Get Him to the Greek

In Get Him to the Greek, Russell Brand gets his first crack at a leading role in a Hollywood movie.

He plays Aldous Snow, a strutting, singing, drug-snorting personification of British rock-star clichés, who previously enjoyed a strut-on part in 2008’s Forgetting Sarah Marshall. In many ways Snow is a thinly veiled version of Brand’s own persona, but the character really harks back to the British rock-gods of old.

Joining him is live-action Cartman, sorry Jonah Hill, playing Aaron Green, a young idealistic label lackey, who happens upon the idea of reviving Snow’s career, which has since faltered thanks to his ill-advised attempt at a worthy single, the cringe-bringing ‘African Child’.

The plot is simple enough. Green has seventy-two hours to get Snow from London to the Greek Theatre in LA. What follows is a drink and drug fuelled odyssey, which sees Green attempt to help Snow pick through the wreckage of his life and career.

Perhaps the laughs aren’t quite as thick-on-the-ground as they should be, but the film surely does have a heart and Brand really demonstrates that there is more to him than gimmickry, as he weaves a portrayal that is as charismatic in its excess as it is moving in its pathos.

Hill also does a good job, coming across as amiable and likeable, while serving as a solid straight-man to Brand.

Rose Byrne puts in a good turn playing Snow’s vapid ex-squeeze, Jackie Q, which is quite an atypical role for her. Colm Meaney is nicely slimy as Snow’s father, but stealing the most limelight is Sean ‘Puffy’ Combs as the head of the record company.

I find that Combs’s turn reminds me a little of Tom Cruise in Tropic Thunder. It’s an unexpected cameo and should be the funniest role on screen. However, Combs, like Cruise, seems to really lack a sense of the comedic and instead plays the role with savage intensity. While amusing, the result often comes across more demented than funny.

Get Him to the Greek is good fun and well worth a watch, but can’t quite live up to rock-parody classics like Spinal Tap.

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