Review of Four Lions (2010) by Mikael K — 29 May 2013
A black comedy about Islamic extremists whose goal in life is to die in a suicide terrorist bombing. Christopher Morris's first feature-length project isn't a safe choice for an aspiring filmmaker, but the director tackles it boldly.
"Four Lions" is classic farcical comedy with endearingly clumsy characters who can't do anything right. This time these endearing characters just happen to be fundamentalists and the thing they are trying to get right is killing as many people as possible in a violent manner. Intuitively, this seems testeless and exploitative, but one can't help but realize that such stories have been made of gangsters and other criminals killing for not even conviction- as completely misguided as that conviction is- but greed since time immemorial.
The deciding thing here is that "Four Lions" is actually quite hilarious in a very dark, very daring manner. Many will be put off by this film, but I think it's actually admirable in its willingness to bend the rules of comedy and its aim of handling religious fanaticism as another destructive human failure among countless others.
This review of Four Lions (2010) was written by Mikael K on 29 May 2013.
Four Lions has generally received positive reviews.
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