Absolutely Anything (2015)

Am I Missing Something?

A lot of fun.

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Maybe sometimes you do need to throw subtlety out of the window and just make an honest and unpretentiously dumb movie. You, creators of Absolutely Anything, make an excellent point with your movie there. As I watched it, I often found myself thinking "This is so silly," but then wondering "is that a problem?" As far as stories for romantic comedies go, this one must have been fished out of the very bottom of the barrel. It exists only as a base for the movie's situational comedy. Half the humour comes from jokes centred around the magic wishes of Simon Pegg's character getting taken too literally. How original... The rest of the humour comes from the level of ridiculousness of the effects of each wish. The humour is therefore not high brow, but the movie is nonetheless funny, with a lot of good timing. Absolutely Anything feels less like a movie and more like a comedy sketch that has been stretched to movie length and given a budget. That budget is not giant, judging from the level of CGI effects, but big enough to get top billing actors. Simon Pegg does his Simon Pegg shtick with relative ease. Kate Beckinsale is ok, though she doesn't do much beyond providing a pretty female co-lead, who somehow looks 28 at the age of 44...must have been one of the wishes. Both leads are a bit bland. The most interesting additions to the film are Rob Riggle and Sanjeev Bhaskar. They are not funny, but their performances add colour to the movie. Robin Williams plays only a minor role, but considering that this was his last movie, there is extra value there. He isn't given anything particularly funny to say though and does not appear to have been given room to do improvisation. This movie is harmless. It is a little bland and forgettable, but it is stupid fun.

This movie did a lot of things right, but also failed on many levels. Kate Beckinsale is a wonderful actor and is usually a great leading lady. Unfortunately, her work in this movie came off as forced and generic. Simon Pegg delivers as best he can without Nick Frost. I felt like the movie overall was an "R" rated Bruce Almighty but instead of God, we got Scientology. Not a bad watch but you really do not want to watch it expecting Shuan of the Dead or Hot Fuzz.

"Absolutely Anything" is a comedy starring Simon Peg as Neil, a very under-whelmed school teacher. Neil is just an average Joe. There's nothing special about him. He lives in a hum-drum world, surrounded by average people, and works at a job he absolutely despises. Sounds like most of the people I know...Unbeknownst to him, he is given a special power by some all-knowing, supreme aliens to do ANYTHING. Little does he know that how he uses this power will determine whether the earth survives as one of the planets. The aliens (wonderfully voiced by former Monty Python alums) observe his every move and, well, are not impressed.I was not very impressed with this movie either. It had a huge amount of talent: Simon Peg, the gorgeous Kate Beckinsale (it was nice to see her smile for a change), Rob Riggle, Eddie Izzard, and the voice- over talents of John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Gilliam, and the late Robin Williams. However, unlike other critics, I was not impressed by Williams' performance at all. To me, it just seemed very scripted and sedate. Also, with this many comedic actors in lead roles, there should have been so many more laughs. The message of "with absolute power comes absolute responsibility" was negated with sophomoric penis jokes and an ending that was just, well, ridiculous.Rated "R" for brief nudity, language, and sexual situations. "Absolutely Anything" was ultimately absolutely disappointing.

It's hard not to like 'Absolutely Anything' – Simon Pegg, best known for his role as 'Shaun' in 'Shaun of the Dead, Spaced' and almost every other film where he's played a slight variation of his usual lovable slacker alter-ego – plays, well, her a variation of his usual lovable slacker alter-ego. However, when he's wandering around in London one day pining over his neighbour, Kate Beckinsale, he's given the power to have anything and everything he wants by the cast of Monty Python (albeit computer-generated alien monstrous versions of themselves who live in a space ship and decide to test humanity in this way to see what happens – and whether to blow the entire planet up while they're at it!). All Pegg has to do is wave his hand and his innermost desires come to fruition.He therefore fixes the entire world's problems and everyone lives happily ever after.Okay, so that would make a pretty dull film. Everything goes about as swimmingly as you'd expect given a man who talks to his dog unlimited superpowers. You'll notice I opened this review with the line 'it's hard not to LIKE Absolutely Anything.' I didn't use the word 'LOVE.' And the reason being that this is basically one of those films that you can have on in the background and do other things and not really miss that much.It's definitely not bad. It's just not a 'classic' comedy. Yes, the appearance of the (remaining) Monty Python boys is always welcome. Even their beautifully-weird alien incarnations are as madcap as their geriatric human selves. And it's great to see them all together on screen again. In some ways... the film could just be about them and would be even better! Pegg plays Pegg. Kate Beckinsale plays 'generic love interest #56' and there's an array of characters who you'll sort of recognise from other things, but not really know where. The only real stand-out character (besides the CGI pythons) is the dog. The reason being because one of Pegg's wishes is that his pet can talk. And talk her does. For he's voiced by none other than the (sadly) late, great Robin Williams and, yes, he's definitely on a par with the Pythons when it comes to enjoyable screen time.If you're looking for a fun little comedy to pass the time then this would fit the bill. It's a nice enough film which doesn't really try to be anything too amazing and should appeal to pretty much everyone. Once you know the premise then you'll probably predict every last plot point that's to come. However, I certainly couldn't bring myself to hate it and will definitely re-watch it again in a couple of years.