The Interview (2014) | Film Review

This much I can say for certain: I now understand why North Korea would be ticked. Forget all of the hacking insanity, the hype, the hyperbole – let’s just look at the movie itself, The Interview. You have a film about a producer and reporter from an entertainment tabloid show (Seth Rogen and James Franco), en route to interview the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un, with a firm plan concocted by the CIA (summed up by the far underused Lizzy Caplan) to assassinate said dictator once arriving. If this were reversed, Americans would have Facebook protests lined up before the camera started rolling.

Ultimately though, this is satire and what you need to have in comedic satire to make a film gel is a willingness to take chances. No one will ever be able to accuse directors Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg of playing it safe here. Everything you have heard about The Interview is true and, for better or worse, they do follow through on their goal to piss off an entire country ruled by a cranky megalomaniac with an alleged nuclear arsenal at his disposal. These aren’t just chances people, these are cajones.

Does that mean The Interview is actually a good movie? Not so fast. This is still a Franco and Rogen movie which means if you have a high opinion of crude humor or if you are obsessed with multiple definitions of genitalia, you will be very pleased. If you were hoping for an intelligent, thought provoking film examining the nuances of the North Korean regime…you would be better off watching an old Rambo flick. This is primarily low-brow humor which, though hysterically funny at times, is no deeper than a puddle during the California drought.

Rogen’s take on producer Aaron Rapaport is the strongest of the pair here, as he plays it mostly straight throughout the film. Most of his comedy in the film stems from observational humor, clever asides, or stating the painfully obvious. For me, this is when Rogen is at his best. His budding relationship with Sook (Diana Bang), a top-ranked official in Kim Jong-un’s apparently progressive army, gives the film a much-needed boost of culture mashing and often serves as a nice reminder that we are in some twisted fabrication of a factual reality.

Franco as Dave Skylark, on the other hand, is going for the insanely wild TV personality with the IQ of a blueberry muffin, and far too often he completely misses it. There are several moments where his hyper-realized persona comes close to brilliance. Unfortunately, there are several more where Skylark and his antics will grate on your inner soul. Franco seems to want to have it both ways: Create an engaging, realistic character while also painting an almost Austin Powers-like caricature, and he simply never finds a strong enough footing to ground the character.

Franco’s hot-and-cold relationship with Kim Jong-un (Randall Park), though, is a highlight of the film. This section of the movie, which takes a breather from the skewing of a nation in an attempt to give Jong-un ‘the character’ some life as well as a few explanations for his more fanatical actions, shows that Rogen and company were legitimately trying to elaborate on this dictatorship in more than just bland potty humor. It gives Kim Jong-un a little more depth than just sitting there stoically planning an ensuing attack. Frankly, I found their relationship far more engaging than Aaron and Dave.

Speaking of, it really is too bad as this is the rare occasion where Franco’s scenes with Rogen in a film mostly fall flat, due generally to relying on sexual innuendo a little too frequently. Had Franco and Rogen captured their obvious chemistry in a more consistent manner with smarter writing, the overall film would have proven to be worth the incessant hype.

One thing of note for this reviewer was the cinematography by Brandon Trost. For a generic and crude comedy like this one, there are some genuinely beautiful landscape shots befitting a Peter Jackson film. For all of the ups-and-downs throughout The Interview, that attention to background and establishing shots was easily the one constant.

The last thing I will mention, and there will be no spoilers here, is the ending. Throughout the film, Rogen and Goldberg do ample work illustrating both the differences and the similarities between the US and North Korea. At one point, they cleverly go in a different direction than would be expected, only to cop out and circle back to exactly where they were before. Had they followed through on the more eye-opening plot misdirection, this could have been a film with something both hilarious and powerful to say. Instead, we were once again left with the same type of plodding and bland ending you have seen 50 times before.

The Interview is a forgettable comedy with an unforgettable advertising campaign, yet should still be seen for the amount of risks the filmmakers took to get it made at all. It is just too bad they miffed what could have been an incredibly smart ending and took the more predictable, ‘Hollywood’ approach. Much like the America it is representing, the film falls short on following through on its promises.

Starring James Franco, Seth Rogen, Lizzy Caplan
Written by Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, and Dan Sterling
Directed by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg

Aaron Peterson
The Hollywood Outsider