Film Review: Movie 43

About the film

Movie 43 is an American comedy/ anthology film that was released at the cinema on 25^th January 2013 in the UK. Movie 43 has a run time of 90 minutes and is rated 15.

Plot

Two teenagers wanting to get their own back on one of the boy’s little brother, they make up a video that is supposedly the most dangerous on the internet. The little brother is a bit of a genius and knows a hell of a lot about computers. By attempting to find the banned ‘Movie 43’, a film which will supposedly result is the destruction of civilisation; they end up finding a whole load of other short films which shouldn’t be watched.

Some of the Cast

Hugh Jackman as Davis

Kate Winslet as Beth

Justin Long as Robin

Jason Sudeikis as Batman

Jimmy Bennett as Nathan

Chloe Grace Moretz as Amanda

Anna Faris as Vanessa

Chris Pratt as Jason

Emma Stone as Veronica

Johnny Knoxville as Pete

Seann William Scott as Brian

Gerard Butler as The Leprechaun

What I thought

Normally when my flatmate and I go to the cinema, I generally pick the film. Luckily, she loves the cinema so will go and see anything I want. However, this time she really wanted to go and see Movie 43 so as she had been to so many with me, this was our pick of the day. I had seen the trailers but didn’t really know what the film was about. After looking up the film online after having seen it, it appears that the UK gets a slightly different version of the film compared to other countries. Why, I have no idea. I think the version we didn’t get sounds a bit better too.

Our version of the film revolves around two teenage boys attempting to pull a prank on a younger boy, one of their brothers. They plant the idea that they want to look for ‘Movie 43’, the most dangerous video online. This leads to the boys watching a whole range of other films which are either banned or just terrible, as in nobody should be watching them. The other version of the film apparently is about a screenwriter attempting to pitch his script to a film executive by telling him several of the stories that would be in the film. This is where the short video clips come in within that version.

To begin with, I really disliked the idea of these two stupid boys making up a fake movie online. While the friend gets the little brother to search, the brother is off doing god knows what to a different laptop. Anyway, the boys playing these parts, whose names I cannot remember and cannot find online are terrible actors. The bigger brother reminded me of a younger Ashton Kutcher but an even worse actor and much more stupid. The little brother was slightly better than the other two though but still terrible. The whole idea of ‘Movie 43’ was ridiculous in this version which is why I think the other one sounds better. At least the idea behind it sounds more plausible.

It states in various places online that the makers of this film had to trick actors into playing the parts. I can now see why. Although this film does have a great cast, most of the actors are wasted in such idiotic roles. For example, Oscar nominated Hugh Jackman, recently in the amazing Les Miserables, plays a guy with testicles growing out of his neck. While the role is a bit silly and different in comparison, it does nothing for Jackman as an actor. Apart from making him look stupid. Having a cast so big and with so many big names only works really well if the script and the film’s idea is good. The problem with this film is that neither the idea or the script were anywhere near good so the actors who I know are normally great, were not.

This film is so bad that we both said that if Kate hadn’t paid (I have a Cineworld Unlimited card), we both would have wanted to walk out. Even though the film is only a short 90 minutes long, it felt like it went on for forever. I had gotten pretty bored after only about 10-15 minutes or so and because of this, sitting through the rest of the film was a huge struggle for me. While I didn’t like the film at all, I can see that teenage boys probably will. Most of the material is made to either make you feel sick or extremely grossed out. While I didn’t find any of this remotely funny, I know people that would love this kind of thing.