Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby

  I tend to avoid writing about comedies because they're intrinsically hard to write about in a meaningful way (not that my usual writing is meaningful, but I do try). Also, the stuff I find funny does not tend to align with most people's opinion, something that seems to have gotten worse over the last couple of decades because I'm a sad old bastard.
 Case in point: Judd Apatow, whose bloated, unfunny, overtly self-indulgent films make me want to drink myself into a stupor. Which is a feat, because I never drink (...wine).

 Counterpoint: Walk Hard. But also Adam McKay's older movies, released during the post-Apatow drought of good Hollywood comedies. They're not great movies, exactly -except maybe Step Brothers- but they're goofy fun and often manage to cram in some inspired craziness.
 Talladega Nights is probably the weakest one of these, but I still have a vague soft spot for it.

 It recounts the story of one Ricky Bobby, beginning with a bit of mythologizing (he was delivered at the back of a muscle car, because his father was going too fast and overshot the hospital).

 He grows up to be Will Ferrell, who becomes, along with his inseparable best friend/second fiddle Cal (Dewey Cox himself John C. Reilly), the top NASCAR driver. Success, as it usually does in this kind of story, turns him into a mild asshole.
 And of course his dominance is soon upended. This time by a very, very French F1 driver Jean Girard (Sacha Baron Cohen, in top form), who easily bests him and challenges his 'winner' alpha male identity (in more ways than one; Jean is very openly gay). Humble pie is eaten, mojo is regained, something redemption, yadda yadda yadda.

 It's often funny. Very, very funny in its specifics; The biggest laugh is probably when you find out he called one of his twin sons Walker and the other one Texas Ranger ("if we wanted wussies, we would have named them Dr. Quinn and Medicine Woman!"). I mean... just that makes me kind of love the movie right there. There's also some excellent absurdism, like Cal just not understanding that stealing your buddy's wife and home is Not Cool, or Jean's choice of reading material while driving.

 But... it's two hours long, and the heavily improvisational quality impacts the script (credited to Ferrell and McKay). There are a lot of great jokes, but they're spread out in between a lot of overtly indulgent filler, meaning that It really, really drags in places. Funny as it is, it really could do with going a little faster.