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A heady blend of outrageous Grand Guignol comic set pieces and fast-twitch dialogue, “Tropic Thunder” walks a fine line of dangerous satire that straddles gallows humor and bawdy pop-culture inflected slapstick. Robert Downey Jr. in black-face?
Yep. And he gets away with it because of how the stunt is conceived!
In the midst of filming an “Apocalypse Now”-styled movie an overzealous film crew squander a multi-million dollar explosion, thereby forcing director Damien Cockburn (Steve Coogan) to plant cameras and explosives in an area of a Southeast Asian jungle for the cast to perform a low-budget reality version of the film script.
Action-movie-has-been Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller), goofball comedy star/heroin addict Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black), Aussie method actor Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr.), hip-hop pretty boy Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson) and nerdy Kevin Sandusky (Jay Baruchel) make up the cast of war movie stereotypes.
Aside from some scene-stealing by Tom Cruise as a bald and fat Hollywood producer prone to cursing a blue streak, Robert Downey Jr. owns the movie with his comically layered performance as an actor who underwent skin pigmentation treatment in order to play an African American soldier.
Downey’s performance will go down in cinema history as one of the most ridiculous yet comically effective experiments of the decade. Jack-of-all-trades Justin Theroux contributed to the script, along with Ben Stiller, and Ethan Cohen.
Rated R. 106 mins.
