Year One (2009)

How the mighty have fallen. I watched Year One out of fidelity to Michael Cera and writer/director Harold Ramis, and I'm really sorry that I did.

In a riff of sorts on Mel Brooks's History of the World, Part I, Year One follows two tribal villagers - Zed (Jack Black) and Oh (Cera) - on a walking tour of the Old Testament after they eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, an action that results in their exile from the village. After meeting Cain and Abel (David Cross and Paul Rudd) and a brush with circumcision-happy Abraham and his son Isaac (Hank Azaria and Christopher "McLovin" Mintz-Plasse), the two wind up in Sodom & Gomorrah, trying to save the two caveladies they're sweet on.

Among the more distracting and ultimately distasteful aspects of the film is that it plays fast and loose with historical and textual accuracy. The film has us believe that cavemen, Israelites, Egyptians, and Romans existed at the same time, though any student in a 100-level history survey knows better. More problematic is the film's overreliance on established Old Testament narratives, which it disregards in favor of a vignette-style approach in which our cavepeople happen upon notable scenes. Yet Year One suggests that the murder of Abel (Genesis 4), the sacrifice of Isaac (Genesis 22), and the impending destruction of Sodom & Gomorrah (Genesis 19) all occurred within a few weeks of each other - an implication that diverts one's attention from the action on screen. The worst offense on this count is that Sodom & Gomorrah are saved at the end of the film, which is disappointing considering a special effects piece involving Michael Bay-style explosions might have redeemed at least a fraction of the movie for me.

Not that there's much action to watch. Black and Cera move from scene to scene without doing much; they make a few crude sexual jokes before some heavyhanded expositional dialogue signals a coming change of scenery. Black is perfectly cast as a caveman - just not this caveman; as a supposed "chosen one," Zed is responsible for enlightening civilization and ushering in a new era for mankind. This from a guy who in the next breath drops the ball on a fart joke? I've never understood Hollywood's love affair with Black (save for what I thought was a deent supporting role in Tropic Thunder), and Year One solidifies that. Similarly, Cera's underused here, though I doubt he would have done much more with Oh if he weren't; Cera plays the same socially awkward mumbler he always does, and while he's decent at this character type, his delivery trumps the poor dialogue he receives.

That's the biggest problem with Year One - it's a Harold Ramis film. The man who brought us Animal House, Ghostbusters, and Groundhog Day is responsible for this stinker. Knowing that Ramis is capable of so much more than this - cognizant of the potential that's being squandered in this movie - is almost as painful as sitting through the whole movie. As comedy scripts go, this is one of the unfunniest I've ever seen; the acting is weak, the jokes are humorless (even and especially when the film descends to the level of excrement jokes), and the ending fizzles out. Indeed, the only joy one can derive from this experience is celebrity spotting; for reasons I've yet to comprehend, Year One is populated with A-list stars slumming for a paycheck (either that or they simply want to say they were in a Harold Ramis movie). I felt most sorry for Oliver Platt, who's trapped in gaudy robes and one-note jokes about homosexuality; similar pathos goes out to Olivia Wilde, whose nascent career now has a dark smear on it.

Year One is also the name of one of my favorite Batman storylines. DC Comics followed up the popular storyline with Year Two and Year Three, though Harold Ramis would do better to move on and pretend that Year One never happened.
Year One is rated PG-13 "for crude and sexual content throughout, brief strong language and comic violence." The characters talk about sex and "laying with" in almost every scene, sometimes quite crudely; F-bombs crop up on occcasion, and there are a few goofy sword/fistfights that are as enjoyable as they are gory, which is to say not at all.