Review of "Tropic Thunder"

Warning: This review contains information about gay-related plot points.

A loud, gory, profane, and fairly hilarious satire of big-budget movie making, Ben Stiller's Tropic Thunder is full of surprises, most of them good. The incredibly talented cast and wacky, over-the top set pieces will likely garner most of the attention and praise, but it's the film's willingness to throw each and every one of Hollywood's sacred cows onto the bonfire that really sets it apart, as is its ability to poke fun at Hollywood's track record with gay themes and people without being offensive.

The movie begins rather brilliantly with four ads positioned as fake trailers before the movie (finally, something good came from Grindhouse!) to introduce the main characters. First up is an ad for an energy drink and bar called Booty Sweat and Bust-A-Nut, respectively, pitched by a rapper named Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson), who hawks the products while sandwiched between undulating women in hotpants.

Next we meet Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller), an action star who has starred in six Scorcher films, each of which seems identical to the last. Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black) is the star of a comedy series called The Fatties that consists of Jeff playing an entire family of flatulent, fat-suited slobs (the sequel is called The Fatties: Fart Two), and is probably the most horrifying thing I've seen at the movies since the shark chomped that little kid on the raft in Jaws.

And finally, we meet blonde-headed, crystal-eyed 5-time Oscar-winning Aussie Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey, Jr.) in the preview for Satan's Alley, a film in which he and Tobey Maguire (playing "MTV Best Kiss Movie Award-Winner Tobey Maguire" in the trailer) play two Catholic monks who have a forbidden love affair. With its longing glances, hilarious use of religious imagery and perfect choice of music (the sexy Gregorian cheesiness of Enigma's "Sadeness") it's probably pound-for-pound the funniest 45 seconds in the whole movie.

After this clever intro, the real Vietnam epic that these four famous actors, as well as an unknown (Jay Baruchel), have been cast, kicks in and immediately goes off-track. After a disastrous mistake that costs the production four million dollars, panicked director Damien Cockburn (played by Hamlet 2's Steve Coogan) takes the advice of wizened vet Four Leaf Tayback (Nick Nolte) and decides to take the actors "off the grid" in order to get better performances from them.

Of course, once they're off the grid things go horribly wrong, and when the director gets lost on his own and the actors are set upon by heroin smugglers, Speedman is convinced that it's all a part of the director's plan and that they're still being filmed, leading to an "actor's journey" of ridiculous extremes.

Jack Black, Robert Downey Jr, and Ben Stiller

In the end, the story is about what drives Hollywood and the men (there aren't really any women to speak of at all in the entire movie) who make up the various parts of its machine. Stiller's character is a complete idiot (as usual), but an idiot who strives for meaning and legitimacy (which led him to take the Oscar-baiting lead role in Simple Jack, a terribly offensive movie about a mentally handicapped farmboy). Black's character is a heroin addict whose stash is stolen by a jungle bat early on, so he's in various stages of sweaty withdrawal and screaming detox for the rest of the film.

Downey's character, who takes himself and "his craft" so seriously that he has literally forgotten who he actually is, has undergone experimental pigmentation surgery to make himself appear African-American, and refuses to break character even when it is clear that they are no longer filming. Suffice to say it's an audacious role, and Downey tackles it full-force, giving what very well may be the performance of an already impressive career. Seriously, it boggles the mind what this guy can pull off.