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This evening I saw The Visioneers, a 2008 film staring Zach Galifianakis, one of my recent favorite comedian/actors. Zach does not disappoint. (Free on Hulu.com)
In his characteristic style, Zach finely balances dark with silly, playing a middle manager of a corporation intent on maximizing productivity while ridding its employees, and the whole world, of their dreams.
On the scale of silly vs. dramatic/dark/thoughtful, this film lies between The Hangover and It's Kind of A Funny Story. You can tell a good humorist when a dramatic scene, such as the climax of this film involving Zach and a female co-star, can be played in a silly manner, giving it humor, but not taking away from the deep emotion of the scene.
On the negative side, the film moves a bit slowly, and I do not agree with the film's many political/economic implications, including that corporations seek to take over the world and rid people of happiness, or that the government helps promote the profit-seeking strategies of corporations.
On the contrary, what I observe is that the same force of competition that motivates corporations' productivity policies is that which, in the long-run, causes these policies not to go overboard; the "non-corporate," casual work atmospheres of companies like Google are good examples of this principle. And I have only known the government to be an opponent of the private sector, with taxes and regulations that limit, not enhance, profit-making. And if a particular regulation happens to enhance the profits of a certain company or industry, as in the case of the 2009 US bank bail-outs, it is surely acting against the profitability of other companies, industries, or individuals, and is on the whole deleterious.
Keep up the good work, Zach!
In his characteristic style, Zach finely balances dark with silly, playing a middle manager of a corporation intent on maximizing productivity while ridding its employees, and the whole world, of their dreams.
On the scale of silly vs. dramatic/dark/thoughtful, this film lies between The Hangover and It's Kind of A Funny Story. You can tell a good humorist when a dramatic scene, such as the climax of this film involving Zach and a female co-star, can be played in a silly manner, giving it humor, but not taking away from the deep emotion of the scene.
On the negative side, the film moves a bit slowly, and I do not agree with the film's many political/economic implications, including that corporations seek to take over the world and rid people of happiness, or that the government helps promote the profit-seeking strategies of corporations.
On the contrary, what I observe is that the same force of competition that motivates corporations' productivity policies is that which, in the long-run, causes these policies not to go overboard; the "non-corporate," casual work atmospheres of companies like Google are good examples of this principle. And I have only known the government to be an opponent of the private sector, with taxes and regulations that limit, not enhance, profit-making. And if a particular regulation happens to enhance the profits of a certain company or industry, as in the case of the 2009 US bank bail-outs, it is surely acting against the profitability of other companies, industries, or individuals, and is on the whole deleterious.
Keep up the good work, Zach!
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