Directed by: Peter Atencio.
Written by: Jordan Peele & Alex
Rubens.
Starring: Jordan Peele (Rell
Williams / Oil Dresden), Keegan-Michael Key (Clarence Goobril / Smoke Dresden),
Tiffany Haddish (Hi-C), Method Man (Cheddar), Darrell Britt-Gibson (Trunk), Jason
Mitchell (Bud), Jamar Malachi Neighbors (Stitches), Luis Guzmán (Bacon), Will
Forte (Hulka), Nia Long (Hannah), Rob Huebel (Spencer).
Key
& Peele was the best sketch comedy on TV during it brilliant five year run.
That series boldly tackled very serious issues of race, right alongside some
sketches that were just plain goofy fun. During its run, Key & Peele was
daring – but it was also always hilarious, and gave a variety of roles and
characters to its stars/creators – who also openly talked about what it was
like to be a black actor in Hollywood – always have to audition for the role of
“black friend”. While it was a shame that Key & Peele ended – it was
probably for the best for them to get out of the show before it grew stale
(something the latest season of the other great sketch comedy show, Inside Amy
Schumer, is struggling with on this most recent season). But these two
performers have such chemistry together, you knew they wouldn’t stay away from
each other for long – which brings us to Keanu, the action/comedy movie
starring the pair (and co-written by Peele). The movie is consistently funny
for its 98 minute runtime – even if it never reaches the heights of their show.
Strangely, even with feature length to play with, it feels like a lot of the
sketches on Key & Peele were deeper and more insightful than the entirety of
the film. None of this is to suggest that Keanu isn’t hilarious – or a waste of
the talents of the two leading men. Yet, a little like Trainwreck written and
starring Amy Schumer last year, it feels like the film plays everything a
little too safe – and doesn’t upend the Hollywood formulas as much as you may
think given their show.
The
movie takes place in L.A. – and opens with a bloody shootout when a pair of
Allentown assassins walk into a church, filled with Diaz gang, cutting drugs,
and proceed to slaughter them all in an exaggerated, slow-motion gun battle that
even John Woo would think was over-the-top (purposefully so). During the
massacre, the most adorable kitten in the world takes off – eventually finding
his way to the home of Rell (Peele) – a pot smoking, slacker depressed because
his girlfriend has just broken up with him. The adorable cat brings him out of
that depression – much to the relief of his cousin, Clarence (Key). Through a
series of plot twists though the kitten, named Keanu by Rell, ends up in the
hands of a drug dealer named Cheddar (Method Man) – and Rell and Clarence end
up spending time with his crew over the weekend – adopting the persona of the
Allentown assassins from the beginning.
The
movie is at its best as Rell and Clarence try hard to fit in with the gang of
drug dealers – adopting stereotypical drug dealer personas and vocal
inflections they’ve learned from movies like New Jack City and others – which is
miles away from who they really are (early in the film, they compare notes
about growing up in New York and Detroit – arguing over who got beat up by bigger
guys). Clarence is far more reluctant to get into his gang persona – dubbed Shark
Tank – but it only takes him a minute or two before he seems incredibly
comfortable in it – even going so far as to expound on the virtues of George
Michael to the gang, or employ his corporate team building strategies on them
(I loved the moment, late in the moment, where he marvels that they are working
together).
It
must be said that Keanu isn’t a particularly well paced or structured movie –
there are gags that are funny, and then go on longer than they need to (like
what starts out as a hilarious cameo by a comedic actress I want to see more of
on the big screen again – but which flags as it winds down). Will Forte’s drug
dealer is a little bit of a missed opportunity as well – as they never really
push his character far enough, or seemingly have anything to say about cultural
appropriation. And Nia Long is wasted as Key’s wife.
Yet,
flaws aside, Keanu is consistently funny – not quite from beginning to end, but
close enough. The pair have always been movie buffs (one of my favorite Key
& Peele sketches has the pair of them shooting things in a movie theater,
playing on quite a few stereotypes at once) – and while Keanu never quite
reaches Hot Fuzz levels of parody of 1990s action movies, it does come really
quite close. More importantly, Keanu proves that it pair of stars can escape
from the shadow of the sketch comedy, and become real movie stars. I’m not sure
they quite outshine the kitten in Keanu – but they come close. I do hope that
next time out, they push everything farther – but until then, Keanu will do
just fine.
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