3/10
Confuses Inept with Inappropriate
7 December 2013
Vince Offer's "InAPPropriate Comedy" is a weak-sauce sketch comedy that starts off as a series of movie parodies, then drifts off into random and intentionally offensive takes on sex, ethnic stereotyping and racism. In the first category, there's a dated running skit making fun of the 40-year old movie franchise "Dirty Harry." Dubbed "Flirty Harry," it's really just a collection of unoriginal and unfunny gay double entendres delivered by a deadpan Adrien Brody, who's indeed come a long way from his days of Oscar-winning glory nearly a decade ago. Other movies and TV shows that come in for some ribbing include "Jackass," "127 Hours" and even a porn movie version of Siskel and Ebert, none of which elicit even the teeniest snicker from the audience.

The sharpest satire - if one can call it that - comes in a series of skits featuring the very funny Ari Shaffir (who, along with Offer and Ken Pringle, co-authored the screenplay) as a racist who launches into a string of insulting diatribes against Hispanics, blacks, Asians and Jews. The concept works both as humor and as satire simply because it has a point to make and uses absurdity and outrageousness to make it. However, even these bits are not entirely successful, as the ones set in a Jewish market and on a beach in which he's trying to give black passersby free boat trips back to Africa fall miserably flat.

Unfortunately, most of the rest of the skits involve largely unfunny - and often very crude - ideas indifferently executed. Even when a sequence starts off promisingly, the writers often drag it out long past the point where it's amusing anymore. The basic mistake here is in not realizing that inappropriateness, in and of itself, is not a sufficient basis upon which to construct a comedy if there isn't the wit and imagination necessary to make the material funny. And I'm pretty sure that Brody, Rob Schneider, Michelle Rodriquiez and Lindsay Lohan will want to have this particular movie permanently expunged from their wikipedia and IMDb pages as quickly as possible. You know you have a real stinker of a movie when even someone as incapable of embarrassment as Lohan seems ashamed to be associated with it.

And just in case you're wondering, the APP in the title refers to the desktop icon through which an anonymous finger accesses each of the skits on his tablet.

Not quite on a par with that other recent anthology comedy, "Movie 43," in terms of sheer awfulness (what could be?), "InAPPropriate Comedy" nevertheless ranks as one of the least funny comedies of recent times.
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