‘Get Him To The Greek!’ Raunchy, good fun!

‘Get Him to the Greek’ the latest effort from Judd Apatow (Funny People) and director Nicholas Stoller (Forgetting Sarah Marshall) is a raunchy, hilarious romp through rock and roll fame. Rocker Aldous Snow (Russell Brand in one of the best comedic performances this year), last seen in ‘Forgetting Sarah Marshall’ has tanked his career and is found wallowing in a drug induced pity party. Enter Aaron Greenberg (Jonah Hill who can do goofy and sweet like no other young actor) the young intern who works for Snow’s record label and has an idea to resurrect his idol’s career. His idea, celebrate the anniversary of Snow’s pinnacle concert, at The Greek Theater in Los Angles, by staging an anniversary concert at the same location. The label owner, Sergio Roma (Sean ‘P Diddy’ Combs in a simply inspired performance) agrees with Greenberg and sends him to London to fetch Snow and bring him back in one piece. More than a few moments of hilarity ensue!

R rated comedies are hard to come by these days – especially because many fall into simply using foul language and shots of various body parts as an excuse for comedy. ‘Get Him to the Greek’ however steps above the need for raunch for raunch sake; rather it embraces the rocker mentality fully, living it as it portrays it. Like the other fine R rated comedy ‘The Hangover’ –‘Greek’ is as intelligent as it is funny. Brand is brilliant as the sex crazed, drug addled Snow – forever pampered and surrounded by ‘yes’ men, Snow embraces the opportunity to not only try and turn his career around (recently tanked by the single ‘African Child, which was deemed the second worst thing to happen to Africa since apartheid) but save Greenberg from a life of mediocrity. Hill as Aaron Greenberg is as sweet as he is funny, crashing through each situation with childlike wonder as well as humility.

I am reminded of the brilliant ‘My Favorite Year’ – one of the last films to star Peter O’Toole as an aging movie star who is set to host a live television show circa the 1950’s. O’Toole, like Brand, amped up the role to make each situation as funny as the last; in fact, I would not be surprised if writer/producer Aptow were not a huge fan of the film. If you have not had a chance to see either ‘Forgetting Sarah Marshall’ or ‘My Favorite Year’ – both are worth the membership to Netflix to catch a chance to see them. But catch this 3 ½ star comedy as soon as you can! It is well worth the price of admission and may require a repeat viewing to catch the moments you missed because you were laughing so hard!

My Redbox Rental Pick is keeping in the comedy realm of the review. ‘The Goods’ stars Jeremy Piven as the ultimate car salesman who is bought in to a failing dealership to teach the crew how to sell 200 cars in just one week-end. As this involves used car sales and sleazy salesmen, you can only imagine the outrageous behavior that will come of this. This 2 ½ star comedy, while not as intelligent as ‘Get Him to the Greek’, is well worth the $1.00 at your local Redbox! A cool thing I just learned as well – I registered for email and SMS (text updates) from Redbox and every Monday I get a code for a free rental. While $1.00 is not a huge investment, free is certainly better!!