New Movie Review by Matt Arnold: Get Him to the Greek

Movie: Get Him to the Greek
Director: Nicholas Stoller
Release: In Theaters Now!

So this was meant to be my Toy Story 3 review but because of unforeseen circumstances I was unable to see it. (Note To Self: Pixar movie on Father’s Day, Bad Idea.) Instead I went to see “Get Him to the Greek”. Now I’m the kind of person who doesn’t go to the movies to see comedies, last one I saw was “Clerks 2”. I would rather watch them on Netflix. But to my surprise the movie was very good and worth every penny paid.

“Get Him to the Greek” stars Jonah Hill as Aaron Green a low-level record company employee, Russell Brand as Himself… well Aldous Snow the washed out Rock Star to be exact, and Sean “P. Puff Diddy Daddy” Combs in the hilarious role of Record Executive Sergio Roma. Directed by Nicholas Stoller, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” and Produced by Judd Apatow (Funny People, Superbad). The story is set up with Aaron Green coming up with the idea of getting Aldous Snow to do a reunion show and the Greek Theater in LA in order to help out the struggling music label. Sergio at first dislikes the idea but then sends Aaron to London to retrieve Snow and get him to the LA within 3 days with pit stops in New York and Las Vegas for some Rock Star like escapades. The setup is a pretty typical road trip movie with the Rock Star gimmick. With a few original ideas sprinkled throughout.

Both Hill and Brand fit their roles perfectly. Hill comes off as completely uncomfortable with everything that is going on around him and is barely in control of the outrageous Snow. Brand was born for the role of a strung out Rocker has been. Now the real treat of the movie was Combs as Sergio, it has been a long time since I have laughed every time a character was in a scene. He is the most constantly funny character in the film. There are also a number of cameos in the film from Lars Ulrich, of Metallica fame to a great scene with Tom Felton (Draco Malfoy). Now the one thing I have not seen talked about is the amount of commentary the film has on the Music Industry. It brought up a number of points from record labels abusing artist, caring only about the money, and artist not writing their own songs. Now these points are no way new but its nice to see a film bring them up in the light of how well the music industry is doing.

“Get Him to the Greek” is a very effective comedy that gives you relatable characters, great scenarios, a large number of quotables (“When the world slips you a Jeffrey, stroke the furry wall.”) has heart and soul, and one of the greatest comedic roles of the year. I also enjoyed how everything did not work out quite perfect by the end of the film like in most comedies. Take a group of friends and enjoy the best comedy of the year so far.