New on DVD Sep 15 2008 @ 07:21 am
REVIEW: The Love Guru
Directed By: Marco Schnabel
Written By: Mike Myers & Graham Gordy
Starring: Mike Myers, Jessica Alba, Ben Kinglsey
Running Time: 88 minutes
Rated PG-13 for crude and sexual content throughout, language, some comic violence and drug references.
This review was originally published June 20th, 2008.
Dear Mike Myers,
I just got back from your new movie The Love Guru and can’t say I’ve ever felt this way after walking out of a theater. I’ll give you credit for giving the movie a story, even if it was small and one we’ve all heard before. But my main problem was this: I didn’t laugh once. In fact, I did the very opposite of laugh … something I don’t particularly know how to define. Its as if every time your character of Guru Pitka was on the screen, a part of my brain died and unknowingly got sucked into the screen.
Mike Myers (w/ fake bird) and Jessica Alba (w/ pained smile).
Is The Love Guru a satire? For a little while I thought it might have been; let’s say for maybe 5 minutes. Then I saw the first musical number (it took me by surprise, actually) which featured Guru Pitka’s expansive house (complete with many scantily clad, ethnically diverse women watering shrubbery), witnessed the constant scatological jokes, and marveled at how supremely offensive your “innocent” racial stereotypes were. After those leave my head, I’ll remember your film by one other thing: “Mariska Hargitay.” Well lookee here: you think a star of Law & Order SVU’s name sounds like an Indian greeting! Perhaps thats your kind of clever, but after saying it 50+ times, you wore out the joke’s welcome faster than Sarah Jessica Parker wears out a pair of Dior Extremes.
Oh yeah ... Justin Timberlake also makes an appearance.
Mr. Myers, is your new movie even supposed to be funny? There were vague hints of humor at parts (you even convinced Stephen Colbert to be in a few scenes), but the whole ordeal seemed more the antithesis of humor to me. I saw the scene with the two elephants having an intimate moment in a hockey arena and I even made it through that other scene where all the young gurus have a fight with urine-soaked mops. Did I laugh? No. Did the rest of the audience laugh? One of them may have … perhaps it was you! Sure, there were penis jokes and yes, there was the exploitation of a midget, but I think you overestimate the amount of people who think a “comedy” based around these concepts justifies a $9.00 admission ticket.
When all is said and done, its easy to see that the your new movie The Love Guru is occupying theaters right now for the exact same reason Guru Pitka decides to help out the Vancouver hockey team: money and fame. You’ll get the money - a disturbingly large number of Americans seem to like your humor - and the fame you already have, but The Love Guru proves that you don’t really deserve either one.
Mariska Hargitay!
Phillip Johnston
on Jun 20 2008 @ 8:38 pm 1. Evan Derrick said …
Ouch. I predict that Steve Carell and Get Smart crush this one at the box office. I’m not sure what studio-marketing-idiot decided to put this up against the mighty Michael Scott, but I’m fairly certain that this will mark the end of Mike Myers career…at least for a little while.
on Jun 20 2008 @ 8:50 pm 2. Joseph said …
Wow. Sorry you had to watch it.
on Jun 20 2008 @ 9:07 pm 3. Evan Derrick said …
Yeah, I jokingly suggested that Phillip watch it, but I never expected him to actually go.
on Jun 20 2008 @ 11:07 pm 4. Alexander Coleman said …
Wow. So it really WAS as bad as it looked.
Horrifying.
Very good review, Phillip.
on Jun 21 2008 @ 1:57 am 5. christian said …
Thanks for taking this bullet.
You know there is a funny movie that could be made with this character if Myers didn’t feel the need to resort to the most infantile gags possible.
on Jun 21 2008 @ 7:31 am 6. Luke Harrington said …
There are already several Hindu leaders that have called for a boycott of this film…and at least one rabbi has joined them in solidarity.
on Jun 21 2008 @ 8:07 am 7. Phillip Johnston said …
What little faith you have in me, Evan.
on Jun 21 2008 @ 10:37 am 8. Kristena said …
I can totally see this one taking home some Razzies.
on Jun 22 2008 @ 8:36 pm 9. Evan Derrick said …
This film is the quintessential Razzie champion.
on Jun 22 2008 @ 8:58 pm 10. Phillip Johnston said …
Come to think of it, I can’t say I’ve ever viewed a more terrible film at the theater.
on Jun 26 2008 @ 8:21 am 11. Maurice said …
I love ice cream. I love that feeling you get when a frozen spoonful is at just the right temperature and texture when it slides down your throat. That pleasant after taste of vanilla when the goo plops down in the tummy or even a few hours later when there’s the enevitable belch. Like a great shot onto a par four at the municipal golf course, these sensations bring you back for more.
The trouble is, it’s ice cream and a bowl is good, the half gallon is bad and you cannot stifLe the hurl after downing a tub. Also, the brands determine your pleasure level. Bryer’s vanilla rocks, while Winn-Dixie brand is for family picnic with relatives you want to see die from the radiation. Product placement is important in life, as it is in film.
NBC has a large product placement in films. Since 1978, movie goers are constantly exposed to a mostly sinister product placement: Saturday Night Live (SNL). Face it, once the NBC juggernaught found that despite an obvious and degenerate negative effect on the morals of youth, Senator Blutarsky opened a flood gate of talent and also rans that the entertainment world has yet to recover from.
Gleaning good SNL films from the bad is tatamount to segregating the remaining candy in a 7 year old’s Halloween bucket. The good films with alums from the show are sometimes seriously fantastic as the bad are fantastic in the way you compare turds on your lawn. Do we dare compare the “It’s Pat” feces to that of the “Dickie Roberts” without factoring the mess that was/is “Dirty Work” (I was gonna use “Oh Heavenly Dog” until the former turdbit crossed my mind)?
And while we’re at it, what the heck was the deal with the Spade-ster’s character in “Lost and Found” anyway? Am I to believe that a common whinner like that could actually catch the romantic eye of any girl who looks like Sophie Marceau? Please. If I ever snatched the dog of a woman of looks and means, I’d wake every day with the DOG in my bed for the rest of it’s miserable life. I couldn’t catch the eye of Ever Carradine and she’s apparently in some sort of weird, Kervorkian-like contest of noses with Owen Wilson.
That said “Joe Dirt” was funny.
Small doses of SNL character’s and skits are fine. Like ice cream, they go down in clean and smooth little bits and I could occasionaly burb up a bit of Conehead or Mary Katherine Gallagher, say “Excuse me” and wander from the room. But think of this: When was the last time you went to an ice cream buffett? A spoonful of ice cream is fine but eating it by the handful is an experience best left to people with a tube that bypasses the stomach and drains directly into Mr Creosote’s bucket. As well, the glut of SNL based movies is staggering and the weight of SNL actors in films approaches the equivilent of Bill Clinton’s gut when he ran around the country pretending he was Phil Hartman in a McDonald’s sketch.
This product is placed in every aspect of film. When was the last time you ever saw an SNL cast member in a movie without thinking “How long was he/she/they on the show?” You can’t look at Will Ferrell in a film, no matter how funny or serious it is, without comparing his performance to his channeling of Steve Butabi. You think I’m kidding? Which Shrek did you see without sitting on the edge of your seat in anticipation of the donkey blurting out “Hi. I’m Butwheet” or the jolly green asking “Are you looking at me bum? Are you?”
The myriad of characters cross refference our conscieness like the next Perseids meteor shower. We get confused as to what is real, what is good, what sucks or what we really should or should not watch. We sit and stare at the movie screen like stoner’s trying to focus on which dot in the star field will become the Enterprise. Rather than shouting “Geez. Not again!” when a new SNL skit makes it to the screen, there are those that apparently decided that spending money on the “Superstar” movie was a wise thing to do, plunked down $7.50 to allow the fact they are a moron to sink in rather than staying home and just crushing down more tinfoil on their head.
SNL keeps plugging away because they know there a minority of fans that will watch anything from the show. The more skits or characters or actors from the show they get on the big screen, the more money will fill the corporate coffer. And that’s where we come in. Stop. Stop it. No more of Meyer’s “satirical” takes on life. Halt Will Ferrell before he lampoons another sporting event. Advise Miller to stick to Monday Night Football. Chevy, dude, it’s over. And for god’s sake, please, PLEASE, somebody tell Rob Schnieder that he’s not really a gigalo. He can’t do it, Happy.
These folks are funny in bits but let’s keep it new. If there was anyone who saw the “Wayne’s World” Top 10 the other night and didn’t get the same, sick feeling you had when Ross Perot was running for office, please email me. You need help.
Thanks for another great review. I did enjoy it so.
on Jun 26 2008 @ 8:32 am 12. Luke Harrington said …
Wow, Maurice. Writing a book there?
You’re totally right, though. There’s a very good reason that Monty Python stuck with a sketch format when they made the jump from TV to film (Holy Grail and Life of Brian sort of pretended to have stories, but the point still stands). But evidently, SNL vets learned nothing from this.
on Jun 26 2008 @ 8:33 am 13. Evan Derrick said …
Ok Maurice, you are officially my new favorite commenter. Keep it coming, man.
on Jul 03 2008 @ 11:42 am 14. James said …
Stick a fork in Mike Myers… He’s done…
While we’re at it, I should take Adam Sandler out of my fridge. He should be done marinating.
on Sep 16 2008 @ 12:19 am 15. Anil said …
As Noir month ends, a new theme months begins to emerge in MovieZeal, as far as I can see.
Gather your spears and shields people. We are going to fight disastrous recent comedies.
We march… For honor’s sake… For glory’s sake… We march…
I can easily see myself as a front soldier in that type of a battle.
on Sep 16 2008 @ 8:18 am 16. Evan Derrick said …
Anil, the day that we have “awful comedy month” at MovieZeal is the day you can take away my blogging privileges forever.
on Sep 16 2008 @ 10:21 am 17. Haiku Girl said …
Hey, we get the UWE BOLL tribute month first!
on Sep 16 2008 @ 10:41 am 18. Evan Derrick said …
The crazies have spoken.