‘I’ve never been so scared in my entire life. And I was in an elevator with Saddam Hussein...’
You know what you’re gonna get from a Seth Rogen movie. Dick and fart jokes. References to smoking weed. An affable but lazy central character. All this is fine. He rarely makes movies that are out and out bad, and I think there is a time and a place for a Rogen flick. Just as there is a time and place for a Rogan Josh, but you wouldn’t want it for every meal. Charlize Theron is a different matter entirely. The multifaceted actress has appeared in a wide range of disparate roles including serial killer, struggling mother and right wing news commentator. Unfortunately, Long Shot feels much more like a Rogen movie than a Theron project.
Charlotte Field (Theron) is a prominent politician on her way to the White House. Fred Flarsky (Rogen) is a principled but close minded journalist who finds himself out of work when a media conglomerate takes over the magazine he works for. A simple twist of fate results in Charlotte, who used to babysit Fred years before, bumping into him at a party, and subsequently hiring him to partially write her speeches. Hilarity only occasionally ensues.
Theron tries her level best to sell the burgeoning romantic relationship between herself and Rogen here, but it just doesn’t wash. The latter is on particularly forgettable form, and the supporting cast struggle to make any kind of mark either. This is one of those films that will have completely left my head this time next week, despite the fact that I was mostly entertained and partially invested throughout.
Long Shot feels like a particularly old fashioned movie. You don’t really see broad, silly comedies with such prestigious lead actors anymore, and the fact that this one vanished without a trace only adds to the demise of far-fetched teenage boy fodder everywhere. This isn’t a bad film, but it’s overly long, has nothing to say, and isn’t particularly funny… actually, maybe it is a bad film?