Let me say up front that this movie's style appealed to me from the very beginning; another person with a more staid sense of humor might not like it at all and might rate it much lower.
The special effects are decent, the photography and scenery are gorgeous, and the plot is pleasantly absurd without degenerating into "Scary Movie" material. Most of the characters come across as appealing, decent people caught in a bizarre situation. They react in believable ways to unbelievable events, with two exceptions: 1)Oliver Platt's crocodile groupie. The character is a complete flake, but Platt fleshes him out as a funny and self-aware entity who is a lot of fun to watch and listen to...and the character finally has a flash of common sense an hour into the movie. 2) Similarly, Betty White has a semi-cameo as the most eccentric/lunatic grandma in Maine, but she is only a little bit more oddball than any 'real' senior citizen might be in a similar situation.
Pretty much everyone strikes the right tone in this movie and gives a good-to-great performance, but Brendon Gleeson (as the sheriff) makes the movie for me. He gets most of the best lines, and delivers them with the sullen, deadpan, passive-aggressive panache of a born pain-in-the-butt. His character is insulted, pushed around and put-upon something awful in the course of the movie, and he does a wonderful slow burn. IMO, it's the most overlooked comic performance of that movie year.
Aside: geez, Gleeson is an ACTOR. You'd never think that the guy who plays this character would also be great in a visceral adventure/horror film like "28 Days Later". He was also one of best things about "Troy" as Helen's cuckolded husband, who duels Paris (Orlando Bloom) and kicks seven varieties of snot out of him in a towering rage. Gleeson comes across as one big, mean, scary butt-kicker, and he makes Paris/Orlando look like a sniveling little girly-man in comparison. Talk about range and versatility...! From now on, I intend to see any movie with Gleeson in a featured role; he's that good.
Anyway, the movie is good, mean fun, with a nice sense of proportion. It laughs with the characters, and not at them. There is a winking acknowledgment of the fact that people are stupid and no damned good...but they still try their best, and their humanity is both endearing and infuriating.
The special effects are decent, the photography and scenery are gorgeous, and the plot is pleasantly absurd without degenerating into "Scary Movie" material. Most of the characters come across as appealing, decent people caught in a bizarre situation. They react in believable ways to unbelievable events, with two exceptions: 1)Oliver Platt's crocodile groupie. The character is a complete flake, but Platt fleshes him out as a funny and self-aware entity who is a lot of fun to watch and listen to...and the character finally has a flash of common sense an hour into the movie. 2) Similarly, Betty White has a semi-cameo as the most eccentric/lunatic grandma in Maine, but she is only a little bit more oddball than any 'real' senior citizen might be in a similar situation.
Pretty much everyone strikes the right tone in this movie and gives a good-to-great performance, but Brendon Gleeson (as the sheriff) makes the movie for me. He gets most of the best lines, and delivers them with the sullen, deadpan, passive-aggressive panache of a born pain-in-the-butt. His character is insulted, pushed around and put-upon something awful in the course of the movie, and he does a wonderful slow burn. IMO, it's the most overlooked comic performance of that movie year.
Aside: geez, Gleeson is an ACTOR. You'd never think that the guy who plays this character would also be great in a visceral adventure/horror film like "28 Days Later". He was also one of best things about "Troy" as Helen's cuckolded husband, who duels Paris (Orlando Bloom) and kicks seven varieties of snot out of him in a towering rage. Gleeson comes across as one big, mean, scary butt-kicker, and he makes Paris/Orlando look like a sniveling little girly-man in comparison. Talk about range and versatility...! From now on, I intend to see any movie with Gleeson in a featured role; he's that good.
Anyway, the movie is good, mean fun, with a nice sense of proportion. It laughs with the characters, and not at them. There is a winking acknowledgment of the fact that people are stupid and no damned good...but they still try their best, and their humanity is both endearing and infuriating.