Hits

I wasn't sure about going ahead and watching this one, but upon seeing that David Cross directed it my interest was piqued. In particular someone who would like to examine the nature of our social-media driven culture consciousness, ready to laugh at the absurdity of it all, should give it a shot.

What Cross has achieved with his film is a funny, well-cast and multi-layered story that makes up for what it lacks with well developed characters, excellent acting from all cast members, and a completely plausible plot line that very well could be a true story in your hometown.

'Hits' makes great fun of skewering demographics of hipsters, rednecks, teenage delusions of grandeur, ordinary small-town Americans, far- right libertarians, stoners, cops and more, and yet all of the characters portrayed in the movie have a refreshing complexity. Each principal character in the movie (excepting perhaps a brutal cop) has some good trait that we see even as we watch them self-destruct or clash with someone or some situation.

The pace of the film, the editing and screenplay all could have perhaps been tightened up to spare some screen time, but there are multiple branches in this story to tell and somehow it all gets wrapped up in just enough time. There are plenty of sharp-witted laughs along the way but the real humor lies in the increasingly outrageous sequence of events - the big picture.

I recommend it for anyone who suspects that something is amiss in our media consciousness today, and/or wants to see a story about everyday Americans with real, common hopes and dreams all mixed up in an almost-black comedy on the edge of the ludicrous - that same edge being where we find ourselves today!

I cannot think of when I've seen so much talent squandered in a comedic movie as with David Cross's 'Hits'. But then again, I'm not convinced this was supposed to be a comedy. It is possible Cross has gotten so advanced in his irony that this 90 minute critique of the unwashed flyover idiots - and the equally gullible New York "hipsters", and, honestly, everybody but Cross himself - is actually a hybrid documentary, the actors unawares they were executing the author's cunning critique of how gullible everybody in the world is, except the Davidians, of course.

Cross has talent like Amy Sedaris, Michael Cera and the always hilarious Dave Koechner, and uses them for all of a couple scenes each, never once putting them in a situation where they can show off their comedic abilities, rather, rolling out one tired, pandering inside joke after another. In one scene where Michael Cera sells pot to a few nerdy hipsters, the comedy centers around how particular some potheads are over their specific type of grass, a hilarious set piece if you happen to be one of the hundreds of people in the world that has witnessed such absurdities.

The script is trite, cliché and one dimensional. It is so clumsy getting out of the gate that a full 45 minutes in I still had no idea what the movie was about, nor had I laughed once, nor did I care about a single character. In the end, Hits is nothing more than a blathering and pointless monologue, typical of Cross in recent years, where he criticizes the minutia of people that are not as enlightened as he and his cult. To confirm that I'm not just using hyperbole, go to Youtube and look for Cross's diatribe on Jim Belushi, all because Belushi didn't sign an autograph once. It's proof positive Cross has lost his mind, and the defense of his idiotic actions in the comments section evidence of a cult.

It seems incredible that with all the success Cross had in the past with the highly acclaimed Mr. Show and his hilarious turn in Arrested Development, he could not find a better project to put his time and efforts into than... well, most everything he's done, and now this pointless waste of time. One has to wonder if maybe it was Odenkirk that came up with all those funny ideas on Mr. Show and Cross was just in the right place at the right time. He is a funny actor, no doubt, but I'm afraid he's become twice the gullible idiot of those he finds copious time to ridicule.

... following in the footsteps of Becky Sharp and Tracy Flick (with, in Hagner's case, maybe a touch of Kimmy Schmidt). Others on this site have focused mainly on the director, David Cross, and on supporting players like David Koechner and Michael Cera, mysteriously ignoring the star of the movie. To my mind, Hagner is by far the best thing in it: funny, indomitable, slightly crazed, touching in a small-town American way, and thoroughly adorable. In scene after scene, she's never less than charming and amusing. I wish we'd seen even more of her, as well as more of Amy Sedaris, disappointingly wasted in a tiny role. As for the rest -- the satiric thrusts at small-town eccentrics, etc. -- I willingly went along with it.

It was also nice to see a film set in unglamorous upstate New York. (The last one that made such good use of an upstate town, I think, was "You Can Count on Me.") For that matter, too few films target the politically correct hipster culture of Brooklyn, or at least too few do so with such merciless accuracy as this one.

I wish the damn film were currently available on some streaming service, as I'd like to see it again. But for now, it seems to have disappeared into memory.

Maybe the movie would have been better if David Cross was actually in it, instead being behind the scenes as writer director.

The Mr. Show star turns what feels like a few sketches into one big movie about a girl trying to be a star in this era of Reality TV shows like Teen mom which the protagonist is obsessed with and social media, while her dad is getting the attention she thinks she deserves when his complaints about a pot hole in his street goes viral and all the hipsters from Brooklyn come out to help him.

The movie was not funny, although I'm in complete agreement with the joke, it did not make me laugh one bit sorry to say.

It was cool that David Cross got all his friends like Micheal Cera to take small roles adding to the feel of it being a bunch of sketches.

Overall, I got no real satisfaction on his parody of today's version of fame

This movie was a surprise.

From the beginning, the plot and the evolution of the story depict characters' "passions" and obsessions. Those obsessions are moving the characters away from self awareness. I understand that there is a tendency in the movie to criticise the presence and the usage of social media in our every day lives. Which may lead to the obsession of image cultivation, of a successful media persona. Everyone want a piece of the success story so bad, without analysing what success is.

Well no spoilers but the finale is simply magnificent. A psychiatrist's happy end. A real substantial drama.