The story continued from the first one just loose enough to establish itself as an independent story. The main cast is still great. In fact the movie has some of the funniest moments you have seen this year. Steve Carell demonstrated why he is the latest comedy king with this electrifying performance as Brick. Compared to other members of the cast, he seemed effortless and just morphed into Brick effortlessly. His versatility as a comedy actor is once again on parade. I personally have never been a big fan of Will Ferrell. Not that he is not a good comedian or comedy actor, but how he tries so hard to tell people “this is funny, so please laugh”. His over the top performance Ron Burgundy made meI sometimes feel like there is a big light box in front of the screen flashing out “Laugh” to force something out of me. Since it is a movie about him, without a doubt there are lots of such moments in this film. I personally did not enjoy it that much but then I know a lot of people who are Will Farrell’s fans would utterly love it. Paul Rudd and David Koechner delivered reasonably but still Steve Carell is the person who stole the show. James Marsden as Jack Lime was also very funny and interesting to watch. He demonstrated that he is more than just Cyclops (whom I utterly loved) and is totally transformable.
As mentioned earlier, Anchorman 2 banks in on political incorrectness to buy some cheap laugh. Cheap they might be but they are in context. I think that is what makes Anchorman 2 still stands out as a watchable comedy of the year. It is American, so it is about physicality over text, and Anchorman 2 did very well with this. The environment was in a period where women and other ethnic groups were unseen as important players in most industries, and there were a lot of such moments. Deep down you know that it is wrong, but then because of the background of the movie, you did not feel that “inappropriate” at all. Or you would simply “forgive” them. Having said that I do wonder whether this time round I am not as offended as the first movie is because I have grown older and have a higher tolerant threshold; or I have become more insensitive about these issues. I know it is a comedy so I should not be over thinking about these issues. But then I just can’t help.
Having said that, Anchorman 2 is still a very watchable and enjoyable movie. It has an insanely great cast with some of the best comedic timings in comedies. It exploits the genre with not just physicality but also framing, environment and references. Of course one should never underestimate the ridiculous cast of cameos in the movie. You really do wonder how did they manage to round up a whole bunch of who’s who in the current film industry in one go. Not only that, they were wiling to make fun of themselves, look silly and put together some of the most hilarious scenes for the movie. Just watching those scenes is worth your money.
Anchorman 2 might not be the most meaningful movie in human history. It might not be even an Oscar nominating movie. But for its purpose, it does very well indeed. If you are just looking for a good laugh without getting too serious Anchorman 2 certainly delivers. That aside, I still need to find out why I enjoyed the same political incorrectness more this time round…
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