She's All That starring Rachel Leigh Cook











Dick

Starring Kirsten Dunst, Michelle Williams, Dan Hedaya, Harry Shearer, Teri Garr, Will Ferrell, Jim Breuer

I gotta say this: I love Dick. I really do.

And by telling you that I give you the gist of about half the jokes populating "Dick", a charming comedy starring Kirsten Dunst and Michelle Williams set in the final months of Nixon's presidential office. The two female leads play two extra chromosome wielding Bill and Teds, who inadvertently come across compromising Watergate materials and aided by an equally inept duo in the form of a comic Woodward and Berstein, bring about the fall of the White House. Good stuff? Well, yes, actually. Granted, it would've been an easy plot to screw up, but both female leads have enough comic talent to pull a substantial serving of belly laughs from the offbeat story.

I say this never really having been a fan of Dick... and by that mean the whole Nixon debacle. I was a wee child when the whole thing went on, so I always found the anger the subject aroused in my elders hard to relate to. And while Oliver Stone's NIXON allowed my some sympathy for the man it still seemed like a far off dream, a tawdry episode that occurred a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. Indeed, part of what makes Dick suceed is it's timing… this film wouldn't have worked in the eighties, the NIXON wounds were still too fresh. But now that we actually have a generation of actresses who weren't even alive during the Nixon presidency, the proper perspective can be applied and the Watergate episode can begin its transition from national tragedy to lowbrow comedy.

Sure, Dick has its dry moments, (as most dicks do.) Sometimes the comedy falls too low, but at least you have fair warning of that from the films title. But as an amusing diversion for a Saturday night, you can't go wrong with Dick.

I'll stop now.

 




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