Horrible Bosses

Horrible Bosses is a great and fun summer comedy. It’s hard to analyze it further because that is exactly what it is; no more, no less.  This is just a fun movie starring a large ensemble of well known actors pushing the boundaries of good taste.  It delivers what a comedy is supposed to and that is laughs and lots of them.

Nick, Kurt, and Dale (played by Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis, and Charlie Day respectively), play three friends that have one thing in common.  They all work for horrible bosses.  The true joy of this movie is that the supporting roles of the three horrible bosses are played by the biggest names in the movie.  Each working outside their comfort zones.  Kevin Spacey plays a sadistic boss who delights in stringing Nick along and dangling promotion opportunities that he never delivers.  Jennifer Anisten plays a sexually harassing dentist who constantly ‘crosses the line’ with Dale, her newly engaged dental assistant.  Dale’s buddies sympathize, but don’t feel that having a hot boss who is always trying to have sex with him is quite as bad as their problems.  Finally, the most hilarious performance in the movie is Colin Farrell as the coked up spoiled son of the company’s owner that Kurt works for.  When the boss (Donald Sutherland) dies suddenly, the son takes over and wants to soak the company for all he can to keep himself in coke and prostitutes.  Irish Heartthrob Collin Ferrell does an incredible physical transformation to play a totally disgusting sleezeball, complete with greasy combover and all.  His first initiative as head of the company is to ‘trim all the fat’ and by that he means, get rid of the fat people; ‘Get Large Marge in here!”.  

While commiserating over their problems at a local bar, they naively come up with the idea to have their bosses killed.  Having no idea how to do this, they use their car’s navigational OnStar system to take them to the bar most likely to have someone they can hire to kill a person.  The majority of the movie’s humor comes from these three otherwise square guys trying to navigate the world of crime to have their bosses killed.  They finally find a ‘murder consultant’ in Jamie Fox, whose very name causes giggles every time someone says it.  Jamie plays Motherf****r Jones, their guide to murder.  Jamie plays menacing and comedic simultaneously and every time Nick, Kurt, and Dale address him by his first name, the audience can’t help but laugh.

I felt their wasn’t a single weak comedic performance in this film and it was a lot of fun.  I like seeing actors outside their comfort zone.  Who knew PG rated Jennifer Aniston could pull off an R-rated comedy and who knew uber-handsome Collin Ferrel would be capable of being ugly?  There is really nothing to analyze in this movie.  No deep messages or moral conclusions.  This is just a fun summer movie for people in the mood for a laugh.  I really have no critique of this movie other than that.

I rate this movie ***1/2 stars.  I would rate it four, but I would feel guilty doing so for some reason.