Let’s be honest; a Jack Black movie is hardly going to be unpredictable. One can imagine the tone: lovable overweight loser (Black) falls for an unattainable girl, but (and here’s the twist, boys and girls) how about we turn him into a caveman this time (how apt ) who, with his best friend, goes on a quest that rocks the ancient biblical world. Oh, and we have to have at least one scene where he sneaks around and constantly wags his eyebrows, the kids will wait for him… hilarity ensues.
Don’t get me wrong, I like stupid funny movies as much as anyone else and I burst out laughing during this one. But when you can see a joke coming (girl raises her arm to reveal hairy armpit-HILARIOUS…for 1961) it’s not so funny. Thankfully, in this venture, Black has teamed up with Michael Cera (Arrested Development, Juno) as his sidekick, while David Cross (Arrested Development, Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Good Job!) delivers a terrifyingly compelling performance as the psycho killer. Cain.
Overall, Year One is pretty fun, following the journeys of best friends Zed (Black, the incompetent hunter) and Oh (Cera, the naive gatherer) after Zed eats the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge and they get kicked out. of his caveman. village. The duo decide to go on a quest to start their own amazing tribe when they stumble upon biblical times. In addition to Cross’s Cain, they meet plenty of other characters along the way, including Superbad’s McLovin’ guy (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) as Isaac, son of Jewish leader Abraham (Hank Azaria).
Unsurprisingly, the movie leans toward old-school stereotypes (after all, it was written and directed by Animal House and Meatballs co-writer Harold Ramis). This lowers it a bit. One would think that nowadays no one in their right mind would write a ‘sleazy gay boy’ character (Oliver Platt as the High Priest) and consider it comedy gold.