In this deadpan comic send-up/tribute to the psychotic male loner of American cinema (à la TAXI DRIVER, DIRTY HARRY, DEATH WISH, etc., security guard Ronnie Barnhardt (Seth Rogen) is determined to keep the mall safe, whetherhe's running down skaters or harassing employees. A flasher is terrorizing the mall and Ronnie is determined to catch him, and no matter how misguided Ronnie's efforts, the swelling rock-&-roll soundtrack is with him all the way, underscoring his triumphs and his tragedies with fist-pounding anthems and tear-wrenching ballads by Queen, the Yardbirds, and the Band. Writer-director Jody Hill delivers on the promise he showed with THE FOOT FIST WAY, taking the same sort of clueless, fearless protagonist and going even deeper into the darkness. Rogen projects a surprising amount of unstoppable force as the delusional, compulsive, bipolar Ronnie, while also displaying tenderness for his alcoholic mother (Celia Weston) and a genuine desire to protect the perfume-counter girl (Anna Faris) he loves (even though he ends up getting her wasted and taking advantage of her in a controversial scene). Even with such stiff competition, Michael Peña manages to steal almost every scene he's in as a lisping, sycophantic co-worker. Ray Liotta plays a "real" detective, and Hill regular Danny McBride shows up in various amusing cameos. Inexplicably released the same year as PAUL BLART: MALL COP, this is the darker one--the raging id, the heavy-hitter version--with a vengeance.
Ws or Fs