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Brandon T. Jackson as Alpa Chino

If that sounds like an extreme gag, well, it is, and this movie, which easily earns its R rating, has plenty more like it. A recurring gag in the film—and one that has earned threats of boycotts and more from advocates for the mentally disabled—concerns Tugg's disappointment that he didn't win an Oscar for playing a "retard," as he and the other actors keep calling him, in a movie called Simple Jack. Much has been made of the offensiveness of this movie-within-a-movie, but that is, in a way, the point: the target of the film's satire is not the mentally disabled themselves, but the way Hollywood romanticizes mental disabilities, and the way actors take on such roles as "stunts" in a bid to win awards.

Meanwhile, Jeff's desperate need for drugs drives him to bite the animals that cross his path, and to make obscene offers to his co-stars. And back home in Hollywood, Tugg's agent Rick Peck (Matthew McConaughey, looking a bit out of place in a role originally written for Owen Wilson) tries to figure out what has happened to his client, but the extremely callous and profane studio chief is all too willing to let the actors die and claim the insurance money, if that's what it comes to.

Nick Nolte as John 'Four Leaf' Tayback

The movie isn't always as funny as it would like to be, but it you can stomach the more grotesque stuff, there is a fair bit to enjoy here, and some of it may even qualify as "redemptive." Downey Jr. is especially amusing—and fascinating—as an actor given to self-serious pronouncements such as, "I don't read the script, the script reads me." There is a moment where Kirk confronts his fear that he is so good at slipping in and out of his roles that he may have no identity of his own, and it is impossible not to think that Downey Jr. might be playing himself at this point—that is, if he were a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Aussie in blackface, at any rate.

The other actors—Tugg and Jeff, in particular—face similar moments of truth, where the extremity of their situation forces them to confront their deepest fears and come out on the other side a little wiser, but always in a humorous way. The result is a bizarre little film that manages to be both an exercise in tasteless humor and a commentary on Hollywood's tastelessness, as well as an oddly heartfelt tribute to people who, based on what's shown here, are working in a heartless industry.

Talk About It

1. Is this movie about acting as a profession only, or does it have anything to say about the way we "perform" certain "roles" in our own lives? Have you ever had a moment where you said to yourself, as Kirk Lazarus does, "I think I might be nobody"? If so, how did you get through that moment?
2. Where does our true identity lie? In the acclaim we get from others? In our jobs? In our personal friendships? In our relationship with God? In the things we consume? In a combination of these things? How important should each of these things be?
3. How do you feel the film portrayed the movies about the gay monks, the mentally disabled person, and so on? Was it mocking the subjects of those films, or mocking the way Hollywood treats those subjects? What's the difference, if any?

The Family Corner

Tropic Thunder is rated R for pervasive language including sexual references (four-letter words throughout the movie, plus a few uses of Jesus' name in vain; the rap star also uses sexy dancers to promote a beverage with a somewhat lewd name), violent content (people are shot, stabbed and blown up, sometimes in very bloody ways; an actor drinks blood from a severed head believing it is a prop filled with corn syrup; etc.) and drug material (one character is fighting an addiction and goes through withdrawal; the protagonists come across a drug cartel in the middle of the jungle). The movie also features a lot of politically incorrect material as the actors debate how to portray racial minorities and the mentally challenged. One character also comes out of the closet, and is later seen with a real-life gay celebrity.

Photos © Copyright DreamWorks SKG

© Peter T. Chattaway subject to licensing agreement with Christianity Today International. All rights reserved. Click for reprint information.

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