ANCHORMAN - ENDANGERED SPECIES

Comedic spoofs like Anchorman are difficult to review, for they are judged almost entirely whether or not they are funny, which is highly subjective. One person sees a film like this and fall down laughing in the aisles. Another sits there stoically, wondering what’s the big deal.

For a reviewer, it always helps when the film has a definite story to latch onto. But many films trade story for the antics of a broad comedian, someone like Will Ferrell, Jack Black, or Ben Stiller (and to a lesser degree Mike Myers, Jim Carrey, and Adam Sandler), those with a proven ability to make audiences laugh no matter what they are doing on screen.

But that formula isn’t foolproof. (See, for example, Saving Silverman or Zoolander.) Sometimes films like this resemble an extended Saturday Night Live skit, with one running gag. Sometimes the Dumb & Dumber tendencies get tiresome. And sometimes, the humor is too lazy, as opposed to smart parodies like Best in Show (which starred Fred Willard, who is great in this film) and Waiting for Guffman.

We want to stay away from a situation where “the funniest part of the film was the outtakes at the end.”

There’s nothing wrong with a film having no purpose other than to make you laugh your head off… At least, I don’t think there is. But I think we want something more than a bunch of funny guys and gals acting silly.

Anchorman, directed by Adam McKay, is definitely light on the story, but funny all the same. It reminded me of Dodgeball, with Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughan (both of whom make cameo appearances in this film) and Starsky & Hutch (again with Stiller and his oft-cohort Owen Wilson. Owen’s brother Luke makes a cameo in Anchorman). These films run in a different crowd from other comedies like Elf, 50 First Dates, School of Rock, and Meet the Parents, which tell a decent story while making you laugh at the same time.

This isn’t to say that Anchorman is not worth your while. The film delivers what it promises, a comedy about some really dumb and creepy (and strangely sweet) guys, here local television newscast personalities, doing some really dumb and creepy things.

Will Ferrell plays Ron Burgundy, the self-possessed, chauvinistic, and exceedingly stupid anchorman of Channel 4 News in San Diego. Ron is no brainiac; he’s the sort of untalented newsman that was lampooned by William Hurt and company in Broadcast News, his basic talent being the ability to read from a teleprompter.

But Ron lives in a magical time, a time when men completely ruled the business and news world. Enter Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate) and the age of diversity, and Ron’s world is suddenly in a state of testosterone charged chaos. Now he and his news team (including Paul Rudd, Steven Carell, and David Koechneer) are competing against a woman for all things “good ole boy” and dumb and silly, i.e., all things male.

Anchorman is consistently funny, more often than not of the cheap variety (like the idiotic ravings of weatherman Brick Tamland), but not always. At times, the jokes crossed over the line of corny and overly ridiculous, but such is the nature of these parodies. The jokes either fly or they fall flat.

A recent essay by Michael Moore argues that men are becoming an endangered species, because they are outnumbered, outlived, and often outsmarted by women in today’s world. A man’s contribution to creation can now be replicated in a test tube, thereby negating another very important male role. And so, Moore satirically argues that Mother Nature is trying to get rid of men altogether.

Anchorman gives you a sense that Moore is onto something.

The film is rated PG-13 for sexual humor, language, and comic violence.

RATING B minus