Esther Cohen

Utter dross. Predictable and facile film. I really like Zach Galifianakis and the cast is superb, however it’s basically just one long celebrity roast- a strange American tradition of hurling insults at famous people which is rarely witty, ironic or clever. Zach just insults celebrities at will and just very obviously. The premise (thin as paper) is that because he almost drowned Matthew McConnaughy - Will Ferrell sends him to do ten celebrity interviews and if he succeeds he’ll get what he wants the most - his own talk show. The problem is why does Zach want his own talk show when he clearly can’t stand the celebrities and has no idea or interest in movies???Wouldn’t it have been more clever if he was very in awe and yet quite pompous and full of himself similar perhaps to Alan Partridge (although of course no one can emulate the master). This just makes no sense - shouldn’t interviewing celebrities bring him joy? I realise that this is a much harder film to write because it has to be sharp, witty, ironic and not basic but the actors and writers are a talented bunch surely they could do better than this??? At one stage Zach say that if they don’t steal something from Peter Dinklage then ‘their dream of their talk show is over’ but he never seems to be interested or have a dream at all. If you want to see how to utilise celebrities who are willing to poke fun at themselves which is always fun and have a host who is bumbling but sincere perhaps they should look across the pond to the mighty British - Steve Coogan and Ricky Gervais have done it perfectly. There are some truly wonderful comedies from the USA and talent in abundance but for the life of me I can’t understand why this superb opportunity was frittered away on this paint by numbers, easy bait, immature and disappointing rubbish. Shame on all involved.