No. 39 Let’s Go To Prison (2006) 25 of 100

 

This film popped to the top of my list when it came up on a random search. It looked a good prospect as it had Bob Odenkirk as director and featured Will Arnett – Gob Bluth off ‘Arrested Development’ – but alas it was a terrible effort and a waste of the talent involved. Looking at the film’s Wikipedia page it’s noted that the film suffered from studio interference in the editing room so they may just get a pass. That said, Odenkirk made the same complaint about his earlier effort ‘Run Ronnie Run’, which was a lot better, so you’d hope that he’d of learnt his lesson.

You can tell the film will be a stinker early on when there is a lot of voice over exposition. That usually means stuff has been cut and they need to patch something together from the bits left behind. Here we have Dax Shepard as our protagonist and alarm bells ring right away when his character is called ‘John Lyshitski’. Hee-hee – he has a funny name!

John gives us a rundown of his life to date which sees him having been sent to prison on three occasions by the same judge. He has no introspection and blames the judge for all of his troubles. When he gets out for his latest crime he plans to get revenge on the judge but is aghast to find the beak has died. He decides his best course of action is to go after the judge's son Nelson, played by Arnett.

Nelson manages a large trust fund and is your typical spoiled asshole with a BMW. John manages to get into Nelson’s car and empties the yuppie’s inhaler. This causes him to have a panic attack and to ransack a pharmacy. It’s strange he can’t just explain himself but he gets 3-5 years in jail for his antics. John isn’t satisfied with this and arranges to get sent to prison himself so he can make his quarry’s life as miserable as possible. There are large stretches of credibility here but as it’s a supposed comedy you have to let it go.

The two men are put in the same cell and you then get an hour of your usual prison cliches including Champ Kind’s corrupt guard, some over friendly inmates and a white power gang, led shamefully by Mr Shannon. He’s meant to be super tough but gets bested and killed off by Nelson inside half an hour.

For reasons the two men are put in a death match and one must die. Who will die and who will get out?

This was an awful film with very few laughs. My only smirk was when someone said ‘I’ll fill you with more holes than an asshole convention’. Bob can hide behind the editors but his work here was poor and he offered little on screen when he appeared as a lawyer – better not call Saul!

Shepard and Arnott had no chemistry at all and they looked like they were reading random pages of script at each other. There was no believable character development, with the douche bag rich guy subverting our expectation by winning over the prison whilst streetwise John just sits and gurns.

Shannon offered little menace despite a buzz cut and a swastika tattoo. He had the mad eyes but little in the way of a physical presence. You need someone like Grossburger in ‘Stir Crazy’ to pull this kind of part off – Shannon looked a bit lost in what was a small and relatively early role for him.

The film staggers on for about 90 minutes but you know where it’s going early on and there are no surprises. One to deny parole from your video dungeon!

When is Shannon-On? - 28.15

Outcome? Dead; Overdosed on boat cleaner

Film 1.5/5

Shannon Stars 2/5