Review of Let's Go to Prison (2006) by Jesse O — 18 Aug 2016

You know, I remember seeing a lot of this movie several times on TV. I almost always saw up to the point where Lynard, the white supremacist, stupidly kills himself. It was almost like Clerks, where I saw bits and pieces of the film, but I never saw the thing in its entirety in one sitting.

Though the difference between Clerks and this one is that I actually wanted to see Clerks in its entirety. The only reason I saw this movie so much on TV was because I left the TV on in that channel, sort of as background noise.

Like I was using the laptop and I'd leave the TV on on any channel so it wouldn't feel as quiet as it would without it. Now that I actually watched the whole thing, however, I gotta say I'm pleasantly surprised.

This movie wasn't as bad as I would've expected. Given the fact that I gave it 2 stars suggests that I still didn't think it was good, but it's definitely not as awful a movie as it might seem.

Perhaps this is due to the fact that, ever since Arrested Development, I've been a major fan of Will Arnett. I think the guy is a tremendous comedic actor, but I don't feel that he's gotten the chance to prove it as much post-Arrested Development as Jason Bateman or Michael Cera have.

And I think Arnett is entertaining here, no doubt about it, but I don't think it uses his talents as well as they should have. But he is a large part of the reason why the film gets a better rating than it would've without him.

The film's concept is actually cool, like this guy, John, who's been "fucked over" by the same judge decides to take revenge on him by killing him. But when he finds that the judge has died, he sets his eyes on the judge's son.

He frames the son for a crime he did not commit and he gets three to five in the state penitentiary. John then decides that best way to fuck with Nelson, the judge's, son is to get himself arrested and manipulate things the way he wants from the inside.

That's about it for the concept as they end up relying on all the prison tropes you would expect. Nelson being, and acting, like a rich kid in a world where people like him are eaten up by the hardest criminals.

Nelson's fear of being made someone's bitch to be ass-fucked every single day. Or Nelson's fear of being killed by any of the people who have their eyes set on him. Once everyone believes that Nelson killed Lynard, the head of a white supremacist group, he becomes like the top dog in the yard.

It's all the basic stuff you've come to expect from this type of comedy movie. There are laughs, but I will say that they are sporadic. And that's where the problems lie, the fact that the comedy isn't great.

It relied on old and tired gags. And I'm not saying every movie needs to be subversive, because if that becomes the norm then nothing is really, truly subversive, but it doesn't really feel like they made an effort.

Chi McBride did a great job here and I like Dax Shepard as well, so the leads aren't a problem in the slightest. It's like they took the first draft of the script and went and filmed it without revising it.

I'm sure they didn't have a lot of money to work with either, but it just feels like a movie that was filmed without any sort of refinement done to any of its technical aspects. Now that I think about it, this and The Brothers Solomon really did ruin Arnett's career as a legitimate comedy lead.

Everything else I've seen him in has been supportive. And part of that is his fault, he did attach his name to both films and he's one of the leads in both films. Both films were also major flops at the box office and Hollywood takes that into consideration, regardless of the fact that two shitty movies say nothing about the act in them.

Jason Bateman was in Teen Wolf Too, as they so creatively named the movie. I rest my case. I did like the reveal over how both Nelson and John came to agree to their plan to get out of prison. It was simple, but I liked it.

I expected this review to be shorter since I wrote most of it on my phone, but it turned out ok, all things considering. Everything prior to 'I expected...' was written on the phone, everything after that was on the laptop.

It's not exactly relevant to this, but just pointed it out. Either way, this was better than I expected. Still not what I would call a good movie anyway. Arnett and Shepard having some good chemistry isn't enough to overcome a lazy and tired sense of humor and, generally, unfunny material.

It's on Netflix, so at least it didn't really hurt so much to watch it.