If the movie Superbad wasn't already such named, they could have just swapped out 'intelligence' for 'bad'.  And that said, both the Prom and this POS HBO movie both star James Corden. 

I think we have 2021's least common denominator. Or greatest?  James Fucking Corden. 

I can't lay this at his feet. Everyone is super bad (see what I did there?).  McCarthy is lame. How dare they underutilize Bobby Cannavale? Jean Smart - horribly horribly wasted. The only ones who walk away unscathed are Octavia Spencer and William Daniels who just do voices - and yes, Daniels does reprise his voice of Kitt from Night Rider. And their voices are one time that last less than 20 seconds each. 

Oddly, this is on par with many McCarthy movies. Someone I know - who will remain nameless - loved Tammy.  Ugh. Dread - and not only for Susan Sarandon. Don't even start me on Identity Theft.  She fares slightly better in Spy (which also has Cannavale) and for some reason, I found her to be hilarious in the Boss

Director Ben Falcone - who is McCarthy's husband, and also did Tammy and the Boss (so he's very hit and miss too....more miss) - just fails here, though whomever wrote this pile is ultimately to blame. 

In a nutshell, McCarthy is selected by an overtaking AI to determine whether the world should be saved or destroyed.  S.N.O.R.E.   Melissa can't even save this movie, let alone humanity.   (Not Really A Spoiler Alert: she totally saves the world!!!) 

Honestly, the star of the movie just might be Seattle - and I'll give Falcone this - he doesn't even invoke or show Starbucks once, though the ubiquitous Pike Place Fish Market is right there. 

Superintelligence didn't merit one smile, let alone laugh, from either 710 or myself.  Not. One.  It was a little over 105 minutes and seems so. much. longer. 

Like so many others movies regarding technology -  War Games, A.I., Her, Ex Machina - you have your cautionary tales.  

Here's another one:   P. U.  Steer clear.  You've been warned. 


2021 Movie Count / Goal: 03 of 15


Song by: Rodney Crowell

3 comments:

uptonking said...

Hate wasting time on a bad movie. The BF and I will start to watch something and we both have a FAIL button to push at anytime in the first 20 minutes. That has saved us from a lot of pain. I did make him watch Tammy. It was not terrible, but it wasn't good... I think because the world it took place in is a world that does not exist. Thanks for the review. I love McCarthy... but, yes... she just seems to enjoy wasting her time in bad movies.

rebecca said...

I don’t mind being named. Truly. I even saw College Mom or whatever - and laughed! A lot!

Raybeard said...

I'm surely not alone in never having 'got' why Ms McCarthy is considered by so many as being so special. Nothing I've seen her in has marked her out as a 'WOW'. And now with Mr Corden himself who's done nothing worthwhile since 'The History Boys' my mind has been made up for me. Detour!