In my mind, I’ve always thought of Seth MacFarlane as the Emperor with New Clothes of comedians.Â
While millions have embraced his Family Guy television show and hailed
him as a comic genius, all I see is an overgrown class clown who’s somehow
survived being beaten up by bullies and made it big in Hollywood. While he did reveal his true lack of wit when
he hosted the Academy Awards ceremony, it should be said that 2012’s Ted was
an unexpected delight – a genuinely funny if crude look at one man’s fear of
growing up that provided some keen insight into the mind of the adolescent
man.Â
Based on that film, I went into his latest cinematic foray A Million Ways to Die in the West with an open-mind, thinking he could
subvert this tattered if nearly forgotten genre in the way Mel Brooks did with Blazing Saddles. I couldn’t have been
more off base if I’d taken a wrong turn at Albuquerque. Simplistic, unimaginative and sophomoric,
this is an agonizing exercise in misguided moviemaking that has one clever joke
amidst a litany of misfires. Out of his
depth as a director of anything relating to visual scope, MacFarlane has seemingly
lost his ability to pace a film as well as this is a meandering exercise that
overstays its welcome before arriving at its predictable ending.
The director stars as Albert, an incompetent sheep farmer
whose been jilted by his gold-digging girlfriend Louise (Amanda Seyfried) for
rich businessman and moustache aficionado Foy (Neil Patrick Harris). Despondent, he finds solace with Anna
(Charlize Theron), a mystery woman who’s suddenly appeared in town. Inexplicably, she finds Albert attractive,
takes him under her wing and soon teaches him how to shoot, a skill he doesn’t
realize will come in quite handy when her husband Clinch (Liam Neeson), the
fastest gun in the territory, tracks her down.
What damns the film from the start is MacFarlane’s inability
to find a consistent tone. His jokes
land with a thud because his character is constantly outside the action
commenting on it. He’s not laughing
while being a part of his subject, as Brooks’ and company did in Saddles, but
is laughing at it, a narcissistic approach that’s mean-spirited at its
core. This is more akin to a Mystery
Science Theater exercise, but instead of MacFarlane commenting on the film
from the audience, he’s inserted himself into it, a strategy that never
gels. Equally off-putting is the movie’s
brand of slapstick, which is far too violent to be funny. A barroom brawl replete with a person’s neck
being gouged out with a shattered bottle, another’s leg being violently broken
and a woman’s head being bashed open on the bar seems more akin to a Quentin
Tarantino film than this comedy. And don’t get me started on the poor
unfortunate who gets his skull shattered by a falling block of ice; the blood
that’s splattered in this moment would break any comedic mood.
As
for the jokes themselves, well they’re the sort that MacFarlane has become
famous for, namely gags of a scatological nature, the sort that puts middle-schoolers
in stiches every time. Yep, fart, poop and pee jokes are the order of the day
and for good measure, a couple pedophilia gags are thrown in as well. This isn’t cutting edge humor but rather
desperate attempts to generate laughs that fall flat because they’re obvious
and repetitious. MacFarlane is a
lowest-common denominator comedian and Million is nothing more than a
collection of simplistic gags that are far from innovative. He doesn’t push the
edge of the comedic envelope here; it’s far safer delivering and beating the
same joke again and again like a dead horse. Â Â
This article appears in May 22-28, 2014.
