There are many places we can begin the next chapter of my amazing movie reviews. This is one such place. Today, I am going to be reviewing the sequel to the 2004 comedy film “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy,” which is called “Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues.” Similar to the first “Anchorman” film, this sequel stars and was co-written by Will Ferrell. Also returning was director and other co-writer Adam McKay, as well as co-stars Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner, and Christina Applegate. Not to mention there were also some new faces in this movie that weren’t in the original which I will bring up later in this review. Unlike the first film, this sequel was distributed by Paramount Pictures, whereas the original was distributed by DreamWorks Pictures. The reason for that is because in 2006, DreamWorks merged with Paramount at the time, and the latter company bought the rights to the first “Anchorman” film and anything else “Anchorman”-related in the future. Nevertheless, this does not affect my overall opinion on the actual movie itself, it’s just something that I wanted to bring to your attention. Now, I really enjoyed the first “Anchorman” movie and I thought it was very funny! So, when I first saw the previews for this sequel, I was really interested to see this in theaters, which I eventually did! And, what did I think of Ron Burgundy’s latest adventure? I thought it was good, but I didn’t think it was necessarily a “Whammy!” as Champ Kind would put it. Why would that be case? Keep on reading more words and you’ll find out! Oh, and bear in mind, this review is going to be on the PG-13 version of the movie, not the “Super-Sized R-rated version” that was released in theaters during late February/early March for one week only. I have never seen the R-rated version of this film, so this review will just be focusing only on the PG-13-rated version and I will avoid any comparisons in that regard. With that typed, I certainly hope all you guys out there reading this are slipping on some protection to turn your Po’ Boy into a Fat Tuesday, because I will now type about the good stuff that I found in this movie! First off, I thought that the acting was good for a comedy sequel. There wasn’t anything I saw that was really Oscar-worthy, but for what most of the actors were told to do, they did it fine. Second off, the jokes that they told were really funny, at least… half of them. Yeah, I’ll also get to that later, but for the ones that did make me laugh, it hit a bull’s-eye with me every time! One scene that had a joke I really laughed at was the one you’ve probably seen in the trailers where an RV swerves on a road, repeatedly flips over, and it shows what’s happening to our main characters in Phantom high speed camera-related slow-motion as they’re being flipped over while inside the RV! And the background music is set to “Muskrat Love” by The Captain & Tennille, which makes me like that song even more now that it’s been in this movie! The main actors, themselves, worked naturally off each other, just like they were best friends in real life, which they probably are! You can tell, too, because there were many scenes when it felt like there was a LOT of improvisation and it looked like they were all having fun while doing that! In addition, I liked how a good number of the cast from the first movie came back, including cameo appearances from both Fred Willard and Vince Vaughn reprising their respective roles! Speaking of cameos, do any of you remember that huge fight scene from the first movie where all these newscasters come together out of nowhere and engage in a “Hunger Games”-style fight to the death? Well, there is another scene just like that in this sequel, except this time, there are even more newscasters and even more famous people participating in a huge fight! I thought it was unbelievable on how many people the production team got just for them to be in this one scene for this one movie! I won’t dare give away who any of those celebrities and famous people are, but it’s really something for you to see to believe! Anynews, I could follow the whole film incredibly well, I did like a few of the new characters introduced here, whenever a scene showed an animal, they looked like they were trained very properly, there was another scene showing Will Ferrell doing some flamboyant ice skating, which reminded me a lot of one of Will Ferrell’s previous movies, “Blades of Glory,” and I did like the effort it took to make this movie look like it took place in the 1980’s, including the technology, the fashions, and the fact that the characters sometimes reference real events that actually happened around that time period! Be careful not to take a bite out of a piece of chicken of the cave, because I shall proceed to type about what I found to be underwhelming in this movie. While I typed before that I did like a few of the new characters in this movie, including Josh Lawson’s character, Greg Kinnear’s character, and even Dylan Baker’s character, not all of them played out successfully with me. One of them pertains to James Marsden, who plays a character that is such a clichéd bully stereotype who has no reason to exist except to be a jerk to everyone around him, or more specifically, to Ron Burgundy. Okay, he reads the news, but does that really make him any better? Characters like this really frustrate me and it frustrates me even more that movies have to keep resorting to these clichés that doesn’t make my movie-going experience any better or more exciting. If anything, it makes it much more boring. I really thought that films nowadays have moved past tired old clichés like that. But, NO! Screenwriters these days are just too lazy to come up with their own fresh new ideas, or even give some sort of creative or unique twist to these pointless and dull clichés. And Marsden’s character was SO dull, that it resulted in him not being funny, interesting, complex, likeable, and even his presence slowed this movie down for me! The only two things this guy has got going for him is that he reads the news and hes good-looking, but that isnt saying much. Compared to a lot of other generic, one note bullies I’ve seen in the past, he’s not really as bad as the jocks from “Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel,” or Diamond Tiara from “MLP: FiM,” but, come on, they could have made this guy a LOT more exciting! Another character that could have been better executed was Meagan Good’s character. I found her to be very odd in this movie. Meaning that if she’s a character who is proclaimed to be as “tough as nails,” why does she dress so feminine and look so feminine and has a voice thats so feminine? I was actually quite surprised that she wasn’t portrayed as a tomboy! When we first get to meet this character, she clearly has an immediate strong dislike for Ron Burgundy, even to the point where she beats him up during one unfunny scene. Yet, in a few scenes later, she starts to become really horny and tries to make out with him, in her work office of all places, and completely out of nowhere! Seriously, where did all that passion come from?! Wow, after going through the events in Saw V, no wonder shes acting this way! And, unfortunately, the movies problems dont stop there. While I thought that half of the jokes were very funny, the other half felt very juvenile to the point where some of them dragged on too long. For example: Theres a scene when Brick Tamland is standing in front of a green screen and hes broadcasting the weather while wearing green pants. Then he thinks he lost his legs and pretends not to stand up! Sorry, I just didnt find that joke funny. There was also a side romance which featured him and another character played by Kristen Wiig. It was cute, I guess, but it wasnt really funny to me, either. There was also a huge chunk of the third act focused on a sort of life-changing event that happens to the main character caused by none other than the bully stereotype! It takes up about 15 minutes of the films running time, including having a pointless song sequence, and I felt that it needed to be shortened by half that time. I mean, really people, the movies long enough, already! There was also a child character played by Judah Nelson who could have tried a little harder with his acting skills and it looked like the film editing needed to be worked on some more. So, on The Global News Network, I liked “Anchorman 2.” You all may recall that I did not include this movie in my Top 10 Best and Worst Films of 2013 List. Referencing to what I typed before, I thought it was good, but it wasn’t as funny or quotable, for that matter, as the first film was. Nor was it anything too spectacular either. Maybe the “Super-Sized R-rated version” is funnier, but I don’t know what that’s like seeing as how I’ve never seen it at the time that I’m typing this review. According to the film’s movie poster, it claims to have 763 new jokes in it!* (*Subject to your sense of humor.) I can’t really argue with that, so I guess I’ll have to take the movie’s word on it. As of the version that I saw and reviewed, it will be coming out on DVD, Blu-ray, and UV Digital Copy tomorrow on April Fools’ Day, which will contain the “Super-Sized R-rated version” and a third “Unrated version” of the movie! Also, a 1-disc DVD edition of the PG-13 version will be released on the same day. Some of you could be thinking right now if this movie worth purchasing and owning? Ummm… in terms of the 1-disc DVD PG-13 version that has no bonus features at all, I want to tell you that the answer is yes, but I would feel like I’m lying to you. There are some good jokes in this version that are definitely worth laughing at and even some famous celebrity cameos coming together during that one scene! But, I think there needed to be more of that in order for me to officially recommend this for a solid purchase, even at a discount price. In that sense, this version is definitely worth a rental. In terms of the DVD/Blu-ray/UV Digital Copy pack that has a ton of bonus features in it, maybe it’s worth buying. But, even then, that’s a BIG “maybe.” That pack contains all three different versions of the same movie, and since I’m not able voice or type my own opinion on this pack, you guys reading this will have to decide for yourselves if it’s really worth paying the extra $6 to officially buy and own it forever. Okay, now that that’s out of the way, even though this movie wasn’t the laugh-out-loud comedy extravaganza I was expecting it to be, I would still like to see an “Anchorman 3” in the next 9 years. Maybe even sooner if this film did well enough! However, Adam McKay said recently that there won’t be an “Anchorman 3” and he thinks that’s it for Ron Burgundy. Still, he could be tempted to change his mind sometime in the near future. Then again, maybe he won’t. All right, folks, that’s about all I got for this film, I’ll continue to type more words on a keyboard from a teleprompter in the near future, and from all of us here on Facebook, I’m Joseph Pesantez. You stay classy, Internet.
Posted on: Tue, 01 Apr 2014 03:50:34 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015