Release date: 3/20/09 (Limited)
The Great Buck Howard, written and directed by Sean McGinly, is a comedy about a young man unhappy with his life, who starts a new job for a washed up mentalist named Buck Howard, who was famous for being on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson 61 times. It is a funny comedy for a story that is somewhat original, and has a great performance by the great John Malkovich which is the only reason why the story works so well.
Troy Gable (Colin Hanks), a recent law school dropout in Los Angeles, is searching for a job when he comes across a personal assistant position advertised in the local paper. He meets and is struck by the Great Buck Howard (John Malkovitch), a has-been mentalist/magician. Although skeptical of Buck, Troy is convinced the job will be an exciting change from his ordinarily dull life and goes on the road with Buck playing for half-empty houses in small towns and cities across the country. One night Troy’s father (Tom Hanks) appears, angry to find his son – who he thought was still in law school – is working as Buck’s personal slave. Troy, who is almost ready to call it quits, decides to stick it out a while longer because Buck has a “spectacular” trick planned that will guarantee his long-awaited comeback. The big event is planned for Cincinnati and Buck hires a big New York PR firm to handle it. Buck is upset when, instead of sending the top publicist he was expecting, the firm sends junior publicist Valerie (Emily Blunt). Although Buck is unimpressed by Valerie, Valerie and Troy hit it off.
The story is well written and I connected with Troy’s character right from the beginning. Colin Hanks gets the job done with his performance but there is nothing special to it. I almost wish he showed a little more emotion throughout and maybe by the end we could really feel for him as the audience. Instead the story feels like it’s missing something. What makes this story amusing and very entertaining to watch is John Malkovich. His character ‘The Great Buck Howard’ is ridiculous, with his unnecessarily strong handshakes and his loud one-liners “I love this town”. Malkovich really shows that he is a great actor who can pull of any type of role, along with Burn After Reading from last year; Malkovich puts in another ridiculously funny character into his resume.
I also really enjoyed the performance by Emily Blunt. There is something about her that is just very attractive, and that is always a good sign of a star in the making. I’m excited to see what she has to offer in the upcoming film Sunshine Cleaning. Then there was a cameo by Steve Zahn who played a deranged fan. He was really funny at parts, but also had a very emotional scene with Colin Hanks, which was nice to see. It was a solid performance by an underrated actor. The cameo by Tom Hanks playing his son Colin Hanks’ character’s father was really cool to watch, but you can’t help but to realize that Colin Hanks will never get out of his dad’s shadow. Tom doesn’t do as many movies as he use to and it was nice to see him put in a small role for this film.
Overall The Great Buck Howard was not bad, but it was missing something that would make it great. I’m not sure if it’s the performance by Colin Hanks, but I definitely would need to see it again to try and figure it out. John Malkovich and Tom Hank’s cameo are the performances that stand out. Colin Hanks and Emily Blunt hold their own, and the story of The Great Buck Howard is one that you should check out.
IMDB: 8.0/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 87%
Moviewiseguys: 7.0/10