J_Chambers_1985's Movie Review of Year One (2009)

Decent but not memorable
J_Chambers_1985 - wrote on 10/01/09

I had heard a lot of good things about "Year One" from my new co-workers at Blockbuster so I figured I would check it out. Well what I got was a decent movie but the really funny parts were few and far between.

In “Year One” we meet two misfit cavemen Zed (Jack Black) and Oh (Michael Cera) who end up being banished from their tribal village. For the next hour and a half they go off on an adventure set in what we are to believe is year one although I tend to doubt historical accuracy. In their adventures we get some good cameos from David Cross (His is more of a running bit throughout the movie that I enjoyed), Harold Ramis, and Oliver Platt (His cameo is pretty hysterical so I won’t ruin it). Hank Azaria has a cameo that I just didn’t find all that funny and I’ve always found him to be funny due to his many roles on The Simpsons. The kid from "Superbad" McLovin is in this and I was told he had the funniest line (I must have missed it) in the movie but it felt like he was just rehashing McLovin only set in biblical times.

Then you have Michael Cera I’m more then likely not the first person to comment on him and I’m sure I won’t be the last to comment on him. The guy needs to play a role other then the awkward whinny little emo kid that he’s played in like every movie that he’s been in but I fear that it may be to late for him at this point seeing how he’s back at it apparently in "Youth In Revolt". But in this movie aside from a couple moments his performance for me was very hard to watch because I’ve freaking seen it before. Although in a way I suppose I should be impressed that he was able to pull off the whole whiny awkward emo kid bit in what’s suppose to be year one but that would probably giving him to much credit.

So all in all "Year One" is a decent movie with a few good moments here and there and one running bit that I really enjoyed involving David Cross because I’ve always been a fan of writing that involves a running bits. The problem with "Year One" is that it just doesn’t have enough moments in it to make it be a truly memorable comedy.