Rat Race (2001)

Director: Jerry Zucker

Cast: Rowan Atkinson, John Cleese, Whoopi Goldberg, Cuba Gooding Jr.

Have I Seen It Before: Have I? I’m almost positive I haven’t. I’d remember it, right?

Did I Like It: I think there’s a certain dishonesty to a certain generation when they say that It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963) is… oh, what’s the word…? good. The moment when a boomer got a hold of the rough concept, the first thing he did was chop down the running time by about half. I’m not sure a single comedy could ever successfully fill two VHS tapes. Billy Wilder understood it, Mike Nichols understood it. Even Kubrick—he being unafraid of a long film, to be sure—understood it.

Zucker understands it, too. Unfortunately, the film forgets to be funny in the meantime. Maybe Zucker didn’t get it, had a three-hour version of this film and chopped it to fit the modern sensibility.

I sat there stone-face aside from a few moments, which should open and immediately close the case on the film. One might argue I’ve been sleep deprived and wouldn’t have cracked a smile at Chaplin if he started churning out films again, but I’m submitting that the film is the one which is sleep deprived. The two biggest comedic beats of the movie are that John Cleese has improbably white fake teeth, and that Rowan Atkinson is sometimes very foreign, sometimes very sleepy, and occasionally both. Blink and you’ll miss whether or not Seth Green’s brother is foolish or pitiable, and if you’re thinking that deeply about this question, I would forgive you for neglecting to laugh. I sure did. I still don’t understand what Cuba Gooding Jr.’s problem is. Are football fans usually this worked up about the coin toss at the top of the game?

Also, Smash Mouth is there. They’re naturally hilarious. Ahem.

Monty Python’s Life of Brian (1979)

Director: Terry Jones

Cast: Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle

Have I Seen It Before: Ok, confession time: No. I know, I know. For some reason, my adolescence was not tied to any sort of Python obsession.

Did I Like It: Is it weird to say that there is a certain malevolence that exists at the core of the Pythons? This isn’t even remotely a complaint, but I honestly didn’t laugh any louder than I did when one of the wisemen (several days after the viewing I’m thinking it was Cleese, but gun to my head, I couldn’t be sure; he was tall, and that feels good enough for me) is so thoroughly annoyed that he wasted his time with Mandy (Terry Jones; definitely, unassailably Terry Jones) that he just shoves her to the ground on the way over to the correct manger. It’s just such a needless moment of cartoonish violence, how could one not laugh? You can have all of the absurdity, wordplay, and dead parrots you want, but when it comes right down to it, I want to see new mothers being pushed to the ground.

It had to be Cleese, right? It was such a Basil Fawlty thing to do. What else does one dwell on in a Python film? The filmmaking? It’s all cheeky fun, wrapped up in the sheep’s clothing of a biblical epic. Honestly, the moment the Wise Men leave Brian’s barn, and find out where they were supposed to go, might be one of the best shots ever produced in a comedy film. Throw in an imitation Shirley Bassey theme song so good I thought until I looked it up that it was the real thing, and that’s, *chef’s kiss*, pure cinema.

That nearly perfect moment of nihilism is completely obliterated by the ending musical number—“Always Look on the Bright Side of Life”—which may be one of the happiest songs ever to be created, and certainly to come out of the United Kingdom…

Then again, when one considers the context of the ending, it might be the final push to the floor of the barn.