July
24'Tropic Thunder' reflects Cruise control
Comic-Con used to be a delicious secret of the nerd herd. Today the event gets wider media coverage than any other festival or film event in the world.
This town is jammed with 150,000 or so folks hungry to get in on the fun, not to mention the myriad studio reps who are desperate to court favor among the geek elite.
The celebs here pose a sharp contrast to the stars and auteurs who attract the hordes at Cannes. Stan Lee, the Dostoevsky of comic books, is a god-like figure at Comic-Con, as is Zack Snyder, who directed ‘300’ or Frank Miller, the graphic novelist-turned-filmmaker.
Given the ‘heat’, Comic-Con is a great place for studios to expose their edgy picture, and last night’s screening of Ben Stiller’s "Tropic Thunder" was the ideal product for the moment.
Bawdier even than an Apatow effusion, "Tropic Thunder" elicited thunderous laughs, but also triggered some surprises even from this audience. Here was Robert Downey Jr. famously cast as an Australian superstar with an identity problem playing a black action star with an identity problem.
Even more bizarre, here was Tom Cruise cast in a supporting role as a Hollywood studio chief, screaming a vocabulary that would embarrass a hardened rapper.
The Cruise-Stiller notion of a contemporary Hollywood boss was an intriguing one: Cruise’s character, a bald, pudgy man named Grossman, is not the slickly corporate type who heads studios today, but rather a screaming, smarmy Semite more reminiscent of Columbia’s fabled Harry Cohn. Cruise's Grossman character is perfectly willing to "sell" the life of his star to terrorists in return for insurance money.
Harvey Weinstein would fire the Cruise character on the grounds of being politically incorrect.
But that is part of the subtext of "Tropic Thunder." It is as momentously vulgar as it is comical – but it’s also a movie within a movie. Downey, Jack Black and the other characters in the movie conduct a delightful parody of actors, their self-doubts and delusions, with myriad references to obscure movies and arcane incidents to satisfy the most dedicated cinephile.
The principal plot is too off-the-wall to describe here, but it was perfect grist for the Comic-Con crowd, who are eager for inside jokes and first looks.
The nerd herd assembled here wants to know what Watchman will look like, how the Spirit will shape up and how Stan Lee views the state of his art. If Barack Obama walked the floor of the Comic-Con convention no one would notice.
For god’s sake, he probably wouldn’t even be in costume.
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I funna watch it.
Posted by: Eric | 8/13/2008 6:26:18 PM
Good Job!
Thanx for spoiling the cameo.
You rock!
(Yes, that's sarcasm)
Posted by: way2go | 7/31/2008 4:56:35 AM
Looking forward to this but seems like Big Tom is running scared trying to get people to like him again. Some kick-ass action like "MI:3" should do the trick.
Posted by: Fanboy Slim | 7/30/2008 9:31:48 PM
Yeah, I want to see this too.
Posted by: bobby | 7/25/2008 12:18:15 AM
This movie looks great and I look forward to seeing it. And I'm glad Tom Cruise is doing a big comedy. Tom, we love to laugh with you - do some more big comedies!
Posted by: GirlComedyFan | 7/24/2008 6:41:27 PM