(Long Island, N.Y.) It’s been a while since I’ve seen a good comedy- the best one in recent memory was 2003’s Old School. That movie also starred Will Farrell, playing pretty much the same character he plays in every movie- a wild yet childlike middle-aged guy without any impulse control whatsoever.
Lately, Will has taken the formula one step further by making basically the same movie over and over- talk about typecasting. It started with Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, went on to Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, and now continues with the subject of this review, Blades of Glory. All three movies chronicle larger-than-life public figures at the top of their game who experience a major downfall, and their subsequent successful attempts to recapture their former glory. Anchorman wasn’t bad. Talladega Nights was an abomination. Blades of Glory, however, has refined the formula of the previous two movies, keeping the good while distilling out the bad, and actually succeeds in standing on its own as an excellent comedy.
Will plays Chazz Michael Michaels, the hard-drinking, womanizing bad-boy of the professional Figure Skating world. His arch rival is one Jimmy MacElroy (Jon Heder, who’s quickly becoming typecast himself as the go-to man when you want a hardcore nerd in your movie), an effeminate pretty boy raised by his cold, filthy-rich adoptive father. They are evenly matched, not just in their unparalleled skill on the ice, but in their mutual hatred of one another. That hatred comes to a head when they tie scores in a competition and engage in an all-out brawl during the award ceremony when they are forced to share a gold medal. Consequently, both are banned from men’s singles competition for the rest of their lives. Chazz sinks deep into depression, becoming a vomit-spewing drunkard on the children’s ice-show circuit, while Jimmy is disowned by his over-achieving father and reduced to an Al Bundy-like existence selling ice skates to bratty little girls.
Informed of a loophole in the lifetime ban by an obsessive fan- that he’s merely banned from singles competition, but not doubles- Jimmy sets out to find a partner mere weeks before a qualifying contest. However, time is running out and eligible skaters of his caliber are in short supply.
Meanwhile, Jimmy’s former coach, played by Craig T. Nelson and credited only as “Coach” (the typecasting continues), has an epiphany: that the ideal partner Jimmy is looking for is, in fact, his worst enemy- Chazz Michael Michaels. Disgusted at the prospect but eager to escape the hell their lives have become, Jimmy and Chazz set aside their differences and team-up for the qualifying event and a chance to skate for the World Championship. Facing stiff competition from the evil brother/sister team of Fairchild (Amy Poehler) and Stranz (Will Arnett) Van Waldenberg, can the previously individualistic Jimmy and Chazz train in record time to gel as a cohesive figure skating unit without killing each other first?
This movie was almost non-stop fun. You’ll probably think so too, if your tastes are as low-brow as mine are. This is a rare example of a film where they don’t really try to redeem its characters- Farrell’s Chazz is as wretched a human being by the end of the movie as he is at the beginning, which is refreshing, not to mention hilarious. I’m sure Farrell’s act will wear out its welcome sooner or later, but right now the guy’s mucho bankable as a comedic leading man. Jon Header is simply channeling Napoleon Dynamite for yet another role, only this time more gay. Only he’s not gay, as his character falls for the Van Waldenberg’s little sister (played by the adorable Jenna Fischer), so go figure. Speaking of gay, there’s a great deal of homoerotic humor in Chazz and Jimmy’s skating routines, but if you’re secure in your manhood (or, um, just like watching that kind of stuff), you won’t be able to hold back the laughs.
At a mere one hour and 33 minutes, the movie is lean and not bogged down by unfunny filler that would only serve to detrimentally pad its running time. I can’t count the number of movies that would have been great if they were only 20-30 minutes shorter- I despise this current trend of making films longer and longer when 90% of the time it works against them. Leave ‘em wanting more, not looking at their watches wondering when the hell it’ll all end.
Anyway, based on how bad Talladega Nights was, I went into Blades of Glory fully expecting to want to kill everyone around me before the opening credits had ended. Little did I realize how totally enjoyable it would turn out to be, thus sparing my fellow moviegoers a grisly fate. But honestly, I don’t think I would have harmed anyone, even if the movie was indeed bad. But I would have wanted to. Regardless, let’s reward Blades of Glory for sparing audiences from the wrath of crazed movie reviewers nationwide by going to see it many, many times and making it a great success.
