Rat Race is an example of a very purile, silly comedy film. And
yet I find it absolutely brilliant. It’s a film about a group of people who are
told that there is $2 million sitting in a bag in New Mexico and the first
person to reach the locker from Las Vegas will keep it all. Naturally,
hilarious scenarios unfold on screen which will be guaranteed to make you laugh
at least once.
With a cast that many people will recognise, Rat Race is a very
good example of how enjoyable a comedy film can be. Starring Rowan Atkinson,
Breckin Meyer, Whoopi Goldberg, Seth Green, Cuba Gooding Jr., Jon Lovitz and
John Cleese, Rat Race has a cast that many people will be able to enjoy. The
scenarios that the actors get involved with are so unpredictable that you just
don’t see them coming. From Cuba Gooding Jr. trying to take a taxi to New
Mexico and ending up driving full of Lucille Ball enthusiasts, to Jon Lovitz gatecrashing a
Veterans meeting in Hitler’s car and Whoopi Goldberg breaking the land-speed
record with her estranged daughter, there is so much unpredictability that the
comedy flows brilliantly.
The nature of the film is such that each character’s fate is
presented in an order, so you are shown what is happening to each character one
after the other. Because there are so many characters, by the time you see each
one again you realise that it has been a while since you last saw them, and
almost laugh at the introduction of them again. Rat Race manages to deal with
the problems around this very well though. You never feel like there are too
many characters, and (although there probably are too many characters), the way
the film brings them all in is perfect.
Rowan Atkinson, who I feel is one of the greatest British comedic
actors ever, is absolutely side-splitting here, and despite having seen the
film countless times I always find myself laughing the most at his parts. What
makes it even better is his comedy Italian accent. He has obviously exaggerated
it for comedic effect, and it does come across as very funny. Also, there are
so many of Rowan Atkinson’s lines that are repeatable that the film will leave
a couple of quotes in your memory bank.
All the other actors are pretty funny too, especially Jon Lovitz,
but I found Seth Green and Vince Vieluf to be fairly annoying. I’m not the
biggest fan of Seth Green as an actor and have never seen Vieluf in anything
before or after this. Their storyline is fairly amusing, but Green’s character
is inherently selfish throughout the film (right up until the end) and this
makes me go off him a bit and feel that maybe he deserves his nightmare journey
to New Mexico.
The whole film has a bit of a ‘well you just couldn’t make that
up’ atmosphere to it, and this is why it is so funny. The scenarios that happen
seem perfectly plausible on screen but when you step back and think about it
they are utterly ridiculous. Obviously in a comedy film, plausible
ridiculousness is what is aimed for, and Rat race achieves this very well. I
cannot work out though whether I am biased towards Rat Race because of how much
I enjoyed it the first time I watched it.
If I had one criticism of the film then it would be that some of
the actors do not actually play a character wholly different from most of the
characters they otherwise play. Breckin Meyer plays the nice guy who never
takes a risk, Seth Green plays the moody teenager-esque bloke, John Cleese is
the eccentric hotel owner (now which hugely successful British sitcom does that
remind you of?) and Rowan Atkinson, although funny, is funny in the same way he
normally is. In terms of the cast, it is impressive but not astounding.
However, despite this I am fairly confident that Rat Race will
have you laughing at least once. If you are not made of stone then you should
find yourself giggling along to the hilarious scenes unfolding in front of you.
I rate Rat Race very highly and thoroughly recommend that you give it a watch.
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