Review of Nebraska (2013) by Richard W — 02 Mar 2014

The humor was cliche. The old lady talking about sex and the one-dimensional dumb Midwestern cousins bragging about driving fast were not believable and seem like things I've seen a million times before. The line "See what you could have had if you hadn't talked about wheat all the time?" was trying too hard. It would have been funnier if she didn't say anything about the guy or his history and just lifted her skirt and let the viewer wonder why she did that. Like when Ben Kingsley pissed on the floor in Sexy Beast. He didn't need to say anything. You knew he was a nasty man and the action just went well with his character.

Will Forte was way funnier in MacGruber which got panned on this site for being crude and childish - but it had things in it that I have never seen before, such as the star reaching such a low that he assumed he needed to offer blow jobs to people (who didn't want them) to get his way. Forte's character was downright boring in this movie.

His newsman brother Ross was boring too - another waste of talent because he was hilarious as Porno Gil in Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Bruce Dern's cranky old man lines were forgettable even if he is a good actor.

The story was not consistent - Bruce Dern's character was neither naive nor demented yet the story revolves around taking him to Lincoln to entertain his naive, demented idea of winning a prize.

The scenes of people not saying much were not funny. I was shocked the screenwriter was from the midwest. It felt like a script full of simple midwesterners by an east or west coaster who didn't know that there are plenty of non-stereotypical people in small towns. This movie could learn from Napolean Dynamite - a funny movie in a small town with characters and scenes unlike any seen before.

Some good things: The small town bar felt real. Also, I liked the musical theme they kept playing. Stacy Keach was good. I could go either way on the black and white.

Overall: A movie about a family driving from one midwestern town to another and returning to their roots could be interesting, but this movie wasn't.