Special Correspondents is a satirical comedy film about a journalist (Eric Bana), and his sound guy (Rickey Gervais, who also directs the film), who are supposed to be covering a foreign war, but end up losing their tickets. As such they decide to pretend that they have gone and fake all their coverage from a room above a restaurant.
This film doesn’t know the meaning of subtly. It is the most garish, in your face, forcing itself down your throat film I have ever seen. The characters are all caricatures and are played up to a ridiculous degree. It is clear from the beginning that Eleanor (Vera Farmiga), doesn’t love her husband Ian (Gervais), as she sleeps with Frank (Bana), this would have been enough to set her up as a bad character and one we as the audience are not supposed to like. But No!
The film then does one better and has her trying to profit off her husband’s disappearance and refuse to pay his ransom, which would obviously come out in public but never mind. At this point, the film takes all the subtly and nuance that it could have had and sets it on fire. They make Eleanor almost like a cartoon villain.
The two main guys are themselves just stereotypes Bana is the gruff tough action hero type and Gervais is basically playing a slightly nerdier version of his character from The Office, neither one of them is developed any more than that, the characters actually have no arcs at all. What’s more the one singular good thing about this film is Kelly Macdonald’s Claire. Macdonald is the only person in this whole waste of time movie that seems like she is trying to give a good performance, but she is hamstrung by the fact that she is given little more to do than being seen worrying for the two leads. She has a little B plot that goes nowhere, but essentially, she is just a love interest for Gervais’s character, which is again the most obvious thing in the world.
This film is so bad that you sign off midway through it, you don’t care what happens to any of the characters because the film can’t make you care about them. The confrontation between Ian and his wife that you had hoped would happen since the beginning of the film is handled in the weakest possible way, feeling like one final slap in the face from the film. I have seen some bad films in my time but, this is a special kind of bad. Please stick to in front of the camera stuff Ricky.
Ps. America Ferrera you deserve better than this stinker of a film.
Pros.
Kelly Macdonald.
An Interesting Concept That It Then Wastes.
Cons.
The Characters Have No Arcs.
The Ending Is A Slap To The Face.
It Is The Most Aggressively Average Film You Will See All Year.
1.5/5
Reviewed By Luke
Another Millennial Reviewer 