Almost Heroes 1998, Rated PG-13 Warner Brothers Home Video

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Starring Chris Farley, Matthew Perry. Released to DVD on December 1, 1998.

In the right context, namely when paired with David Spade, this can provide for some amusing moments and situations in between sips of beer with your already drunken friends. However, when paired with a weaker actor who relies on minor facial contortions, awkwardly pronounced words, and James Burrows' style of direction for laughs like Matthew Perry, star of the all-worldly, multi-trillion dollar blockbuster, When Fools Rush In (the same words I used to describe the people who saw that film in the theaters), Farley's yelling becomes decidedly unfunny, and turns the overall product of the movie into a comedy debacle of enormous proportions--kind of like Farley's chins--regardless of whether you've consumed a case or two of Rolling Rock or Miller Light.

Almost Heroes is the supposedly comic tale of Edwards and Hunt, played respectively by Perry and Farley, two bumbling explorers competing with fellow explorers Lewis and Clark to be the first team to make it across the territory in the Louisiana Purchase and to the Pacific Ocean. Despite the fact that Perry is on his death bed for weeks, and that Farley, noted woodsman and guide, seemed to have trouble finding his ass with his own two hands, Edwards and Hunt ultimately beat Lewis and Clark to the Pacific, causing trouble along the way.

Screenwriters Mark Nutter, Tom Wolfe, and Boyd Hale are mostly to blame for this atrocity. Director Christopher Guest is at fault for assembling this mess, but it is Nutter, Wolfe and Hale, with their offensively stereotypically portrayals of everyone, white, black, Native American, Spaniard, French, or other, and the terrifically unfunny dialogue and situations in Almost Heroes that made chewing broken glass seem a preferable alternative.

Farley can be funny, he proved this in Tommy Boy, but unlike Chris Tucker and Bill Murray, it is apparent that Farley cannot take control of a film and be funny while doing so. The amount of humor derived from Farley's performances come from a good script and an equally talented style of direction, two qualities, among many others, that Almost Heroes is totally without. The acting is beyond poor--at times watching Farley steal eggs from an eagle's nest, I felt as if I was watching a bad skit on Saturday Night Live--as Farley has never been accused of being much besides an obnoxious and occasionally humorous actor. However, it is Perry who seemed most out of place, portraying a tight-lipped, 19th century, aristocratic explorer. His mannerisms may be historically accurate, but Perry wasn't comfortable delivering them or his lines.

Watching Perry drop pounds as the film progressed was interesting, but there was nothing else remotely positive I can think to say about Almost Heroes. This was just abysmal.