ReelBob: ‘Long Shot’ ★★★
By Bob Bloom
‘Long Shot” is a funny, low-brow rom-com that pairs an unlikely couple — Seth Rogen and Charlize Theron — against a political backdrop that abets the movie’s comedic parameters.
The movie’s two main assets are heart and smarts.
Rogen plays Fred Flarsky, an idealistic journalist, who hates wealthy people, Republicans and compromise. He is unkempt and seems to always be angry. He quits his job when a media conglomerate — a thinly veiled spoof of Fox News — buys the publication for which he writes.
To cheer him up, his best friend, Lance (a sharply funny O’Shea Jackson Jr.) takes him to a posh affair where Boys II Men is performing.
There, Fred reconnects with Charlotte Field (Theron), who used to babysit him. Field is now Secretary of State, working for a doltish president whose only qualifications for the office was playing a president on a television series. (Any resemblance to any president — living or dead — is surely coincidental.)
Field invites Flarsky, who always has had a crush on Charlotte because of her beauty, brains and idealism, to join her staff as a writer to help punch up her speeches with a few jokes.
Charlotte needs to improve her likability numbers with focus groups because she has decided to run for president in 2020 after her boss told her he will not seek re-election. (As the president explains to Field, he wants to try something much more difficult — breaking into movies — a move only a couple of television stars have done successfully.)
So, Flarsky signs on. Of course, the usual battles over differences erupt between Flarsky and Field. He pushes her to remember her youthful principles, while she lectures him on the art of compromise in politics.
Soon, as you’d expect, different kinds of sparks fly as the pair draws closer to each other.
“Long Shot” is, in a sense, a male fantasy. In the real world, a guy with Flarsky’s looks and rumpled, Salvation Army-looking wardrobe would not even be in the same ZIP code as a successful and accomplished woman such as Field.
But this is the movies, folks, and on screen, attraction trumps reality.
Director Jonathan Levine, working from a script by Dan Sterling and Liz Hannah, alert you from the outset that Flarsky and Field (which sounds like the name of a vaudeville juggling act) are going to be a couple.
It’s no surprise, then, when they begin exchanging suggestive glances, which then lead them into bed.
“Long Shot” works because of the scintillating chemistry between Rogen and Theron.
Levine keeps Rogen in check, cutting back on the actor’s usual schtick.
Theron shows impeccable comic timing, but also the loneliness and frustration that her position entails and the toll her career has taken on her personal life.
The usual sort of outrageous complications that infest these kinds of movies arise to challenge Flarsky and Field, but, of course, everything is resolved in a manner that defies real-world logic.
You know what? That doesn’t matter. “Long Shot” is entertaining, deftly blending high ideals and gross-out humor.
It’s enjoyable enough to make you want to reignite an interest in politics.
I am a founding member of the Indiana Film Journalists Association. My reviews appear at ReelBob (reelbob.com) and Rottentomatoes (www.rottentomatoes.com). I also review Blu-rays and DVDs. I can be reached by email at bobbloomjc@gmail.com or on Twitter @ReelBobBloom. Links to my reviews can be found on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
LONG SHOT
3 stars out of 4
(R), language, sexual content, drug use