Why Is This Funny?

Someone explain to me why Ben Stiller is funny? I never got the big deal of "There's Something About Mary". I thought it was just one cheep crotch shot joke after another. Every scene designed to appeal to the lowest common denominator.

I couldn't even stand the look of Ben Stiller. Now, I know he may be the nicest guy you could ever meet, but from the first time I saw him I though "This guy has serial killer written across his forehead". Ok - so I don't mean I literally think he's going to kill people, but with his face he should be doing Ted Bundy biopics.

Instead he does a movie like "Zoolander" where he's supposed to be "really, really, incredibly good looking". In what reality is he good looking? He's creepy! Of course, look at his dad, great comedian but homely! I guess he's lucky he turned out as he did. But on his best day - not good looking - at all.

But the bigger mystery is why in the world does anyone find this guy funny? Twice now I have attempted to watch "Zoolander" when nothing else was on because they give it such a high rating and I know Premier Magazine rated it as one of the 50 funniest movies of all time.

Well, Premier must have been picking from a VERY limited list of comedies. The first 2 times, I couldn't make it past the first 15 minutes, it was just so painfully bad. Now I am forcing myself to sit through it, hoping that there will be at least one redeeming moment. With about half an hour to go - I'm beginning to lose hope.

It's all so horribly, horribly stupid. A gas fight? Coal mining in southern New Jersey. Seriously - did anyone over the age of 8 laugh at that? The ridiculous "blue steel". His constant butchery of the English language. Oh God! The part where he asks if the building model is supposed to be for ants. Come on - even someone as dim as he's supposed to be couldn't have thought that was supposed to be the real facility.

The only bright spot was David Bowie's cameo - which wasn't much but it was a momentary oasis in a complete waste of a movie. And all the other cameos... are all these celebrities just so desperate to get their faces in front of the camera or what? Ben Stiller must know where some bodies are buried in Hollywood because I cannot understand any studio putting out the cash for his crappy, crappy movies. And I don't know how else to explain some of the people who agree to appear in his movies. All right, Will Ferrel will be in anything, which is censure enough for me when it comes to a movie. He's a bigger mystery to me than Stiller - but that's a story for another blog post.

Ok - David Duchovny's cameo is a bit of a grinner for those who are X-Files fans, but not enough to redeem the movie, or even cause a full fledged smile.

What happened to clever comedy? What happened to jokes that have nothing to do with human anatomy or bodily functions. Why do we keep getting movies that could have been better written by the average elementary school student?

The standard for good comedy gets lower and lower all the time, and it's just sad. Really, really incredibly sad.