Farce of the Penguins

Man, this movie could have been so much funnier.

The premise is ridiculously basic - a parody of March of the Penguins, made entirely with cheap stock footage, and voiced by a star-studded cast of comics. Bob Saget is credited with the writing - the movie probably would have been a lot better if all the comics doing voices had just written their own lines. But still, it's not a _bad_ movie - for some reason, I tend to expect that dumbass comedies like this will either be genius or crap. But this one is soundly mediocre, with a few moments of absolute hilarity. I wouldn't be surprised if, 5 years down the road, I ended up thinking it was really funny. Because as my friend Ligaya pointed out, if you spent some time hanging out with someone who thought that this movie was comic genius, and constantly quoted lines from it, you'd probably end up finding it hilarious. I mean, that's kind of how my love of Office Space started - I didn't think it was all that funny when I first saw it, but after hearing it quoted a billion times, I ended up thinking it was comic genius. Farce of the Penguins actually has the potential to be that kind of movie. There were scenes that I'm still chuckling over a few days later, and some of the lines will indubitably become a part of my amusing non sequitor repertoire ("I'm Jaime. I'm up front. I don't play games. Wanna bang?" "Ew, disgusting!" "Oooh, you're up front too. I like that."). Some might complain that it's overly crude, but what in the hell are those people doing renting the movie? What did they expect?

The highlight of the movie is almost certainly Samuel L. Jackson's narration. But Carlos Mencia (whom I normally don't particularly care for) does a great turn as a stoned penguin roaming through the tropics. And the montage of various animals getting it on is kind of awesome.

Ultimately, I guess, it's a movie you sort of have to be in the mood for. And getting in the mood should probably involve slaughtering an ungodly amount of brain cells. I certainly wouldn't recommend watching it at full mental capacity. But if you're looking for some good dumb humor, you could do worse. You could also do better, but hey, it's always good to have a backup plan.