The Watch

If there's anything worse than a comedy without laughs, it's a comedy without laughs that squanders a perfectly usable idea. The Watch is guilty on both counts. It's the kind of movie where you want to demand a rewrite of the script while you're watching it. The filmmakers have gathered some actors who have been funny in other films, and a good idea, but seemingly no clue how to bring these elements together.

The Watch is the latest in the string of raunchy, adult-oriented comedies that seem to come out in droves every summer, ever since The Hangover and Bridesmaids proved that there was box office gold to be mined. The difference between those movies and this one is that the earlier ones were not just about vulgarity. This screenplay uses four letter words in much the same way that a 13-year-old trying to sound mature would. It's overkill, and it doesn't take long until we are bored instead of offended or shocked. The movie features comic actors like Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill, and Richard Ayoade (a British comic making his Hollywood debut), but it forgets to give them real characters to play. Instead, we're watching them unsuccessfully improvising off one another, and throwing vulgar language into their dialogue when they can't think of anything funny to say.

The plot kicks off with Evan (Stiller), the manager of a Costco store, arriving at work to discover that the night security guard has been murdered in a gruesome fashion, with a mysterious green ooze near the body. Fearing that there might be a serial killer stalking his peaceful suburban neighborhood, Evan organizes a Neighborhood Watch. Only three guys respond to his call, and they include a big lummox who is struggling with raising a teenage daughter (Vaughn), a young hothead with a passion for guns and switchblades (Hill), and an ethnic guy (Ayoade) who is given little to do in the script until the third act. Until then, Ayoade pretty much spends his American debut staring at the more successful Hollywood actors surrounding him, or standing in the background.

There is a smattering of character development here and there, such as a pointless subplot concerning Evan being unable to conceive a baby with his loving and understanding wife (Rosemarie DeWitt). What such a plot is doing in a comedy about four idiots trying to save their neighborhood, I have no idea. Later, we learn that the the string of mysterious murders happening around the neighborhood are the result of an alien invasion, and that the monsters have made their nest underneath the Costco store where Evan works. The reason for this is naturally so the action can return to the store as often as possible, and show more product placements that have been strategically placed in the center of the camera's focus. Of the numerous products on display in this movie, Budweiser and Trojan Condoms obviously put up the most money, as their products get held up to the camera by the stars more than once.

The Watch is chaotic, but it holds absolutely no inspiration. The actors are up their on the screen, trying to liven things up with their motor mouthed comic delivery, but nothing they say is all that funny. And once the aliens are revealed, the movie turns into a noisy and unfunny special effects spectacle. Granted, the aliens are well designed, but it's disappointing to discover that they exist simply to jump out and growl at the actors, ooze dripping from their mouths. Equally disappointing is when we discover the their weakness. Looking back, however, in a movie where the main characters make non-stop dick jokes, it's pretty easy to figure out the part of the alien anatomy where the men must aim their guns in order to destroy the creatures.

This is a movie that smacks of desperation. None of the jokes hit, and the various subplots seem to have been added in a vain effort to give some humanity to a project everyone knew was a dog early on. It's the kind of film that seems doomed to linger forgotten in bargain bins almost as soon as the DVD hits. Something tells me that Stiller, Vaughn, and Hill will be trying to forget this one long before then.

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