Let's Go to Prison

John Lyshitski (Dax Shepard) is a young guy who's spent most of his life in prison, blaming the judge who continuously sent him them, he hatches his plan for revenge. But he dies three days before he gets free of prison, so John decides to go after the judge's son, Nelson (Will Arnet of brilliant "Arrested Development" fame) John's plan is to frame Nelson, get him sent to jail, and then get himself sent to the same jail to bunk with him, which he accomplishes. But things don't always go as planned afterwords though.

Personally I found this film hilarious and don't really know why there's all this hatred towards it. Will Arnet is pretty funny and Dax Shepard plays off him quite well. But the REAL star of the film is Chi McBride as Barry, an eloquent rapist. Whenever he's on the screen it had me in stitches. The film's not as good as Mr. Show was (but hell what can be?) But director Bob Odenkirk still has a winner here.

My Grade: B+

There are movies that follow a relatively obvious plot. There are movies where you expect every plot twist ten minutes in advance. This certainly is one of those movies. But then, why would you go see a comedy looking for gripping plot lines? This is one of those movies that would have bombed, in the wrong hands. Given an average director and a mediocre cast, this movie would have been barely watchable. But under the care of Bob Odenkirk and a trio of skilled actors, it turns out as one of the funnier movies of the year.

Let me be clear about one thing: this movie is all about subtle, dry humor. The situations are, on their own, intentionally not funny. Played a different way, many of them would be downright terrifying. But the way the actors carry themselves through it, their timing, their facial expressions, bring out the absurdity of the serious script.

If you go into the movie expecting it to hit you in the face with everything it's got, you may be disappointed. But if you go prepared to pay attention and catch the nuances as well as the broad strokes, you'll barely stop laughing.

Hilarious, just simply hilarious. Let's go to prison gives out the funny about prison life. Even though prison life is a very serious manner, just watching this movie will leave you in stitches. Here you have a well-respected lawyer who comes from a family of arbiters of the law. On the other side, there's a born trouble-maker who dealt with his father in the past, when he died, he went for his son. So when this gallant troublemaker gets to be his bunkmate in prison. There he meets some characters who gives him some tips on who to trust and who to avoid. One of the prisoners who happens to be called the "Barry White" of the cell-block, takes high interest in him. The prison love can make you lose you dignity, but the toilet wine tops it all. So instead of having the biggest riot that could cause a breakout, they create a death that makes a breakout. Now why would a high class man would like Tecnotronic's "Move This"? Guess every guy's got his own vices. This movie is a lot of fun, and a lot of laughs to go by. Watch this! 3 out of 5 stars.

... but WHY do I feel guilty? Maybe it is because such terrible things go on behind bars - rape, gangs that dish out death based on race, bad food, corrupt guards, etc. and all of that is treated comically in this film. BUT, really nothing that you would expect given the set up of the film actually happens to the degree that it could, and in the end it turns out to have some very clever twists. It is just not all stupidity and it is very non-violent considering what could happen.

The setup is that a career non-violent criminal, John Lyshitski (Dax Shepard) is constantly getting caught and sent to prison by Judge Nelson Biedermann. But Lyshitski blames all of his incarcerations on the judge, not on his own bad choices, and he spends so much time in prison he knows everybody by name. So John decides to carry out a plan of revenge on the judge, except the judge dies right before he gets out of jail. So John changes his plan to avenge himself on the dead judge's son, Nelson Biedermann IV, by tampering with his inhaler and making him temporarily high. In this state Ned trashes a store and attacks the store owners, all caught on the store security camera. Did I mention that Ned IV is an insufferable preppy jerk? So Ned demands that the Biedermann foundation help get him out, BUT the foundation decides they would like to be rid of this stupid jerk and defend him themselves and throw the case. Ned goes to prison for 3-5 years.

Meanwhile, John is not feeling the glee he thought he would at Ned going to prison. After all, he figures, he won't be there to see Ned get what is certainly going to be coming to a soft preppy rich kid with no street smarts. So this time, John gets caught on purpose, gets sent to prison for 3-5 just like Ned, and manages his prison connections so he is Ned's cellmate. At first things go like you think they would, but then a twist of fate for both Ned and John change things in a way that was inconceivable to John when he started this whole thing. From there you will have to watch yourself and find out what happens. If you have a distaste for violence, don't worry, this is not Shawshank Redemption on any possible level.

Oh, and kudos to Chi McBride who becomes the unlikely means for Ned to give the foundation that dumped him their comeuppance. This film is probably a 6.5 as a comedy, but I rounded it up to 7 for originality, especially during the last half.

Putting this into my DVD player i didn't expect more than a few chuckles but i found myself laughing hysterically rather frequently. While i don't think every joke landed quite as well as Odenkirk would have wanted, the overall product was rather funny. Chi McBride has by far the funniest character in the film since he does fall in love with one of my personal favorites, Will Arnett. Dax Shepherd was surprisingly standable considering i'm really not a fan of his at all. Dylan Baker's "comment in the butt hole" joke i don't think quite made it... or maybe that was the point, so i didn't care much for him. Koechner was as funny as usual and all the stupid quirks of this movie made me laugh. Deep? No. Funny? Yes. What's funnier than a rich inmate struggling with a bunch of people who want to kill him or try to have dirty sex with him? That's funny.