charlie-benjamin

30 Rock is sharp, witty, and very, very funny, in part because of the excellent performances from the entire cast. Like The Larry Sanders Show, 30 Rock takes us behind the scenes of a television network, and while just as funny, is somewhat more lighthearted, less acerbic, than its predecessor. But this is not to detract from either The Larry Sanders Show or 30 Rock. If you're a fan of one, you'll be a fan of the other. One thing that I find distracting is the use of music in each episode. The music seems oddly unnecessary, and I hope will be dropped in future. However, the music does not stop this from being one of the best comedy dramas on television. Probably the strongest aspect of 30 Rock is its characters and their relationships to each other, all of whom have a great deal of potential.

This film is so bad that it is actually laugh-out-loud funny. If you're a fan of Garth Marenghi, then you need to see Dungeons and Dragons the blah blah of blah. Its hilariously awful. Probably the best line in this film occurs when they discover a sleeping dragon beneath the mountain. The maiden says 'What's that hole?' Hero replies 'That's not a hole. That's a nostril'. Classic. The special effects are below the quality of those in television drivel such as Charmed, while the script and acting worse than the worst video game. Another problem is that almost all of the actors look like porn stars trying to break into mainstream acting. The badness of this film is its only redeeming quality, and its for its badness that it should be watched. If you want cinematically beautiful fantasy with superb acting, the Lord of the Rings trilogy remains the only series of films to do the genre any justice.

Friends is neither so unfunny that I switch channel, yet nor is it funny enough to ever make me laugh out loud. At best, I'll chuckle, but that's as far as it goes. The dialogue consists of 1-2-1 exchanges that with almost clockwork precision result in one of several "quirky" expressions, most commonly the much copied "sh'uh right" from the infinitely funnier Wayne's World. Its that, or its Phoebe's expression of disgust, "Y'eugh". You get the idea. The comedy is built around this predictable exchange, with the audience no doubt cattle prodded into laughing, or paid. Over the years that the comedy has run, attempts have been made to develop the characters, and I believe this was directly in response to the masterful writing in Frasier, which managed to combine complex character and relationship development with laugh-out-loud humour. But Friends failed to succeed in developing either the characters or their relationships. Rather, what we were presented with were teenagers in adult bodies, 'playing' at being adults. And in a sense, for people who love this comedy, it perhaps represents a 30 minute opportunity to identify with this and its opposite, namely being 20 but living the life of a 30 year old, or being a 30 year old, and remembering back to when they were 20 fantasising about being 30. In the latter sense, comfort can be found in knowing that they aren't the idiots that the Friends are, but at the same time, they have achieved a comparable lifestyle, whilst being able to fantasise that they too have achieved that lifestyle with the same level of ease as the Friends. Conversely, people in their 20s can fantasise that they too will be able to attain a comparable lifestyle with the same level of ease. Herein lies its success but simultaneiously its weakness, that contributes to the general lack of substance that characterises this show. Life, especially in the city, is often about struggling, and indeed, it is in the struggle from which much comedy is born: the struggle to find love, the struggle to find work, or in my case the struggle to find Friends funny. Friends is a hugely but inexplicably successful series...I hesitate to call it a comedy because this would be to imply that it is funny. It is not. Put it this way: I can watch Friends, and effortlessly hold a straight face. It simply is not funny. The paradox, however, is that aside from Matt Leblanc, the cast have proved themselves elsewhere to be excellent dramatic and comic actors. But you would never guess it from watching Friends. I was glad that Friends finished, only to realise that there would be in eternity of repeats to avoid. I can only hope that Arrested Development is given a new lease of life on HBO, that Kelsey Grammar and gang return to a new series based around Frasier Krane, and that the new seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm and Rescue Me start soon. These are shows against which Friends is eclipsed and soon forgotten.