Horrible Bosses (2011)

This slapstick comedy about harassed workers conspiring to kill their bosses made Jack and me laugh, despite its obvious title (just like Bad Teacher). The star power is strong, with Jennifer Aniston, Jason Bateman, Colin Farrell, Jamie Foxx, Kevin Spacey, Jason Sudeikis, and Charlie Day from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Aniston (I wrote about her in The Switch), with bangs and darker hair color than usual, has never been more gorgeous as the sexual predator dentist who torments her poor hygienist Dale (Day). By contrast, Farrell (my favorites are listed in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, after which I mentioned him and his remarkable versatility in Ondine), as Bobby, is made up to look as unattractive as Tom Cruise did in Tropic Thunder, with a comb-over and a belly. His beleaguered employee is Kurt, played by Sudeikis (Saturday Night Live (2003-11) and a series arc on 30 Rock as Liz Lemon's boyfriend Floyd). Spacey (details in Casino Jack) is fairly versatile himself, and played almost exactly the same character as this (Dave) in Swimming With Sharks (1994), and Bateman (also covered in The Switch) is always entertaining, but, so far, has been typecast as a harried, nervous, sensible guy, just like Nick in this one (we'll see if he gets to stretch in The Change-Up later this summer). Jamie Foxx's (details in The Soloist) role is small but mighty. All seven of these actors fill out roles that have been well written for the silly farce that this is.

The writers are Michael Markowitz, who also is credited with the story, in his feature debut, after some TV shows, only one of which is familiar to me; Jonathan M. Goldstein (also a feature debut); and John Francis Daley (best known as Sam Weir on Freaks and Geeks when he was 14), who has a cameo as Carter. Director Seth Gordon (I wrote about him in Freakonomics) also has a cameo, as Ralph Peterberg, but we both missed it.

The soundtrack has both songs (list and streaming available here) plus a kick ass score by Christopher Lennertz (from his long list of credits I have seen only one other of the movies he has scored: Adam, which I liked a lot but apparently didn't feel moved to mention the music) with some special guests (to listen to clips, go to the amazon page and click "play all samples").

#3 at the box office last weekend in its third week, with 82% from audiences (69% critics) on rottentomatoes, this is perfectly good, albeit crude, entertainment for adults.