Fist Fight
Dustin Chase
This is not the first film to make jokes at the expense of the problematic American school system. It offers no political commentary or insights after all the derogatory representation. Instead, Fist Fight makes light of all the infections that plague our public schools. Guidance counselors doing meth, students dealing drugs, and teachers behaving as badly as the students in a variety of circumstances. As I tolerated the bad jokes and predictable plot, I tried to think of the last film that realistically explored the public-school system and I couldn’t come up with anything other than Dangerous Minds (1995), Music of the Heart (1999) and School of Rock (2003). Fist Fight is the worst film Ice Cube (Ride Along) has been a part of, and that’s saying a lot when you look at his filmography. Charlie Day (Horrible Bosses 2) matches the unpleasantness and low brow performances of comedian Kevin James.
Andy Campbell (Day) has a lot to contend with on the last day of the school year. He is the nice English teacher that students run over because of his mild temperament. Upon arrival to the school, he realizes that the senior school pranks have gotten out of hand and the entire facility is under siege. To make matters worse, the superintendent is cutting faculty and his wife is ready to have their baby any minute. Opposite of Campbell, is history teacher Ron Strickland (Cube), the most feared teacher in the school. The two teachers have a misunderstanding, and Strickland challenges Campbell to a parking lot brawl after 3pm. The news of the fight quickly spreads throughout the student body as Campbell tries to make peace.
Charlie Day matches the unpleasantness and low brow performances of comedian Kevin James.
It’s one thing to poke fun and have a raunchy comedy, it’s quite another to advocate and glorify bad behavior. Fist Fight is the most reprehensible film you will see in the first quarter of 2017. It’s without any sense of merit, from script to performance, nothing in this film directed by Richie Keen, a television director, is worth a conversation or afterthought. Any respectable filmmaker would have refused a script this bad, a project this vile or a role this pathetic. The writers, director and actors are not artists here, they are sellouts; contributors to cinematic garbage.
If there is a silver lining in Fist Fight, it the short running time of 90 minutes. That’s it, nothing else is entertaining, funny, or memorable. Christina Hendricks continues to insert herself in the worst movies following Bad Santa 2 and Zoolander 2. Jillian Bell (Jump Street 22, Office Christmas Party), no stranger to lecherous material, takes on the brunt of the vulgarity. When you start looking at the actors, producers and directors previous work, you start noticing that it’s the same people involved in all the bad comedies.
Final Thought
Fist Fight will be hard to top when it comes to the years worst film. Grade F