Hot Rod

Posted by Nathan Deen (nathan@filmschoolrejects.com) on August 4, 2007

A complete mess in almost every way imaginable, “Hot Rod” is about as funny as a contemporary Saturday Night Live skit, and that’s not saying much at all. In fact, it’s worse. I was caught completely off guard by how bad this movie was. The trailer looked decent enough that I was expecting a reasonably pleasant experience, but it’s one of those cases where every laugh in the movie is also in the trailer. It’s a mystery as to why the movie is so lame when it’s about a daredevil stunt man.

Will Ferrel wouldn’t sink this low, that’s why he serves as an executive producer to cash a nice big fat paycheck while still being able to say he wasn’t a part of this monstrosity. Instead our hero is played by SNL’s Andy Samberg and his character’s name is Rod Kimble. My first impression of Mr. Samberg’s transition from TV to the big screen: the guy has no talent whatsoever. No, his character is not mentally challenged, he just has the intelligence of someone who is.

Rod (Samberg) has always wanted the respect of his stepfather Frank (Ian McShane, “We Are Marshall”) but until he is able to win a fight against him, Frank will deny that respect and constantly make fun of Rod. The only thing Rod cares about is his stunt work as he tries to follow in the footsteps of his father, a professional stuntman. Suddenly Frank is taken ill and needs a $50,000 heart transplant to live. Samberg decides to use his stunt talents, or lack thereof, to raise the necessary money by making a jump over 15 school buses in hopes of one day fulfilling his dream of kicking his stepfather’s ass.

Stupidity is a complete understatement for what “Hot Rod” is but what more can you say? Among the cheesy, intelligence insulting dialogue is a debate about who would win in a fight between a grilled cheese sandwich and a taco. There’s funny, then there’s stupid funny, then there’s stupid, then there’s abysmal, then there’s “Hot Rod.” Let’s be honest, writer Pam Brady (“South Park”) had to be high on something to write a script this strange, this random, and this idiotic. To quote comedian Lewis Black, “Where would one find a drug to make oneself so delusional?” The movie is unpredictable but in the worst of ways. If she wanted a few scenes to contain something you wouldn’t in your wildest dreams be expecting, then she succeeds because I sure as hell wasn’t expecting Ebenezer Scrooge to pop his head out of a school bus with a turkey on a silver platter in the middle of a hot summer day during a stunt show. Yes, you read right.

The one joke the movie has going for it is beaten to death like an old rug and wasted after twenty minutes. That joke is seeing Rod crash into something with his bike, but these scenes are just cartoonish. Each time Rod crashes, there’s about a 90% chance that he would be dead each time in real life but instead all we hear from him is a simple “Ouch.” And his stepfather doesn’t call him a man? Furthermore there’s an overly long, and as Rod describes it, “painful” sequence that shows Rod tumbling down the side of a mountain hitting every boulder and tree along the way and he just gets a few bumps and bruises. Perhaps a more suitable title for “Hot Rod” would be “You Tube: The Movie.” There’s a scene in which all of Rod’s stunts gone horribly awry are packed together in a homemade video. That little five minutes could have been the whole movie and that would have been just fine with me.

The stupidity continues to rub off on every element of the film and the supporting cast is no exception. Fellow SNL cast member Jorma Taccone plays Rod’s stepbrother Kevin who is alos the team manager. He offers no comedic relief nor does Bill Hader (“Knocked Up”) and Danny R. McBride (an upcoming comedic actor) as the two idiot friends. And it’s so disappointing to see the lovely Isla Fisher take a giant step down from her role in Scott Frank’s “The Lookout” as Rod’s love interest. Her performance here is indeed the polar opposite from her performance in “The Lookout.” Of course her character, Denise, is dating another man (Will Arnett, who also doesn’t even try to salvage anything out of this disaster) who she says is a nice guy but is clearly an obnoxious jerk.

This is SNL director’s Akiva Schaffer’s first feature film and let’s hope it’s his last. His film, from the cast to the crew to the script is below the amateur level and I firmly believe a better movie could be made by a group of teenagers. Schaffer seems to be trying to salute 80’s movies like the “Karate Kid” by throwing in a bunch of 80’s rock songs but ends up insulting them by making one of the year’s’ worst movies and it’s almost as if he’s doing so deliberately. “Hot Rod” is one of those comedies where the filmmakers seem to be trying to make the movie as bad as possible. There may be enough material here for a ten minute skit on SNL but this movie is a total disgrace as a feature-length film. SNL is so bad right now, these people need to stop worrying about the big screen and start focusing their good material onto the small screen.

Grade: F

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