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Horrible Bosses

kdk July 8, 2011
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In his hilarious breakout documentary, .php>The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, director Seth Gordon took an arcade full of video game geeks and a scheming bully and turned them into a wildly entertaining film. If he could do that with real people, then it seems only natural that he could also take a cast full of seriously funny actors and crank out a wildly entertaining film. And, fortunately, he doesn’t disappoint with his new (fictional) comedy, Horrible Bosses.



Sure, it probably doesn’t take much to take stars like Jason Bateman, Kevin Spacey, and Jason Sudeikis and produce a side-splitting comedy. You could probably just put them on a sound stage with a couple of phone books and let them go nuts, and you’d still come up with something that’s worth shelling out 10 bucks to see. But a clever script doesn’t hurt, either.



Nick (Bateman), Kurt (Sudeikis), and Dale (Charlie Day) are constantly tormented by their evil bosses. Nick’s boss, Dave (Kevin Spacey), is a control freak who constantly makes him jump through hoops, only to pass him up for a much-deserved promotion. Kurt’s boss, Bobby (Colin Farrell), is a greedy cokehead who’s running his late father’s company into the ground. And Dale’s boss, Julia (Jennifer Aniston), is a hot dentist who sexually harasses him while their patients are sedated. Over drinks, the three fantasize about killing their bosses, but after they’re pushed too far, they actually decide to go through with it.



Of course, when you mix three lovably bumbling would-be killers, a paranoid psychotic, and a crazed cokehead, nothing goes quite as planned—and everything soon spins wildly out of control.



You might be surprised, though, to see just how it spins out of control. The story doesn’t go in the direction you might expect. Instead, just when you think you know what’s coming, the wacky comedy takes a surprisingly dark turn. And even though it seems to fizzle out a bit in the end (especially where Aniston’s Julia is involved), it’s a welcome twist on the same old hapless caper.



Really, though, Horrible Bosses is full of all kinds of surprises—like an ugly Colin Farrell with a bad comb-over or a nasty, foul-mouthed, dark-haired Jennifer Aniston. And while both roles are relatively small, Farrell is at his In Bruges best as Bobby, and Aniston somehow makes the role feel completely natural (unlike Natalie Portman’s awkward turn in No Strings Attached).



What isn’t surprising, however, is the rest of the cast. Spacey has always been oh-so-good at being oh-so-bad. And Bateman, Sudeikis, and Day make the perfect trio of beaten-down employees. Their delivery and comic timing couldn’t be better—and, despite playing blundering idiots, they still manage to make their characters (mostly) believable.



It may not be as over-the-top outrageous as, say, The Hangover, but Horrible Bosses is even better: a ridiculous but clever comedy that just about any average, hard-working schmoe can relate to. Forget The Hangover Part II. Horrible Bosses is the must-see comedy of the summer.

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About Post Author

kdk

Kristin Dreyer Kramer has been writing in some form or another (usually when she was supposed to be doing something else) since the ripe old age of ten—when she, her cousin, and their two Cabbage Patch Dolls formed the Poo Authors’ Club. After a short career in advertising, Kristin got sick of always saying nice things about stuff that didn’t deserve it—so now she spends her days criticizing things, and she’s much happier for it. Since creating NightsAndWeekends.com in February of 2002, Kristin has spent her life surrounded by piles and piles of books and movies—so many that her office has become a kind of entertainment obstacle course. As if her writing and editing responsibilities for N&W.com weren’t enough to keep her out of trouble, Kristin also hosts a number of weekly radio shows: Reel Discovery, Shelf Discovery, and On the Marquee. She’s also a proud member of the Broadcast Film Critics Association (CriticsChoice.com), the Central Ohio Film Critics Association (COFCA.org), the Online Film Critics Society (OFCS.org), and the Women Film Critics Circle (WFCC.Wordpress.com). Kristin lives in Columbus, Ohio, with her husband, Paul, and their daughter, Anna. She welcomes questions, comments, and fan mail at kdk@nightsandweekends.com.
kdk@nightsandweekends.com
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kdk

Kristin Dreyer Kramer has been writing in some form or another (usually when she was supposed to be doing something else) since the ripe old age of ten—when she, her cousin, and their two Cabbage Patch Dolls formed the Poo Authors’ Club. After a short career in advertising, Kristin got sick of always saying nice things about stuff that didn’t deserve it—so now she spends her days criticizing things, and she’s much happier for it.

Since creating NightsAndWeekends.com in February of 2002, Kristin has spent her life surrounded by piles and piles of books and movies—so many that her office has become a kind of entertainment obstacle course.

As if her writing and editing responsibilities for N&W.com weren’t enough to keep her out of trouble, Kristin also hosts a number of weekly radio shows: Reel Discovery, Shelf Discovery, and On the Marquee. She’s also a proud member of the Broadcast Film Critics Association (CriticsChoice.com), the Central Ohio Film Critics Association (COFCA.org), the Online Film Critics Society (OFCS.org), and the Women Film Critics Circle (WFCC.Wordpress.com).

Kristin lives in Columbus, Ohio, with her husband, Paul, and their daughter, Anna. She welcomes questions, comments, and fan mail at kdk@nightsandweekends.com.

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