Review of World's Greatest Dad (2009) by Paul A — 10 Jun 2012
The movie reminds me of a book by Jack London titled "Martin Eden." The Dad is a writer but can get no one to publish his material. It always comes back in the mail with the same envelope he used to send it.
His son is completely obnoxious and acts like Jonah Hill, who played Seth in the movie Superbad. He tries so hard, in fact, that I would bet money that the producer tried to get Hill to play the character in the first place.
The dad is dating another teacher at the school, but she is flaky and is trying to get on another writing teacher, who has just been published in the New Yorker. The son is a super pervert who spanks his monkey while choking himself with something tied to the doorknob.
One day the dad walks in and his son is dead. To give the kid's memory some dignity he pulls up his pants and makes it look like a suicide instead. He writes a suicide note for the kid. The note becomes a hit and everyone is at awe at such wonderful writing.
The Dad decides to ride the wave and milk it for all it's worth. Everyone in the school suddenly idolizes the dead kid when they would not have anything to do with him while he is alive. Finally the Dad walks up to give a speech and ends up telling the world that he was the one who wrote everything and that his kid really died by spanking his monkey while choking himself.
The movie ends abruptly with the dad stripping naked and diving into the school pool with his woody hanging out for the audience to see. All in all, a good movie, but it feels like it needed to be a couple of hours longer in order to get its intended meaning across.
Instead, it takes a swerve at the end and it's almost like a "hurry up and find a plausible ending" kind of thing. Definitely worth watching though.
This review of World's Greatest Dad (2009) was written by Paul A on 10 Jun 2012.
World's Greatest Dad has generally received positive reviews.
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