yearone

Will placing Jack Black and award-winning Juno and Superbad actor Michael Cera together guarantee you a funny show? Well, that must be what writer-director Harold Ramis thought when he cast them for his latest movie, Year One. Sadly, for a comedy, there’s only so much Black’s talent can do, and it wasn’t as funny as expected. The plot, which takes swipes at Biblical narratives, failed to keep up the interest and the jokes failed to tickle, unless you’re an avid fan of pee and poo humour.

The story brings us back to Year 1 AD to the lives of 2 cavemen, Hunter Zed (Jack Black) and Gatherer Oh (Michael Cera). The movie begins in Apocalypto fashion, till the ever-bungling Zed appears, setting the tone of the movie. Zed and Oh are shown as the losers of their tribe, that is everyone considers Zed an inept hunter while Oh is always being teased for his girlishness. They find themselves exiled after Zed takes a bite of the Forbidden Fruit (without the help of any Eve), sparking off a series of little adventures. First, they meet 2 arguing brothers, Cain (David Cross) the farmer and Abel (Paul Rudd) the shepherd. Like in biblical times, they watched Cain whack his brother to death with a stone.

Zed and Oh had a brief spell as slaves where they met up with the girls they like back at the tribe, Maya (June Diane Raphael) and Eema (Juno Temple). The guys managed to escape the Sodomites, who have captured and enslaved the rest of their tribe, and vowed to return to save the girls. On their way to the city of Sodom, they stumble on Hebrew Abraham (Hank Azaria) attempting to kill his son Isaac (Christopher Mintz-Plasse). After finding out that Abraham has an obsession with circumcision, they ran off towards Sodom to save the loves of their lives. Of course, anyone who knows the Bible knows that more than 1,800 years actually separated Cain and Noah (Abraham’s ancestor), and for the 2 heroes to meet both sets of characters, they must live an incredibly long life and not age a day, or else, they must have a time machine.

Other than Black (Tropic Thunder), the whole cast was pretty much dreadful with all of them providing sub-par performances. Cera was predictable as Oh; his acting range not having been stretched further from his turns in Superbad and Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. It’s questionable if he can excel if asked to play anything  but losers. David Cross was average as the supposed madman Cain, making the villain look almost good. Hank Azaria, uber talented voice of multiple characters from animated hit series The Simpsons, and most recently cast as the comical Kah Mun Rah in Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, was practically a cameo as Abraham in this movie.

If not for Black and his unique comic talent, this movie would have been a total flop. From being a loser and a bad friend to the hero at the end, the comical half of Tenacious D was entertaining throughout. His jokes sound as though they were improvised and made up on the spot and his energy compensates for the lacklustre performances of the other actors.

Overall, this 97 minute movie is an uneventful ride with the occasional lame joke that any 5-year-old boy can come up with. The jokes evoked more disgust than laughs and the actors seemed like they just turned up to act because someone else called in sick. It’s disappointing, to say the least, that such a skilled writer-director and writers from popular drama The Office could churn out a movie of such low standards. All the best and funniest moments are in the trailer. This is really a movie made in year one.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/RTNBwIAY9Zo

Rating: 2/5
Directed by: Harold Ramis
Starring: Jack Black, Michael Cera
Running time: 97 minutes
Genre: Comedy
Rating: NC-16