From the guys who brought you Popstar, Never Stop Never Stopping comes Hot Rod. Technically, this was a few years before Popstar, and boy, can you tell?
Hot Rod is the tale of self-proclaimed stuntman, Rod Kimble, who vows to save his step-father’s life by raising money through the means of a ridiculous stunt he’s conceived.
As you can tell, it’s very light on plot, but has the potential to be something utterly hilarious. Andy Samberg himself does some brilliant physical comedy in this, but sadly the rest of it isn’t very funny. Where are the jokes? Answer: there are none. Because the plot is so thin, without such jokes it ends up just being a complete train wreck. Although its run time sits at only 90 minutes, it felt much longer. Popstar, on the other hand, is longer than this movie, but because it’s so funny, the time flies by. If you’re gonna make a comedy, you have to make it funny. Sounds obvious, but apparently the creators of this film forgot that little fact.
There’s a brilliant cast (albeit very-SNL alum due to Lorne Michaels producing) but I wish they’d been given more free reign to ad lib. And if they were, it’s like they didn’t have their heart in this, which is strange because apparently this was a ‘passion project’. It’s just not funny, and it’s telling to learn that Samberg actually said ”It will get bad reviews. Comedy is traditionally not reviewed that well”. It’s more the case that this shouldn’t even be classed as a ‘comedy’ because, I’ll say it again, IT’S NOT FUNNY. Although I’ll give a pass to Will Arnett who is kinda great in it.
The soundtrack is brilliant, but this film has nothing on Popstar, as I’ve already mentioned. Maybe it was funnier in 2007 but the writing just seems weak compared to the calibre of comedy we’ve had since. (Parks & Rec, Brooklyn 99 etc).
It’s not that bad, its just not that good either.
Overall, this gets a resounding ‘no’ from me, and I’d suggest you avoid it too.
Hot Rod is available to stream on Sky Cinema, Now TV, Netflix, and Amazon Prime Video in the UK. (It probably streams for free literally everywhere because they know no one will buy it…)
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