The Agency's Posts

NEW FILM PREMIER TONIGHT! BUILDING HOPE: Turk Pipkin's new filmBuilding Hopewill have a NY Premiere at the Tribeca Cinemas on Monday, July....
Read More>

Amy Winehouse: An Appreciation: Who couldn’t be drawn to the soulful singer, with her honesty, devil-may-care attitude and....
Read More>

Kristin Scott Thomas: From 'movie star' to 'actress': The British actress has a movie coming out about French Jews in 1942 and is starring on London's....
Read More>

Ricky Gervais: "Give Emmy to Carell".: Add Ricky Gervais to the long list of Emmy watchers who believe Steve Carell should finally,....
Read More>

Heroes.. and Duds: Among the highlights are appearances by Steven Spielberg and 'Tintin,' new Spider-Man Andrew....
Read More>

Captain America: Square-jawed superheroSteve Rogerslays strangely immobile in the bowels of an enormous “su
Read More>

Charlie Sheen to star in new 'Anger Management' sitcom: It's official: Charlie Sheen has found a new sitcom. Now all he needs is a network to air it.....
Read More>

'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows' box office: "Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows -- Part 2" broke the opening-weekend....
Read More>

Television review: 'Roseanne's Nuts' on Lifetime: Wednesday night viewers can tune into a reality show about an outspoken, controversial,....
Read More>

Horrible Bosses: Review: You can practically hear little coils of contempt tightening insideJason Batemanevery time he's....
Read More>

Arnold Schwarzenegger will make a new stand: There had been rumors for several weeks that Arnold Schwarzeneger was dipping his toe back in....
Read More>

Is James Franco honest or tiring?: We're closer to the next award season than to the last one. But James Franco still has the....
Read More>
Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, review
Posted on: 12/16/13
Share/Save/Bookmark

The sequel to Anchorman is surprisingly funny, says Robbie Collin, as an unexpected satire of 24-hour news culture

 

By 

The first thing that surprises you about Anchorman 2, a new sequel to a decade-old Will Ferrell comedy, is that it makes you laugh quite as often as it does. The second, bigger surprise is why.

In the original Anchorman, we were introduced to Ron Burgundy, a coiffed and booming newscaster working in 1970s San Diego, whose idea of a journalistic coup was candid footage of a waterskiing squirrel. This follow-up is set 10 years later, when the newly founded rolling news channels were cottoning on to the power of what might be called the waterskiing squirrel model of broadcast journalism. In this context, Ferrell’s character looks less like a preening chump than some kind of media visionary, which means that Anchorman 2 operates – in its opening act, at least – as an unexpected satire of 24-hour news culture.

“Does the news have to be so boring?” Ron grumbles during an editorial meeting at GNN, the New York-based cable channel where he and his cronies from the first film – played again by David Koechner, Paul Rudd and Steve Carell – have been hired to work the graveyard shift. (Ron’s ambitious wife and former colleague, Veronica Corningstone, played by Christina Applegate, is now presenting on a rival network.)

“We need more graphics!” says Ron. “We already have quite a lot,” a technician replies, warily. But Ron gets his way, and his financial bulletins end up looking like he is trapped in the central reservation of a six-lane motorway for share prices. News, he insists, should be exciting: it should pander to viewers’ prejudices, broadcast live car-chases and tend towards either the cuddly or the coarse. The station acquiesces. Ratings, of course, go through the roof.

Has Ferrell decided, 10 years into a broadly fruitful Hollywood career, that his films had better start meaning something? Until recently, his work with director Adam McKay, who shares a writing credit here, has always been scrupulously stupid, but their last picture together, The Other Guys, featured a billion-dollar investment scam not unlike the one operated by Bernie Madoff, and we saw flickers of a social conscience at work.

Well, either way, the new material here is mostly funny, and the satiric arrows, frankfurter-thick as they are, find their targets more often than not. The fashions of the era, too, are brilliantly caricatured – although there is only a hair’s-breadth of silliness between the blaring ties and windproof hairstyles here and in American Hustle, David O. Russell’s 1970s-set caper film.

LIST: Ron Burgundy's memoir: the 15 best lines

Yet in the same way that old bands feel obliged to roll out their greatest hits in concert, Anchorman 2 retreads many of the first film’s jokes and ideas, and in these moments, it feels more like a schematic cash-grab. Old characters meet new matches, or at least vague doppelgängers: Ron finds a rival in a younger, more snappily dressed newscaster played by James Marsden, and the simple-minded weatherman Brick Tamland (Carell) falls in love with an even simpler-minded secretary played by Kristen Wiig.

Ferrell’s comic energy is fuelled by unpredictability, so jokes that pre-empt their own punchlines are hardly ideal, and accordingly, neither scenario delivers quite as many laughs as you might hope. Nor does a sequence in which Ron has dinner with his boss’s family, who are black, and tries to talk as he imagines black people might – although there are flashes of Sacha Baron Cohen-calibre cringe comedy here.

Happily the film finds its feet again in its third act, with a subplot so strange I half-suspect I dreamt it. (Recounting the details would only defuse them, but it involves blindness, a lighthouse and an orphaned shark.) The sequence isn’t pure Anchorman, but it is pure Ferrell, and brings the film in for a smooth landing. The legend loses something in the retelling, but what’s new here is mostly worth the trip.


COMMENTS
Be the first to post a comment!


Post A Comment:




  • It's 2020! Start booking roles in commercials, fashion, films, theater and more with The Agency Online!

  • NEW WORKSHOP with Barbara Barna & Sean De Simone!

    Hi Everyone and Happy Summer! Sean at Sean De Simone casting and Barbara Barna are teaming up for a super informative and fun Hosting for Home Shopping workshop. A great opportunity for established or experienced TV Hosts and Experts interested in learning how to get noticed and how to get in....
  • MASTERCLASS W. Robin Carus & David John Madore

    A Special Offer for the Agency Community, from one of our favorite NYC Casting Directors! EMAIL FacetheMusicWithUs@gmail.com Or Eventbrite To Sign Up! Class Size is Limited.
  • Don't Fall Into The Comparison Trap

    Hi Everyone! As the second installment in an ongoing series of features by the Agency's amazing community, here's some sage advice from our own Regina Rockensies; a humble (& awesome)veteran we've had the pleasure of working with for a long time. Have an excellent week! : ) - The Agency....
  • One Model's Agreement

    Hi Everyone! As the first piece in an ongoing series of original articles by the Agency community, here's a short reflection on some of the values of professional acting & modeling that we can all keep in mind for our next casting. Good luck on your castings &shoots this week! : ) -....




 
home       castings&news       privacy policy       terms and conditions      contact us      browser tips
Official PayPal Seal