A-lister
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- Joined
- December 28, 2009
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I noticed I never commented on the movie.
So what to say, it's a pretty nonsense comedy that frankly isn't that funny most of the time, it's clearly aimed at an American audience who has little or no knowledge about Eurovision. As a Eurovision fan one can obviously be irritated a bit at how the contest is somewhat presented as a joke (feeding the narrative), but looking past that and understanding that it IS a Will Ferrell comedy after all and it's meant to be a parody, some obvious fact mistakes on minor stuff like the voting procedure etc. is also irritating at times.
Flip-side though, if one can look past the obvious nonsense, the movie is still a quite "cute comedy", it's not very offensive and even with its flaws, I still think it's made with the heart in its right place and not as a pure mockery. It does have some fun moments, so it's an all right movie to pass time if you don't take it too seriously, but it has so many lost opportunities to be brilliant wheres it's mostly a bit meh. The Russian and Greek character for instance had lots of potential to be hilarious and spot on playing with prejudices, unfortunately the script don't develop them further and not in the direction one would have thought, I for instance thought at first there would be more drama with these characters but turned out pretty bleak in the end. I do think however it could have been even better with a female Ukrainian antagonist, not to play on the Ukraine vs. Russia thing, but because Ukraine is the country that I say more than Greece defines these big female Pop divas (although Greece also fits quite well here).
In conclusion: The movie is all right as a pretty stupid feel-good comedy, but it is flawed in its presentation and story-line and they could have done so much more with the concept. In fact, a full on absurd mockery would have been better than this middle of the road thing since they didn't really stay on the facts anyways
So what to say, it's a pretty nonsense comedy that frankly isn't that funny most of the time, it's clearly aimed at an American audience who has little or no knowledge about Eurovision. As a Eurovision fan one can obviously be irritated a bit at how the contest is somewhat presented as a joke (feeding the narrative), but looking past that and understanding that it IS a Will Ferrell comedy after all and it's meant to be a parody, some obvious fact mistakes on minor stuff like the voting procedure etc. is also irritating at times.
Flip-side though, if one can look past the obvious nonsense, the movie is still a quite "cute comedy", it's not very offensive and even with its flaws, I still think it's made with the heart in its right place and not as a pure mockery. It does have some fun moments, so it's an all right movie to pass time if you don't take it too seriously, but it has so many lost opportunities to be brilliant wheres it's mostly a bit meh. The Russian and Greek character for instance had lots of potential to be hilarious and spot on playing with prejudices, unfortunately the script don't develop them further and not in the direction one would have thought, I for instance thought at first there would be more drama with these characters but turned out pretty bleak in the end. I do think however it could have been even better with a female Ukrainian antagonist, not to play on the Ukraine vs. Russia thing, but because Ukraine is the country that I say more than Greece defines these big female Pop divas (although Greece also fits quite well here).
In conclusion: The movie is all right as a pretty stupid feel-good comedy, but it is flawed in its presentation and story-line and they could have done so much more with the concept. In fact, a full on absurd mockery would have been better than this middle of the road thing since they didn't really stay on the facts anyways
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