#anna friel avatars

[harleystuff]

📷 Anna Friel by Jackson Moyles

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Is It Really That Bad?

It’s hard to deny that in the 2000s, Will Ferrell was the comedy star. Starting off with minor roles in stuff like Austin Powers and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Ferrell hit it big in 2003 with the Christmas classic Elf, and then followed that up with the wacky newscaster comedy masterpiece Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy. From there, the hits just kept coming: Talladega Nights, Step Brothers, Blades of Glory, Stranger Than Fiction, Curious George, and even a hilarious one-scene cameo in the Wedding Crashers. The man was on top of the world!

But then came 2009’s Land of the Lost. Based on a campy 70s sci-fi series, the movie was a pretty big bomb coming from such a massively successful actor; on a budget of a hundred million, it only managed to make about sixty-nine million back. Director Brad Silberling was relegated to producing TV after this, and poor Ferrell’s prospects as a leading man completely shriveled up overnight. After this, he basically has only co-starred in stuff like The Other Guys or done voice work for films like Megamind and The Lego Movie. Any attempts to get him back on top have been pretty middling, to put it lightly; does anyone remember Anchorman’s sequel? Does anyone want to remember Holmes & Watson?

But come on, it’s a 2000s Will Ferrell comedy! He was in his prime back then! Surely this wacky spoof of some goofy show from the 70s couldn’t honestly be that bad, right? Well, that’s what we’re here to find out. Was it justice that Will Ferrell’s promising leading man rep was lost harder than a Sleestak’s skin during sex, or is this a hidden gem unfairly judged because people didn’t understand it was meant to be a parody?

THE GOOD

The Sleestaks are easily the best part of the film, at least when they don’t have those awful CGI mouths transplanted on them. The suits look great, they’re weirdly adorable lizard people, and they mercifully didn’t go with the awful, edgy redesign from the 90s reboot. These guys are pure goofy 70s camp. 

The score of all things is solid too. Michael fucking Giacchino did the score! And it fucking rocks! Unbelievable!

...Yeah, that’s all I’ve got.

THE BAD

Oh where do I even fucking start? How about with Ferrell himself?

Look, I’m a big Will Ferrell apologist. His comedies tend to be absurdly lowbrow, especially something like Step Brothers, but he has a certain manic energy that makes him fun to watch. Here, though? All of the negative aspects of his acting are cranked up t eleven. He’s shoutier, he’s douchier, he’s just obnoxious and ridiculous… He’s just utterly unpleasant in this role.

It’s not like anyone else is remotely pleasant, though! Danny McBride especially is obnoxious in this film, and Anna Friel is boring and forgettable, but as bad as they are neither of their characters hold a candle to Chaka. Played by Jorma Taccone (of all fucking people!), he is an obnoxious chattering monkey man who is basically treated like a servant and who is played so obnoxiously that I swear to God he feels like he’s racist somehow. I don’t know what race this would offend, but it just has some sort of rancid vibes that only a racist caricature does.

The CGI throughout this film is just utterly ass. Like there is an awful CGI dinosaur antagonist, and at one point Will Ferrell vaults into its mouth, and at another he slides down its back, and both of them are effects so bad they make Sharktopus look like Avatar in comparison. I’m guessing that hundred million mostly went to Ferrell’s paycheck and the Sleestak suits, because it sure as hell didn’t go into the visuals.

Truly the worst thing about this movie is that its very existence feels cruel and mean-spirited. I have never watched the original show at all, but this parody is absolutely barefaced with its contempt for the source material. It just oozes a lack of care, passion, or respect beyond surface level stuff like the Sleestaks; do you know how much the characters are mangled from the show to the screen? The big bad of this movie is a fucking ally on the show! Imagine if they made a movie based on Scooby-Doo and they made oh, I don’t know, Scrappy a villain, wouldn’t that fucking su—wait.

At least in that movie’s case it was one singular lame element. This movie is just an excruciating exercise in being as lame and unpleasant as possible. It genuinely feels like it was just made because they had the rights to Land of the Lost and then they remembered the name of Ferrell’s character in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and decided they needed a Ferrell vehicle.

IS IT REALLY THAT BAD?

Look, I know absolutely nothing about this series. I have no emotional attachment to it at all. I’ve never seen a single episode. But I don’t think you even have to watch a single episode to know that this movie is a slap in the face to fans of it. The entire thing just feels spiteful, and coming from a place of sheer malice. Yes, this film is that fucking bad, I can totally see why it blew up Ferrell’s career, and honestly it should count itself lucky that it has been forgotten because I say this film deserves even more hate. This is The Love Guru levels of bad. That 5.3 up there is beyond generous; this is easily a contender for the bottom 100 of IMDB, but I guess that would require anyone to give a shit about it.

But hey, as a non-fan, maybe my opinion doesn’t hold as much weight as what a truefan of the series would say. Thankfully, I have one of those on call, and here’s his summation of this film’s quality:

Hey, it’s me, @unadulteratedpiratepizza​, and I’m here to take you on a journey back in time! Long before streaming services, TV shows aired their new episodes on different designated times and days of the week, and Saturday mornings were the slot for new episodes of children’s programming. Back in the 70’s, long before me and Michael were born, the brothers Sid and Marty Kroft were the kings of that time slot, with their bizarre plots and expert use of their low budget, bringing us classics such as H.R. Pufnstuf, The Bugaloos, and the subject of today’s review, Land of the Lost.

Land of the Lost was a high-concept soft Sci-Fi series exploring the adventures of Rick Marshall and his children Will and Holly, as they explore a bizarre world full of danger and mystery. They must survive hungry dinos, aggressive lizard people, and even time-displaced humans, as they search for the truth of this world and a way to get back home.

Unlike the high energy upbeat shows the Kroffts were known for, LotL was more serious in tone at times, with a pretty consistent world and strong stories. LotL had a team of prolific Sci-Fi writers, a number of which worked on the original Star Trek, which had the effect of some of the stories feeling like TOS episodes. No jokes, “The Stranger '' is such a strong episode with heavy Star Trek vibes, written by Walter Koenig, the actor for TOS’s Chekov.

When I said the Kroffts knew how to use a low budget I meant it, using stop-motion for all the dinos and reusing that footage constantly, cheap costumes and goofy special effects, this show had it all! But, you could have the best special effects in the world and that would amount to nothing without strong acting, and boy does Land of the Lost deliver on that. Everyone is bringing 110% to this show, which is so surprising given that child actors aren’t usually considered the best for serious roles, but when I hear these children scream for their lives as goofy costumed lizardmen shamble towards them, by god I feel like the Sleestak are the most terrifying creatures in the world.

All and all, Land of the Lost was a strong and fun show that took its world seriously, but still had plenty of room for light-hearted fun. It is unfortunate that by the 3rd and final season, most of the writers had moved on, and the actor who played the dad had also left, leaving it the weakest of the three, but I can still say this is a show I highly recommend, especially if you like old Star Trek.

The 2009 Will Ferrell led remake sucks.

And I think that’s all that needs to be said about that. Anyway, here’s a picture of a nightmarish, terrifying predator with a couple of Sleestaks. 

[zuzcreation]

Anna Friel as Elizabeth Bonny in Nerverland (x7)

[zuzcreation]

Anna Friel as Elizabeth Bonny in Neverland (x6)