Beware any film in which the cast appears to be having more fun than the audience.
Watch film trailers now »Tropic Thunder is that film – a one-joke affair that strings its gag across the best part of two hours as writer/ director/star Ben Stiller indulges himself and his penchant for silliness.
There are several strands to this war-com, the first being that it sets itself up as a glorious spoof of blood-soaked hard-ass 'Nam movies.
Second, it adopts that hoary old stand-by, the film-within-a-film, as a none-too-hardy band of Hollywood heavyweights find themselves fighting for real when they are meant to be making a movie.
Third, an array of high-calibre talent queues up to ridicule its collective persona and to prove that it can be funny. Cue Nick Nolte as a grizzled veteran, Matthew McConnaughey as a scrappy agent, Tobey Maguire in a fleeting cameo and, shout it loud, Tom Cruise as a foul-mouthed studio boss who likes to dance while abusing his staff.
Stiller is Tugg Speedman, the pampered action star, fighting to outshine multi Oscar-winning Antipodean poster boy Kirk Lazarus in his new opus.
It's hard for Tugg because, like most action stars, he can only play one role: himself.
Lazarus, however, is the ultimate Method performer. For Tropic Thunder, he's undergone a pigmentation transplant in order to play jive-talkin' black sergeant Osiris. The other player in this cock-eyed triumvirate is Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black), a corpulent comic best known for his flatulent heroes.
The movie is about to be shut down by studio bigwig Les Grossman (Cruise) when Brit director Damien Cockburn (Steve Coogan) whisks his stars into the jungle to shoot the picture guerrilla-style. What he can't expect is to land in the middle of a real war zone.
If the movie is Stiller's dream come true – the ultimate comedy homage – then it heralds the final element in the career resurrection of Robert Downey Jr, playing Lazarus. His brilliant turn reminds
us all just how close to genius he can be.
He outshines Stiller totally, proving on screen what many of us have suspected for some time – that Stiller needs a new shtick. Even the normally reliable Jack Black fails to shine alongside Downey,
As for Cruise… he tries hard but his hirsute, bald-headed worshipper of all things profane just jars. This is an actor in search of a character, but who comes up lacking.
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