Tropic Thunder: Movie Review (2008)

The new Ben Stiller movie, “Tropic Thunder,” has a hilarious opening that establishes its main characters in ways that are so rich, it won’t be revealed here. But it is ingenious. What can be said is that it cleverly introduces audiences to a group of famous men struggling to find themselves mid-career by starring in what they hope will be a hit.

Those men include Tugg Speedman (Stiller), a muscled action-adventure type on the downside of fame; Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson), a rap star best known for his popular soft drink, Booty Sweat; Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black), a heroin addict beloved the world over for starring in such comedies as “The Fatties: Fart II”; and Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr.), an Academy Award-winning thespian who takes his craft so seriously, he undergoes a controversial pigment transformation to become a black man for his latest role in the Vietnam War movie all are appearing in now.

About that movie. Shot in some faraway jungle overseas and based on the life of Sgt. Four Leaf Tayback (Nick Nolte), who lost his hands in combat, it eventually leads all down one disastrous path, especially when egos get in the way, as egos tend to do, and when things go unexpectedly wrong for their director, Damien Cockburn (Steve Coogan).

Making matters worse is studio head Les Grossman (Tom Cruise), a hirsute mess determined not to lose a dime just because these prima donnas are having a tough time making their movie. Bullying them at every turn, Les instills in them the sort of foul-mouthed fear that drives the action forward.

What springs from this is an unwieldy plot that relies so heavily on surprise to sell its laughs that revealing more would ruin the adolescent pleasures laced throughout the script. This isn’t a consistently funny movie, but when the laughs do hit, it’s as if you’ve been rocketed to the moon.

What should be explored is this: Currently, “Tropic Thunder” is causing a stink with a few special interest groups. The film does, after all, present unfavorable impressions of obese people, Asians, homosexuals, heterosexuals, Hollywood executives, the mentally disabled, white men, hairy men, bald men, children, priests, those with uncontrollable bouts of flatulence, virgins and pyromaniacs, among other minorities and majorities.

Since it also features Downey Jr. in blackface, some are questioning whether the film also is racist, particularly since Lazarus’ impression of what it means to be black is akin to some jive-talking stereotype from the 1970s.

And here’s where things get interesting. While it’s true that even going there was brazen on the film’s part, it’s also fair to note that nobody complained when Eddie Murphy slapped on pale pancake makeup to portray a stereotypical elderly white Jewish man in “Coming to America.” Likewise for the Wayans brothers, who turned themselves into clueless white coeds in the movie “White Chicks.”

Were they being racist when they did whiteface? Many just saw those movies as satires, which they were--and which “Tropic Thunder” also is. The thing about “Thunder” is that it isn’t a cruel movie--if it were, you could nail it to the wall, and deservedly so. But really, it’s just crass, silly and at times, very funny. What it’s really poking fun at is the film industry and its skewed view of all the groups noted above. That’s an important distinction to make, though in these overly sensitive times, it seems as if some missed out on the joke.

Grade: B