Can This Onion Bring Tears of Laughter?

I originally had plans to go see the great Nic Cage's new movie Drive Angry tonight, but life is unpredictable and plans change. As a last minute selection, I grabbed The Onion Movie and pressed play. For those who don't know, this movie is based on the popular comedy website The Onion News Network, which I love and find hilarious. This is essentially the same premise, but the movie focuses a bit more on behind the scenes of the news network. This movie just about made me cry, but was it from laughing so hard or was it because it was so bad? Hit the jump for more.


Before I get too far into the movie, I'd just like to put a little more light on the ONN website that started everything. Taking a quick glance at the page will give you a rough idea of what they're all about. Today shows headlines like "Al Queda Attacks Internet With Photo Of Adorable Piglet" and "Study: 87 Percent Of Movies Would Be Better With Micheal Keaton In Them". They have written articles, videos of various themed shows like the evening news or their morning show "Today Now". They even have a radio section which is audio only. All skits are extremely well done, acted, and could be totally mistaken for the real deal if not for the strange headlines and topics like "Kim Jong Il Unfolds Into Giant Robot".

Now to the movie. Needless to say, I had high expectations for this movie due entirely to being a fan of the site and the high production values of their video segments. This is also entirely why I was so disappointed by this movie. Yes the movie has skits similar to the funny headlines on the site, and it's all there in spirit. Unfortunately the quality of the acting and the sets is lacking when compared to the videos I'd become accustomed to on the website.

I found the acting of the lead newscaster simply too serious and dry to work for me. The anchors on the website do act seriously about their topics, but they have that over-the-top flair that just works a bit of magic. This didn't only affect the main anchor, but the majority of the cast and extras. It all just seemed really low budget to me.

That's not to say I didn't find any humour at all. The commercial for the Steven Seagal movie "Cockpuncher" was quite funny, but they used the joke to death. The fake ad is one of the first skits in the movie, and you keep seeing it being played or mentioned over and over throughout the rest of the movie. It even becomes part of the main storyline. Speaking of the overarching storyline, it's totally stupid and not entertaining in the least. There were a few other clever skits, the Michael Bolton one and the ad for the gay cruise were funny, but mostly they fell flat for me.

I'm sure there's an audience out there somewhere that this is one of the greatest movies for, I'm just not it. Most of the jokes are based on racial stereotypes, some of which are invented just for the movie, none of which is really my kind of humour. In the end this movie just didn't hit the mark for me. Even if you're a fan of the website, this movie is entirely passable. As bad as I've heard Drive Angry is, it has to be better than this.