[4]

Saturday Night Live‘s Andy Samberg stars in this comedy about an aspiring stunt man trying to raise money for his step-father’s heart transplant. I like Samberg, but he isn’t quite charismatic or funny enough to carry this particular movie over the finish line. He gets assistance from the always reliable Bill Hader and Danny McBride, but it’s not enough to make Hot Rod memorable. Isla Fisher is thrown in as a obligatory love interest and Sissy Spacek is wasted in a thankless mom role. Deadwood‘s Ian McShane is featured as Samberg’s stepfather, but his scenes are all one-note and oddly restrained. All through Hod Rod, I felt like the cast were being held back and that if they could just cut completely loose, it might have been a much more enjoyable movie. Then again, in the absence of well-written situational comedy, how much should we really expect the players to compensate? On the plus side, there’s a cool soundtrack full of 80s songs and Hader’s funny when he accidentally gets shrapnel in his eye. With Will Arnett and Chris Parnell.