Search found 1 match: Matthew Broderick

Searched query: matthew broderick

by Guest
Mon May 25, 2015 10:08 pm
Forum: Full Reviews
Topic: Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Replies: 1
Views: 1090

Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)

Note: This review contains spoilers.

Unfunny comedies are probably the second-worst thing that a critic must suffer through. They sit in complete silence for a couple hours, checking their watch, tapping their fingers, bemoaning their wasted time, and groaning at bad joke after bad joke. But the worst thing a critic can suffer through is an unfunny, offensive comedy. And that is precisely what Ferris Bueller's Day Off is. It starts off as merely unfunny. One can heave a sigh of disappointment and start counting down the minutes until the "film" ends. But it slowly starts getting demoralizing. The feelings associated with the "film" goes beyond mere boredom and descends into fiery hatred. Ferris Bueller's Day Off is a repulsive insult to cinema, art, and anyone with even the slightest semblance of a moral compass.

The "film's" thin plot revolves around a high school senior named Ferris Bueller, who fakes illness in order to skip school, rounds up some buddies, and goes about having the "best day ever." This storyline is stretched far past its breaking point with its 103 minute runtime. A plethora of ridiculous and inconsequential subplots surround the main story in order to pad the runtime.

This is the cinematic equivalent of pouring a bucket of acid over your body while lying on hot coals and massaging your face with a venomous jellyfish. There are bad films, and then there is Ferris Bueller's Day Off: a hot, stinky diaper of a "film" that offers virtually no redeeming features, likable characters, or creative ideas. There are no laughs either, but that's the least of this "film's" problems.

I spent the entirety of the "film" in silent (and sometimes slightly less silent), astonished disbelief of everything occurring onscreen. Surely this obnoxious, childish, sickeningly cruel (and not to mention unfunny) high-school snot-head isn't our protagonist? But he is. And his friends aren't any better. Bueller's girlfriend (whom I will not name as she is not a character, just an accessory to Broderick) shows up to assist in a highly contrived joke about incest, and just follows Bueller around for the rest of the "film," failing to add almost anything to the picture. She's a completely unnecessary character that has no place in this "film."

Worse is Bueller's "best friend," Cameron Frye, whom Bueller manipulates throughout the entire "movie." The repetition of Bueller repeatedly convincing the nervous Frye to participate in his schemes gets tiring almost immediately, and gets more and more dull from there. But the worst thing about Frye is a speech he gives at the end of the "film."

After stealing Frye's dad's expensive new car, and realizing that there's no way Frye's dad won't notice the dramatic increase on the odometer, Frye decides to kick, dent, and ultimately destroy the vehicle. Then, Frye goes on a long rant about how he intends to stand up to his father for...liking the car too much? Revealing Frye's nature as a mindless spoiled brat, Frye, who lives in a big beautiful home, owns a car purchased by his parents (Frye certainly didn't buy it; he doesn't have a job), and has everything a boy could want thanks to his family's wealth, decides that his dad is a terrible person. What nauseating and unjustified behavior. These are the protagonists!

The other characters are no better. Bueller's parents are ditzes. Bueller's sister, Jeanie, has a completely unexplained change of attitude in literally the last minute of the "film" in order to allow Bueller to get away with his crimes, thus rendering her character a pointless excuse to pad the runtime. The principal, Mr. Rooney, is portrayed as the antagonist, despite being no more horrible (though certainly no less) than Bueller and Co. I have no problem with flawed protagonists. But the characters in this "film" are the scum of the earth.

With the exception of Mr. Rooney, every character goes unpunished by their actions. Beuller and his girlfriend get away completely unscatched, and even Frye's supposed encounter with his father does not appear in the "film." Even two unsavory valet parkers who temporarily steal Frye's car to go on a joy ride are never caught nor given justice. Without creating consequences for the characters in the "film," Ferris Bueller's Day Off promotes disturbing positivity in regards to stealing, property damage, public disruptions, lying to authorities, mocking authorities, violating various laws of traffic.

I've checked with several reliable sources, and all say that indeed a script was penned (though frankly, I can't believe it). It supposedly took only six days to write (not surprising), and most of the gags were made up on set (which explains their ineffectiveness). The filmmakers were literally making everything up as they went along. After 103 minutes, the "film" offers only a mild snicker from a secretary pulling pencils from her hair. And even then, the gags in this this "movie" are so painfully bad, that they actually produce negative laughs, thus taking away from the "film's" one (barely) successful joke.

Most of the cast is perfectly adequate considering the terrible script. But Matthew Broderick is astoundingly bad in the lead role. Broderick rarely reveals any facial expression other than his "neutral" position, which consists of a slightly agape mouth, and dead eyes staring into the camera to crack cringe-worthy fourth wall jokes with a disengaged voice. It's almost as if the casting director deliberately chose the least charismatic lead possible.

Other problems abound, including gags revolving around singing, lip-syncing, and dancing exist (three types of jokes that almost never induce laughter), a confusing use of John Williams' Star Wars title music that's somewhat appalling, the overused "I heard it from my friend's cousin's uncle's mother's daughter's boyfriend" joke, gags that have no punchlines, a hugely indulgent montage in the Art Institute of Chicago, and Charlie Sheen. Also, the "film" has the audacity to not only include a (painfully unfunny) scene during the end credits, thus forcing me to stay even longer, but a post-credits scene that's even less funny.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off made me want to vomit. An insufferable exercise in idiocy and all its friends, Ferris Bueller's Day Off proves to be even less pleasant than reviled comedies like Jack and Jill. This "film" is a complete calamity of catastrophic proportions. Few films have managed to draw such frustration from me, but John Hughes has done that here. An utterly detestably attempt at comedy that made me writhe with appalled disgust.

Score: 0/10