Horrible Bosses (2011)
***½/****
starring Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, Jason Sudeikis, Jamie Foxx
screenplay by Michael Markowitz and John Francis Daley & Jonathan Goldstein
directed by Seth Gordon
by Ian Pugh A straight-white-male fantasy of the most ridiculous order, Horrible Bosses begins with a trio of working shmoes who are, ironically, comfortable enough to go drinking every night and bemoan how their bosses are making their lives a living hell. Office jockey Nick (Jason Bateman, in his best performance in ages) has been passed up for a promotion by the sadistic Harken (Kevin Spacey); dental assistant Dale (Charlie Day) works under constant sexual harassment from Julia Harris, DDS (Jennifer Aniston, hilarious for a change); and chemical-plant employee Kurt (Jason Sudeikis) is suddenly thrust into the dominion of middle-aged frat boy Bobby Pellit (Colin Farrell, perfection). They can't just quit their jobs because the economy's in the toilet, so the only sane solution is for them to band together and kill their employers. The joke that propels the film is that their poorly-conceived plans amount to little more than one of those online "kill your boss" simulators, and Horrible Bosses occasionally seems to acknowledge its plot as a grossly oversimplified game. A recon mission yields no intel that would be useful to these would-be hitmen, while Kurt puts Pellit's toothbrush up his ass and Dale plays "Angry Birds" on his iPhone to work off an accidental coke binge.