Reviewed by Neil Davey
Stars Andy Samberg, Ian McShane,
Isla Fisher, Will Arnett,
Bill Hader, Sissy Spacek
Written by Pam Brady
Certification UK 12A | US PG-13
Runtime 88 minutes
Directed by Akiva Schaffer
Hot Rod — or, to give it a more accurate title, Napoleon Dynamite: The Stunt Years — is a strange film. It’s an amiable comedy about Rod (Saturday Night Live’s Samberg), a Dynamite-esque teenager famous locally for his stunts which generally end in painful disaster. Rod and stepfather Frank (McShane) have a weekly fight which is meant to give Rod some spine. However, after many years, he’s still never managed to beat Frank and, with Frank recently diagnosed with a fatal heart defect, it looks like he never will. Unless, of course, someone can raise $50,000 for a heart transplant by, perhaps, jumping 15 buses which, for the record, is ‘one more than Evel Knievel’. It’s all very silly and, inevitably, features Bill Hader — who is, apparently, in every film being made at the moment (only when Bruce Willis is unavailable — Ed). However, it’s never quite silly enough and, after delivering three genuine, flat-out belly laughs in the first 20 minutes or so — a classic face plant, a brilliant Footloose pastiche and a stupidly funny Homer-esque fall down a mountain — it never lives up to that early promise. A good cast keeps you smiling but, ultimately, it’s all a bit disappointing.