This weekend, Universal is dropping a bit of a comedy-bombshell into theaters: Your Highness, starring Danny McBride, James Franco, Natalie Portman, and Zooey Deschanel is playing right now at your local multiplex. We saw the film earlier this week-- part of a triple feature at the Alamo Drafthouse-- and loved it, as we mentioned in our early review of the film. But, looking at the film's Rotten Tomatoes score, it appears that we're in the minority. Here's the top five reasons you should ignore all those other critics and see Your Highness, my gentle Examiner readers...
Universal's Your Highness arrives in theaters today, and the first thing your humble Comedy Examiner wanted to do this morning was check the film's Rotten Tomatoes score: what did everyone else have to say about David Gordon Green's film? Did they get the joke? Were they as entertained by the film as we were? These questions neededed answers, and so a trip was taken to RottenTomatoes.com to see how the film was doing. That's when we discovered that Your Highness is not as universally beloved as we might have hoped: the film's sitting at a 26% on Rotten Tomatoes. Roger Ebert gave it a single star. It appears that others aren't getting the joke. What happened?
The common complaint seems to be that the film's immature, but one has to ask: so what? If the film strives to be immature-- to wallow in dick jokes and frequently-shirtless females and over-the-top violence and necklaces made from Minotaur genatalia-- does it really matter if the dick jokes are funny, the over-the-top violence works, and if that swinging necklace is the best sight-gag in recent memory? We submit to you that, no, it doesn't. Sometimes, a good dose of immaturity is exactly what an audience needs.
Your Highness is a genuinely funny film that pays homage to the cheesy, fantasy films of the 80's. It's true that the films David Gordon Green's film pays homage to are all but forgotten (when's the last time you heard someone talking about how much they loved Krull?), or that some of the jokes in Your Highness might be a bit too obscure for the casual filmgoer (amazingly, Roger Ebert seems to have no clue why a "mechanical bird" might appear in this film: rewatch the original Clash of The Titans, sir), but for the film geeks of the world-- the ones that can appreciate a belly laugh inspired by an inappropriate gag involving a puppet, perhaps-- there isn't a more entertaining film in theaters this weekend.
We're kinda stunned by the critics' reaction to Your Highness thus far, and so we've put together a list of the top 5 reasons you should go see the film this weekend. Be forewarned that the list below might be just as immature as the film we're demanding you go and see: if you don't understand the list below, then you're probably not the target audience for Your Highness. Agreed? Very well, then, let's get to it:
5. NATALIE PORTMAN IN A THONG
The red-band trailers showed off Natalie Portman in a thong, but the green-band trailers-- the ones that played in theaters and on TV-- cover up the Oscar-winning actress' posterior. Allow me to assure you that, in the final film, Natalie Portman's glorious butt is on clear display (unless, of course, that's a butt-stunt-double, in which case...uh...well, congratulations to the butt-stunt-double for having a glorious butt).
4. DANNY McBRIDE BEING TYPICALLY AWESOME
If you're a fan of HBO's Eastbound and Down-- or if you've seen The Foot Fist Way-- then you already know that Danny McBride's a badass. In Your Highness, though, he takes his badassedness to previously unexpected levels. Just as a "for instance": his character is introduced having just slept with a midget king's wife. That, my friends, is a true badass. He also co-wrote the film, which means that McBride ends up with many of the best lines (not to mention the fact that he wrote a scene where he gets to make out with Natalie Portman), and while some critics might lead you to believe that McBride comes off as boorish and unlikable in the role, we'd counter by saying that this is exactly the kind of role that McBride plays best: he's supposed to be boorish, he's supposed to be cowardly, he's supposed to be unlikable. That's what makes his character arch work: if he was courageous and non-boorish, he'd be playing James Franco's character.
3. THE SPECIAL EFFECTS ARE BETTER THAN YOU'D EXPECT
I expected to see many things in Your Highness, but I confess that a series of sequences featuring above-average special effects was not amongst them: it just didn't seem like the sorta thing that Green, McBride, and Ben Best (who also worked on the script) would be concerned with. In fact, because the film seeks to pay homage and parody the cheesy fantasy films of the 80's in equal measure, it seemed like low-rent special effects might have been the obvious choice. Instead, Green gives us some really snazzy sequences and creature designs (the five-finger-headed dragon-- that'll make sense when you see the film-- was really cool-looking, and the Minotaur was, uh, incredibly detailed). The last time a fantasy-comedy looked this good, it was 1984 and Ghostbusters was in theaters. Seriously, the effects are that good.
2. WHILE IT'S A PARODY/HOMAGE, IT'S GOT ITS OWN GREAT STORY
When you see a movie like, say, Vampires Suck, you're seeing a parody from top to bottom: an original story isn't being told, it's just one "Hey, remember when this happened in another movie/TV show/video-game/what-have-you?" moment after another. Your Highness, on the other hand, has a genuinely solid story to base its humor around: if you were to strip out all the dick jokes, bad words, boobies, and nods to other fantasy films, you'd be left with a script that still tells a coherent, interesting story. It's not enough to just remind people of things they've seen before; you've also gotta entertain the audience with new parts of the story. David Gordon Green's Your Highness works as a parody, as an homage, and its own beast.
1. IT'S THE FUNNIEST FILM RELEASED SO FAR THIS YEAR
We mentioned this in our official review of the film, but here it is again: your humble Comedy Examiner simply hasn't laughed harder at a film released this year as he did during David Gordon Green's Your Highness. What higher compliment can you pay a comedy? The audience I saw the film with was onboard with the film from the very beginning, laughed hysterically throughout (a guy next to me literally snorted beer through his nose during one particularly funny moment involving the Wise Wizard), and left more than satisfied. Your Highness is hilarious, and anyone who thinks otherwise needs to work long and hard on their underdeveloped sense of humor. If you can name a funnier film that's been released this year, well, we'd like to see that movie. But we'd still tell you to go see Universal's Your Highness.
Folks, ignore the critics. For whatever reason, it seems like bagging on original films is the cool thing to do these days: a few weeks ago, Zack Snyder's Sucker Punch also took an undeserved beating from critics. Every day, film geeks spend an inordinate amount of time complaining to one another that Hollywood doesn't make ballsy, original (read: non-sequels, non-reboots, films that aren't based on old TV shows, etc) movies, only to turn on them when they actually do so. Would you rather see Mr. Belvedere: The Movie (starring Kevin James, I'm sure) or Vampires Suck 2? Keep on denigrating these solid, original films and that's precisely what we'll get.
See Your Highness this weekend. If you watch the red-band trailer for the film (which we've helpfully embedded over there on the left) and think it looks funny, you won't be disappointed. On the other hand, if you think that a sword-and-sandals movie packed with profanity, boobies, a few weed jokes, and some really bizarre creature effects sounds like a bad time, well, tickets are probably still available for Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2.
Stay tuned for more funny videos, news, reviews, interviews, and more from Comedy Examiner HQ in the near future, folks. We've got all manner of nonsense to keep you informed and entertained during the week, so hit the 'Subscribe' button up top to get all future Comedy Examiner articles delivered straight to your inbox, free of charge, the moment they're published...including any of our future Your Highness-related updates
