"Get Him to the Greek" (2010) - Movie Review

You would think that Judd Apatow and his fraternity after creating this comedy genre/routine would burn out in this male bonding streak. You are wrong. Comes from the director of “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”, Nicholas Stoller takes Aldous Snow from his film to “Get Him to the Greek”, another raunchy comedy flick the Apatow production has managed to come up successfully. It dips down to the bottom of traditional butt jokes and drug trips but comes out as film from this production house containing sweet moments and nice smile to end it with a heart.

Aldous Snow (Russell Brand) an English rock star has hit the rock bottom after his abysmal last album “African Child” claimed as the worst thing happen to Africa since Apartheid. Yes it is that bad. Hell broke lose after that and to top it off, his long time girl friend and collaborator Jackie Q (Rose Byrne) breaks up and takes away his child. In America is our chubby friend Aaron Green (Jonah Hill) living with his nurse girl friend Daphne (Elisabeth Moss). Their relationship appears to be day and night, I mean in the literal sense of the words. Aaron works as an executive in a record production company, a day job while Daphne is on night shifts.

Aaron’s boss Sergio (Sean Combs) is on the lookout for breakthrough ideas to revamp the music revenue. Our man suggest an idea to put up a ten year anniversary show of the declining rock star which flies good and bam! He is on plane to meet the on the edge rock star. Russell Brand’s snaky maneuver of his attire and behaviour on its own causes a strange nature of unsettling comedy. Still we can see how he can be magnetic to his fans. He is an alcoholic, drug addict, sex monger and forms every letter on the word decadence. This is a man off the ledge and floating in air to let the gravity do its job. Aaron is there to get him to the LA concert theatre before he falls off completely. Their journey becomes the running joke.

Stoller uses all the possible scenario the comedies made their mark on. I could not identify anything new in the set up but the characters are unique, likable and in the genuine lookout for love and care. Aaron left US after a terrible fight with Daphne and he thinks they are officially on the break. A bad catalyst like Snow is only there to ignite him to drunken debauchery. Aaron consistently tries to get the man to the flight and Snow goes through as if there is no urgency. He is carefree and lives in his world of sad, despair and alone numbness.

Reading the previous paragraph, you might mistake it to be an overly dark story of the rock star but it is true comedy in works. One’s desperate sadness becomes another’s comedy. Here Snow’s struggle with himself comes out as never ending party orgy and Aaron happens to be the driver for this madness. Result is a raunchy, sex filled, deservingly R-rated fun coming through as comforting heart warming ending to not become disgustingly cheesy. It places and plays itself honestly to categorize into the string of success this crew did in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”.

Aaron is psyched to meet his rock idol and Snow does not bully him or treat him with disrespect. He simply self destructs and Aaron has to pretend to love the worst album of his god to be the great. Their first mission is to land for the “Today’s Show” and perform a song. Snow wants to perform “African Child” while Aaron suggest one of his old classics. At the moment to perform, Snow reveals he has completely forgotten the lyrics for “African Child” and Aaron runs to find someone who might know the lyrics. See Snow has to choose “Clap” out of desperation rather than putting down his ego. In that scene, Aaron could have looked it up in his Internet phone but he runs on the streets and building to look for it. Even in that made up scene and a blatant mistake, Stoller makes it work through Russell Brand. And I was surprised by the way the songs worked with its horrible lyrics. I would not lie that I will be buying couple of songs from this film.

Talking about Russell Brand and Jonah Hill, they carry their character with respect and strange admiration. When Brand’s Snow asks the honest opinion of Hill’s Aaron on “African Child”, Hill lays it out. The reaction from Snow would be simple to go ballistic therein showing his stereotype persona of a celebrity. Instead Snow replies with the combination of anger and respect. It not alone brightens the day in a scene where formula comedy was written and highlights the nature of its characters. The same characters engage in a total chaotic unpredictable sex experiment in the end which only throws its audience out of their guessing game. You cannot figure out the reasoning for it and neither does its characters which becomes compromising in a good way. “Get Him to the Greek” gets it there, loud, funny and a little bit of sweetness in the end.