16 The Watch
Starring: Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill, Richard Ayoade
Director: Akiva Schaffer
Out: 27 July 2012
The community-conscious manager of a local Costco store (Stiller) sets up a neighbourhood watch to help solve a murder, but finds the participants (Vaughn, Hill, Ayoade) only want to relax and have a good time. The group’s mundane investigation becomes more eventful when they stumble onto an alien plot to take over the world. The R-rated comedy sci-fi has hints of last year’s ‘Attack The Block’, only that was much better. This was 2012′s biggest disappointment for me, it has a terrific comic cast, but they’re on autopilot and struggling with a script by Seth Rogen that’s purile and lazily plotted. The core idea, a sort of ‘Ghostbusters’-lite, could really have worked had they given it to someone who could be bothered. The Lonely Island videos are genius, it’s hard to believe it’s the same director, he had absolutely nothing to offer here. [Critics: 17%] [Public: 5.7] – Mediocre
