Review: Horrible Bosses

Nick’s boss is a psycho, Dale’s is a man eater and Kurt’s is just a plain tool.

That’s the simple but often hilarious premise of Horrible Bosses; but when all the micromanaging and harassment gets too much for our buddies; they hit on the idea of murdering their paymasters.

Adding nothing really new to the oversaturated ‘Apatow’ type comedy flick, Horrible Bosses manages to raise many a laugh via the usual situational comedy that has become the staple of modern American comedy movies and TV.

There’s plenty of amiable, boyish banter between the thirty something gang of mutineers played by Jason Bateman, Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis as they lament about their respective superiors and their hellish workplaces, to go with the expected close to the knuckle scripted and improvised dialogue; a milder ensemble of The Hangover’s ‘wolfpack’, the boys of ‘bosses’ owe much to the bad taste trail blazed by Bradley Cooper and Co. but never quite hitting the riotous heights of Todd Phillip’s comedy juggernaut.

The real comedy hits though come from the bosses with Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston and Colin Farrell hilarious as the misfit managers.

Spacey really hams it up as the controlling, psycho executive; Aniston’s nympho is sexy and sadistic and Farrell’s un-vane turn as the tool is as convincing a departure as Tom Cruise’s Les Grossman.

A couple of cameo’s by Jamie Foxx’s ‘murder consultant’ provide some hilarious wordplay on his name, Dean ‘MF’ Jones and Ioan Gruffudd’s misconstrued ‘wetworker’ provides a hysterical episode.

Bosses’ laughs are rib-tickling but sporadic in their delivery and quality, often too reliant on crass, low taste cracks and muddled midway pacing gets in the way of any memorable comedic set pieces.

The deplorable chiefs and their devilish humour is underused and nowhere near seen enough as the disenchanted subordinates, who don’t conjure the same hilarity.

But every big name involved plays the fun to perfection, and their unexpected turns provide plenty of chuckles. A funny, super-bad comedy that doesn’t break the comedy mould but executes most of its laughs well.

7/10 – worth a look.