Cinema Reviews

The Interview Review

3rd Feb 2014

So the film that has caused much international controversy makes its way into American theatres this Christmas as well as via the Sony website, VOD and on YouTube.

The war on free speech was launched and seemed ill after until Sony reversed their decision to cancel the release of the film. More interestingly they have released as scheduled, but have also used other formats for people to see the film including VOD. As a prime release of the season this could mark a historical occasion for how studios can release their films and still make a decent profit. We will have to wait for the figure on this one to come through to see if this is a way forward for releasing a big picture – and perhaps on a future occasion they will also release the film worldwide in this manner.

As to the films content – It’s another rollicking Evan Goldberg/ Seth Rogen venture littered with dumb white male lead characters ineptly doing just about everything they set out to accomplish. The plot is ludicrous of course and needs no hindsight to see just how preposterous the whole worldwide threat has become over such a disposable comedy.

Rogen is talk show host producer Aaron Rappaport who has managed success with the show Skylark – hosted by Dave Skylark (James Franco) a mushy talk show that excels on focusing in celebrity gossip.

The plot is turned however after Rappaport is insulted by a “Proper” TV news exec and sets out to make Skylark a more prestigious show. This opportunity comes when the duo discover that notorious North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un is a fan of the show.

After booking an interview in North Korea with the leader the two are then approached by the CIA and asked to assassinate the leader during the interview via a poisoned tape that Skylark would have exposed on his palm when meeting the leader.

Naturally all doesn’t exactly all go to plan thanks to several mishaps on Skylark’s part (Being the dumber and more easily lead of the two). And as the old saying goes – Hilarity ensues!

Writer/directors Goldberg and Rogen don’t seem to have learnt much from their last venture, tjis is the End. Here again there are plenty of impromptu montages of drug taking, poo and vomit gags, word play and hi-jinks to keep the audience entertained. There is a high gag rate, but they hit and miss targets as randomly as bullets in a Peckinpah movie.

In the end you have a couple of dumb lugs getting lost along the way, but finding themselves in the end in order to do the right thing – even if that right thing is a climax that is as over the top dramatically as it is in its action.

No one is going to remember the interview for any of its better gags, instead it will be remembered as a film that caused actually worldwide chaos, threatened free speech, but perhaps is also a doorway to how studios can release their work for public consumption.