Post by StevePulaski on Jul 24, 2011 21:59:54 GMT -5
James Franco and Danny McBride.
Rating: ★
Your Highness had potential to be the Airplane! of fantasy films, but instead, it takes a detour down the road of recycled jokes, lame characters, and so much abuse on foul language it wears paper-thin after a while. All four leads, known for some very famous work in the field of film, give mediocre to abysmal performances as if "Oscar Winner" or "Oscar Nominee" in front of their name meant nothing.
How did David Gordon Green, the director of some great independent films in his early years, manage to pull himself together and do a project with narrow-minded characters and lackluster special effects to top it off. This is a seriously confused movie that can't decipher whether it wants to be a satire on fantasy films such as The Lord of the Rings, or if it wants to do its own thing.
It reminds me of a softcore Skinemax film I watched called The Lord of the G-Strings: The Femaleship of the String. Its got awkward special effects and lame acting, but it also has its share of pointless, gratuitous nude scenes that have no purpose other than to showcase nudity. It almost seems this was a contest to, not only make a bad film, but to make a bad film with large amounts of nudity.
The plot is simple, because I suspect if it was any thicker than the thought-process behind this it would confuse itself to the point of senseless scenes piled one after another. It involves a mid-evil village where Fadious (Franco) has just returned home from a battle, and is about to marry a woman he met named Belladonna (Deschanel). Fadious's brother Thadeous (McBride) is jealous and resentful of his older brother, but somehow is chosen to be the best man at his wedding. Thadeous winds up ditching the wedding, and before we know it, an evil whatchamacallit has stolen Belladonna and now they have to get her back.
Along the way, they meet the beautiful Isabel (Portman) who is obviously a Xena clone. Isabella is seeking revenge for her father's murder, and happens to be going in the same direction as the boys. She tags along, and now we have a gang of numbskulls, and a women, on this quest.
You'll notice that during the course of Your Highness, women have no purpose in this film other than to fill a character position. Unlike the men, not very well developed but we learn more about them as time goes on, the women in this film have no character. Zooey Deschanel and Natalie Portman's characters are just the women units in the film. The Belladonna character is so undeveloped it's an anomaly of film characters. The man's role in this film; to be seemingly strong, resemble utter stupidity, and walk forward and fall into traps. The woman's role; show up, show off cleavage, wear a metal thong, or a red dress. Done.
I've read that all the actors had to work with is an outline written by Green and McBride, and most of the dialog is improvised. I enjoy improvising. I've seen various clips of Curb Your Enthusiasm, and improved or not, it's funny. This is a mess. The characters are struggling to keep thoughts coming out of their mouths. When they realize they can't think of anything to say, they spit random obscenities hoping to get a laugh. That's funny.
Your Highness fails greatly in the special effects department too. After excruciatingly lengthy dialog scenes we get a special effects orgasm or a fight between the opposing sides. When in doubt, throw in chaos is the new rule in action/fantasy movies. Maybe if these battles had been more about making fun of the fantasy film cliches rather than showcasing an awful lot of pyrotechnics they would've been funnier.
This is nothing but a severe mess of filmmaking. Especially by a director of Green's caliber. I respect his choice to move on with a farce film. But farce films work when you have a funny slapstick character or group. Like Chris Farley or The Three Stooges. Maybe the joke is we have four actors, doing the very best they can with the thin material they have to work with. And no script either. If that is the joke, I got it. But it isn't funny.
Starring: James Franco, Danny McBride, Zooey Deschanel, and Natalie Portman. Directed by: David Gordon Green.