Saving Silverman (2001)

Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

The acting in this movie is really good.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

I started watching this "movie" on the TV, hoping for some light relief. What I found instead was: Jack Black, Steve Zahn, the guy from American Pie (whose name I can't remember and don't care to check) and Amanda Peet. They played characters with different names, but given the extremely limited range of these "actors", names are irrelevant. Guess what? Black was an immature musician-slacker; Zahn was a dim-witted pushover; American Pie-guy was a passive weirdo and Peet wore a lot of plunging necklines. The plot, if there was one, was so irrelevant that I started wondering why women get breasts enlargement. If they wore what Peet wear in this, they would get full male attention, regardless of their breasts size.I digress… back to the plot… whatever it was, it was so well disguised by a truckload of gross jokes that I lost track of it. I guess the plot was an excuse for Black to be Black and for Peet to strut around. If you find that entertaining, then you might enjoy this….

Once was a beautiful evening in Finland. I was feeling a little sick (I'm okay now don't worry) and I needed a movie which had to be bad enough to bore me to sleep. So I picked Saving Silverman.From the first second until the last moment of the film, I was getting more and more haunted by the thought I was never going to sleep again. This movie was so bad from the beginning, I could describe it as torture! Who can I sue for this??The acting. Yeah let's start with the acting. Amanda Peet -who I normally love to watch, was painfully sad to watch. It reminded me of me and my friends in a school play called "Panic in the tunnel" -which was part of this gay oriented saga of ours, where people would end up in awkward situations and start to f**k each other. We were ten years old.Steve Zahn and Jack Black were almost okay I guess, but they were just themselves. And their normal routine was not good enough for me. Jason Biggs, oh God I hate that f*****g guy now more than ever. You know I think everyone has this one or two actors they just can't stand? For me it's J.Biggs. He was horrible. So horrible! I'm crying right now...The plot: (no spoilers)So stupid. And I really love stupid comedy! Poop jokes, fine by me. People playing retarded people, well okay let's see how it goes. But this was like an amateur hour, and not the real amateur hour, but the after party for the class where drugs, and booze are free and someone just forgot to shut off the camera..I'm so sorry, I can't do this anymore.. you have to see this. But remember don't shoot the messenger!Ps. I'm quite sure Satan ghostwrote this.

As a Frenchman, i can find easily a lot of comedies that makes me laugh (those with De Funes, Youn, ...). Abroard, i think to "Mr. Bean" (english) and i can find also a real funny American show ("Married with children"). But, right now, to find American movies where i laugh a lot is difficult except maybe those with Chevy Chase and this one! I don't say here that American movies don't make me laugh: i just say that they can't make me laugh all along. So this one is a little surprise and i thank Amanda for her choice. In this movie, she plays a sexy bad girl, which are two new things for her. She is surrounded by an excellent cast that leaves for one time the support roles for the big stage (Zahn, Detmer and Ermey). The movie is great because it builds upon a truth: what happen to friends when one got married? Again, i don't think this idea has been used a lot of times and here, it is played with genius: the script is silly but never fails into craziness in spite of it's not easy to walk on this thin line. In addition, the action takes places in a sweet town at the ocean so the exterior are refreshing. Thus, you can believe me: after the good laughs at the start, you will keep your smile for another hour!

This one takes a while to kick in, but once you get through the pretty bad opening scenes there's an outrageous avalanche of stupidity that gets the motor running. Okay, it's not all good, so let's get that out of the way. First of all, even though it's totally essential the Sandy subplot is pretty bothersome. Especially if it causes Jason Biggs to perform really bad sitcom material involving electrodes on his nipples. That scene was totally wrong for this movie, it seemed taken from some pilot episode that never got to be an actual show for this scene alone. It was embarrassing to sit through. There's also a totally random use of flashbacks throughout, dear God just tell us what happened and get it over with, it's not like any of those flashbacks contains a good joke or something. However, as the movie progresses the material does get better and Steve Zahn and Jack Black deliver like they've never delivered before. They have the on-screen chemistry of a classic comedy duo, only a lot more disturbed. Either way, "Evil Woman" (what kind of title is "Saving Silverman"?) is a movie that made me laugh in all its weirdness(an R.Lee Ermey cameo!) and it looks ever so charming. Unexpectably good.