10 - The Interview

    A TV personality and his producer are set up with an opportunity to interview Kim Jong Un, and the CIA takes the opportunity to try to get them to assassinate him.
    It’s been a pretty big deal, and I’ve put off watching it since it just didn’t seem like a very funny premise.  Now that I’ve seen it…
    It’s honestly not that great.  For a comedy, it’s kind of a low-to-middle ground affair.  There are a few good gags, but most of it is low-hanging fruit.  If not for the whole Sony hacking thing and the terroristic threats, this movie would have probably been in theaters for about two weeks, maybe three, and it would have been forgotten about.
    It’s a shame, because a premise like this should have opened the door to some masterful political satire.  There are hints of these ideas sprinkled, but it’s hard to tell how intentional they were.  Some very basic points are made about North Korea’s government lying to them.  This is balanced with some points about how shallow the US media is, and at at least one point, pointing out that our TV pundits are unaware of our own country.
    The problem is that this movie starts off handling Kim Jong Un in a likable, if comic, manner.  It would be perfectly fine if he were just humanized, and it was more of a bumbling error that led to his people revolting against him.  Instead, he turns out to be exactly the comic-book villain we expected he would be.  This is unsatisfying, and it makes the last act seem cheap.
    There are plenty of legitimate things to complain about regarding North Korea.  It’s strange that those complaints take a back seat to dressing up their figurehead as the root of all evil.  It takes some of the strength out of what could have been a much more on-point story.
    Also, the finger-biting bits were really weird, and just distracted from what could have been a stronger climax.