Review of MacGruber (2010) by Yorkman — 11 Jan 2016

As an Englishman my only experiences with SNL as a broadcast show, is from the late 1980's when certain skits were sort of packaged up and shown on television as part of a late night American comedy compilation show.

This is also how I now enjoy the show, as all I can access are the skits that the 'Network' upload onto YouTube, it's effectively the same.... But I can now access them at will, and find out who the comedians on the show are.

I knew that The Blues Brothers, and Wayne's World were based on SNL characters, but I didn't know Coneheads was, such was my lack of knowledge about the (now) evergreen show.

Macgruber was a skit I found on YT and found relatively amusing (this despite the fact only the first series of the show it was parodying, 'McGyver', was shown on UK TV), and when I discovered a movie had been made I downloaded a copy and got stuck in.

It's also worth making a point that the film barely got a cinema release here, and no one I know has ever heard of it!

The film itself expands on the short skits of the series, introducing MacGruber (Will Forte) 10 years after his wife was killed and living a secluded life (a la Rambo III). He's called back into action after a Nuclear missile is stolen by his arch-nemesis **** (Val Kilmer), and therefore looks to bring back his old team.

However, they are all killed (due to their ineptitude) leaving MacGruber to go after **** with only his dead wife's best friend (and retired special forces operative), Vicki St. Elmo (Kristen Wiig), and wet-behind-the-ears operative Dixon Piper (Ryan Phillippe).

Cue comedic shenanigans as our heroes bumble their way through the movie, as the villain hams it up in a very unamusing way.

This is a sporadically funny movie, but it's not as funny as other films which have spoofed the same kind of genre in the past. Will Forte is probably the only actor who comes out of it with any sense of pride attached, everyone else (including Powers Boothe as 'The Colonel') probably won't mind anyone asking them 'what on Earth were you thinking!!??'.

Overall it's competently directed, the score is acceptable, and the run-time (at 90ish minutes) is bang on.