tmdb28039023
1
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Aug 26, 2022
This movie stars Seth Rogen in a dual role as Herschel, an early 20th century Eastern European Jewish immigrant, and Ben, his last remaining descendant. To paraphrase a Family Guy episode, Seth Rogen looks funny even when he's not doing anything funny. Why, then, is An American Pickle, so unfunny (I laughed exactly one (1) time)? My theory is that two Rogens cancel each other out. My other theory is that the makers were going for a circa early-to-mid 70s Woody Allen-style film; Sleeper and Love and Death come to mind. The problem is that Allen himself stopped making that kind of movies about half a century ago (and even he had the good sense to use cryopreservation in Sleeper, which at least sounds sciency, as opposed to a brine-preserved body).
Much of what passes for conflict here stems from a billboard advertising vodka that has been erected adjacent to Herschel and Ben’s family plot. The former is determined to buy the billboard, which Ben says costs $200,000, and tear it down. The billboard, mind you, is facing the cemetery and not the street (and it’s established that Ben hasn’t visited the plot in at least five years, so not even he has seen the vodka advertisement). Why this billboard – which makes about as much sense as the ones in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – can be so costly and at the same time so worthless, is never explained.
Another good question is, what are the odds that Herschel and Ben, separated by a hundred years and several generations of (one hopes) exogamy, could pass for identical twins? Not good, especially when they look at old family photos and we see that none of Herschel's descendants look anything like him or Ben. The only reason for this genetic anomaly is that the script requires a case of mistaken identities during the climax of the film. That's it.
Wracking my brains to find a good reason for this film to exist, it occurred to me to interpret it as an allegory of Donald Trump’s rise to power. After all, Herschel is a narrow-minded, racist, homophobic, xenophobic, and misogynistic jerk who thinks and says horrible things, but who has a good head for business, allowing him to become popular and successful. That Herschel learns absolutely nothing and never gets his comeuppance is an indication that I may not be too far off.
But then I realized two things; first, even if my hypothesis were correct, the movie would have to be entertaining – which it isn’t – before it could work as satire; and second, I'd be giving the filmmakers way too much credit, when they probably just wanted to do a live-action remake of An American Tail.