Step Brothers

[BillBrasky]

MUCH, much funnier than "Pineapple Express" and at times, absolutely hysterical. It's a lot more grounded in reality than "Anchorman" or "Talladega Nights", yet at the same time it retains that Adam McKay madness.

There is so much funny stuff in this movie that it would be a crime to spoil the best bits, so I won't. But what you see in the trailer is just the tip of the iceberg, really. This movie is gleefully juvenile and crass and immature in the best possible way. It definitely earns its R-rating, in a way that feels justified, not like in "Semi-Pro" where they just gratuitously cursed their way to an R.

There are many UCB people and friends of Ferrell in this that add to the funny. I will say that I was the most surprised at Kathryn Hahn, who has done some cute little supporting bits in other films, but who is shockingly hilarious in this. She goes to some places in this movie....wow, well, again I don't want to spoil, but I know you guys will all like this one a lot when you see it. Highly recommended.

[Famous Police Dog]

That tears it.

I will be seeing this movie in theaters next week ASAP, unlike The Dark Blight

[punkdc]

Going to the drive in next week to watch this...because that's the closest to IMAX this movie can get.

[BillBrasky]

Here's a deleted scene from "Step Brothers" featuring Rob Riggle.
Unfortunately, Rob didn't end up having too big of a role in the finished movie, but he does have one pretty funny scene.

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

[nadsat droog]

I didn't think this was all that funny. It was maybe about as funny as Talladega Nights and that wasn't even very good. I disagree with Brasky about the language, I felt it was mostly unnecessary and it could have been funnier if they were not allowed to curse in front of their parents. There are tons of things in the movie that might be funny on paper but just fall flat on screen. And the fact that it's so grounded in reality hurts it because it fights itself for what kind of world it wants to be. It's better than your average comedy but not what one would expect from the people involved.

[BillBrasky]

Hmm...weird. I remember I wrote a pretty negative review of "Semi-Pro" when it came out, and then a couple people here disagreed with me and said it wasn't as bad as I made it out to be. And now this movie, which I figured people here would love, gets a lukewarm reaction.
I don't know, I guess I can't explain why things strike me as funny, but I really liked a lot of stuff in the movie- the job interview scenes, the scenes where they're disrupting Ferrell's brother's house selling; actually the whole character of Ferrell's brother in general, and his wife- I just thought the humor was adult and R-rated in a good way.
I didn't mean I liked the cursing necessarily, but scenes like the drum kit scene- they never could have done that in a PG-13 movie, it needed to be R, and you can't tell me you didn't laugh at that.
There was a lot of sketch-y type weirdness in this that there wasn't so much of in Talladega Nights- like the scene with Horatio Sanz as the Billy Joel cover band singer. That was reminiscent of Ferrell/McKay sketches from SNL and I thought it was really hilarious.

[yumitree]

i saw this movie this afternoon and generally agree with droog on the movie as a whole, but i did laugh quite a bit, so i shouldn't be nit-picking too much i suppose.

[Ivan]

I dug this movie. Lots of great characters all around, especially Kathryn Hahn and Richard Jenkins.

[nadsat droog]

The late 80's only Billy Joel cover band did feel like an SNL idea, and it is a funny idea, but it just didn't work for me in the movie.

Kathryn Hahn was probably the only good supporting character. I was disappointed in everyone else, except maybe Rob Riggle who was good but had a very small amount of screen time.

The funniest scene was the first sleepwalking scene. I lost it pretty hard because it was probably the most absurd thing to happen in the movie to that point. I kept waiting for more things like that to happen but the movie continued to reel it in.

It's definitely better than the Kicking and Screaming/Blades of Glory/Semi-Pro generic Will Ferrell movie mold, but it missed the mark as a whole. That's not to say I'm not looking forward to the DVD because apparently they cut a lot out (as usual). There were a lot of different things in the previews, one being what I'm assuming is another sleepwalking scene where they destroy a convenience store.

[yumitree]

i guess i'll be the voice of dissent here and say that i wasn't wowed by katherine hahn's performance. i didn't really care for that plot arc.
the unrated/extended/"prestige worldwide" edition will probably be worth seeing for the deleted stuff along. it seems like john c.'s writing credit might have been attained simply by the sheer amount of improvising he (and ferrell) did.

[BillBrasky]

It's interesting to see what makes different people laugh, because the sleepwalking scene was actually one of the few scenes I didn't like in the movie. I thought it was too silly even for this movie; it didn't seem to fit tonally with the rest of the film.

And oh yeah, clearly there was a lot of stuff cut out. Even in the Brennan burying Dale alive scene, they cut out the line "He'll NEVER know you're gone!", which has been in all the commercials, so I don't know why it was cut out of the movie. It was weird to see that scene and not hear that line.

Here's some additional deleted stuff from the interview montage, a lot of which is funnier than what made it into the movie (including a cameo by Adam McKay)

See more Will Ferrell videos at Funny or Die

One thing I've noticed this week watching them do press for the movie- does McKay have Parkinson's disease or something? On the Reel Comedy special, and on Charlie Rose last night, he seemed to be shaking involuntarily a lot while he was talking, and it didn't seem to be a joke. I've never seen him do this on camera before, so I guess he can control it if he needs to, but it was a little bit jarring to see.

[J.B.]

I'm pretty much 100% in agreement with BillBrasky - the funniest movie I've seen this year - completely hilarious - and the sleepwalking scene did little for me.

[Aaron1933]

One thing I've noticed this week watching them do press for the movie- does McKay have Parkinson's disease or something? On the Reel Comedy special, and on Charlie Rose last night, he seemed to be shaking involuntarily a lot while he was talking, and it didn't seem to be a joke. I've never seen him do this on camera before, so I guess he can control it if he needs to, but it was a little bit jarring to see.

From Wikipedia:

In 1998 McKay announced that he has Parkinson's disease on an episode of Fresh Air.

I'm not sure of the veracity of this.

[Aaron1933]

I just got back from Step Brothers and fucking loved it. A lot of people don't like the no regard for plot, sequence after sequence of ridiculous things happening style of comedy, but that's pretty much my sweet spot and this movie delivered.

[billynord]

Speaking of Fresh Air, here's a great conversation between Mckay, Ferrall, Reilly and Terry Gross from the July 23rd episode.

[HeadEgg]

I did not like this movie. I laughed but felt very empty at the end. I was sort of sad.

[Kentock]

I did not like this movie. I laughed but felt very empty at the end. I was sort of sad.

Exactly. That is what happens when people make a movie that has really sloppy structure and a third act with no stakes. That scene at the end with Will Ferrell singing was so long and boring, and what did that performance accomplish for his character? Nothing, really.

Maybe some people don't like to analyze story in comedies, but I do. A series of jokes is not a movie, even if the jokes are funny.

[BillBrasky]

Oh come on. Now your complaints are getting a little ridiculous. This movie was not about story. If anything, the end of the movie was a parody of the tidy way that movies always wrap up all the story threads, with a happy resolution for everyone. Did you have the same complaint when you saw "Billy Madison"? Or any Farrelly Brothers movie?

Analyzing the plot arcs and storyline of a movie like "Juno", or even "Baby Mama", might be germane to a conversation about them, but with a big, dumb comedy movie like this, you're not watching for the story, you're watching it to laugh. All I ask of movies like this plot-wise is that they flow linearly and get you from beginning to end. And truth be told, this was probably the most well-structured movie from a screenplay standpoint that Ferrell and McKay have done to date.

[HeadEgg]

Oh come on. Now your complaints are getting a little ridiculous. This movie was not about story. If anything, the end of the movie was a parody of the tidy way that movies always wrap up all the story threads, with a happy resolution for everyone. Did you have the same complaint when you saw "Billy Madison"? Or any Farrelly Brothers movie?

Analyzing the plot arcs and storyline of a movie like "Juno", or even "Baby Mama", might be germane to a conversation about them, but with a big, dumb comedy movie like this, you're not watching for the story, you're watching it to laugh. All I ask of movies like this plot-wise is that they flow linearly and get you from beginning to end. And truth be told, this was probably the most well-structured movie from a screenplay standpoint that Ferrell and McKay have done to date.

I think Billy Madison had a much stronger story than this. I do appreciate that this movie jumped right into it. If you had to wait 30mins for the main characters to move in with each other I would of been way more dissapointed as whole.

I guess I'm not much for Big Dumb Comedy Movies.

[Ravi]

I laughed while watching the film, but I don't think I'll rewatch it. I did like that it was a departure from the usual Will Ferrell plot and that it wasn't overly plotted in the first place.