Comedies have a way of sneaking into the pantheon through a side door, so while it’s easy to imagine many people, not just stuffy grown-ups, rolling their eyes at a movie like “Hot Rod,” it’s just as likely that the kid down the aisle is thinking, Best. Movie. Ever. There are moments of inspired silliness in “Hot Rod,” such as the sequence when Rod (Samberg) goes into the woods and takes a nasty spill down what can only be described as the longest hill on earth. Often, the movie feels more like 44 two-minute shorts than a normal movie with a normal plot. That isn’t so terrible; as Schaffer, who directed it, points out, “no one was watching ‘Billy Madison’ to see if he made it through school.” But the idea-to-execution ratio—the sheer belly-laugh count—is too low. In other words, it’s just your average movie starring an “SNL” veteran.
But Samberg is not your average “SNL” veteran. As a rookie cast member during the 2005-06 season, he became a star by sneaking through a few side doors of his own, using NBC’s burgeoning Web presence to circumvent the usual pecking order for face time on the live broadcast. Even now, he’s still basically known for only five minutes of work: a pair of mock music videos, the first of which, “Lazy Sunday,” features him and fellow “SNL” star Chris Parnell rapping about an afternoon spent eating cupcakes and watching “The Chronicles of Narnia.” The second, “D—k in a Box,” costars Justin Timberlake in an R&B duet about two lotharios who pull the old “Diner” trick—remember Mickey Rourke and the popcorn?—on their dates. Together, the two videos have been viewed online millions of times, turning Samberg into a cross-platform celebrity and making “SNL” relevant again, even ahead of the curve.
As Samberg attempts the perilous leap from “SNL” celebrity to movie stardom, the breadth and loyalty of his Internet following was supposed to give him a boost. But has it? Forget last weekend’s results for “Hot Rod.” It’ll be months before the audience decides whether that movie is another “Billy Madison” (good) or the next “Night at the Roxbury” (not good). Samberg is hoping for the best, but he won’t be demoralized if “Hot Rod” winds up in the comedy dustbin. It doesn’t mean the game’s over for him. “Maybe I’m an unrealistically positive person, but I laughed my ass off at ‘Night at the Roxbury’,” he says. “It’s not like that movie came and went and no one cared. Me and my friends cared.” And lest we forget, “Roxbury” starred a former “SNL” regular named Will Ferrell. Gosh, remember him?
