I'm sure most of you had to have seen this coming. So the question we have to ask ourselves today is, why am I reviewing this so long after I first hated it? Everyone else loved it. I'm writing this review to try to convince those people that it is a stupid film targeted at stupid moviegoers. You see, the point is not to avoid stupid movies but we must avoid being stupid audience members. I am all for goofy, campy humor but that's only when it is done well. George of the Jungle and Wayne's World are examples of silliness at its best. Those films are whimsical and damned funny. The film I am reviewing today is neither whimsical nor funny. Deal with it.
Anchorman is set during the 1970s and stars Will Ferrell as Ron Burgundy, San Diego's top-rated news anchorman. Burgundy is outwardly willing to adjust to the idea of females in the workplace although he doesn't want his job challenged. Due to that it's no surprise that when an aspiring female anchor named Veronica (Christina Applegate) shows up she is not the studio's most welcome addition. After Veronica pays her dues covering so-called female-oriented fluff pieces (think cat fashion shows and cooking segments), the ambitious Veronica sets her eyes on the news desk; more specifically, on Ron's seat behind it. Not unpredictably, Ron does not take this intrusion lightly and so the two rivals engage in a battle of the sexes for a chair.
Here's a summary of every joke in the movie: Not funny. You know when you tell someone to shut up and all they say is, "You shut up." Those kind of childish insults plague the movie. It's essentially an hour and a half of back and forth insults and dialogue designed for stupid characters that doesn't really go anywhere. Lines like, "You smell like a blueberry" and "Where'd you get your clothes? The toilet store?" leave me wondering, "is that meant to be funny?" The only answer I can come up with is that the shooting script had to be the first draft. The attempts at satirizing sexist workplaces and news stations in the 1970's are so desperate for laughs that it's almost tragic.
IMDB lists the runtime of the film as ninety-four minutes. You know what I did like about this movie? That it wasn't ninety-five.
½ ★
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