Observe and Report (2009) Review

"You didn't bring enough pigs to hurt me."

-Ronnie Barnhardt

Ronnie Barnhardt (Seth Rogen) is the head of security at a shopping mall.  He's emotionally unstable with extremely violent tendencies.  Ronnie is determined to catch a serial flasher, stop a mysterious thief who seems to know everything about the mall's security, and date Brandi (Anna Paris), who works at a department store makeup counter, but Detective Harrison (Ray Liotta) is getting in Ronnie's way at every turn and he is getting fed up.

What Works:

I used to work as a security officer at a shopping mall, so watching this movie gave me some flashbacks.  There are a few brilliant moments in this film that only someone who worked at a mall could really appreciate.  There is a montage sequence that opens the film that shows the various types of people you see at a shopping mall.  This was way too real for me, but I enjoyed it.

Seth Rogen is extremely committed to the insanity of Ronnie Burnhardt.  While he isn't a likable character, he is at least interesting and funny.  It's a different role for Rogen, but he does a great job.

This film has extremely absurd and insane violence.  Ronnie talks a big game throughout the film, but he backs up his words with some badass fighting ability.  We same him take down drug dealers, skateboarders, and hold his own against an army of cops.  It's insane, over-the-top, and a lot of fun.

Finally, the 3rd act chase between Ronnie and the flasher (Randy Gambill) is very well done.  We get a ton of full frontal that nobody needed to see, but it makes the sequence very memorable.  It's a well shot sequence of Ronnie chasing the flasher through the mall and it ends brilliantly.  It's my favorite part of the film and a solid ending.

What Sucks:

It's hard to root for anyone is this film as nobody besides Nell (Collette Wolfe) is remotely likable.  Ronnie is someone I wanted to see fail because he is such an unlikable person.  I really wish we had another main character to latch on to and root for, but that isn't the case.

It also feels like we're missing a few scenes of character development.  None of the supporting characters besides Nell are well developed.  They are mostly hollow characters which is very disappointing.  There are a lot potentially fun characters here that didn't get enough to do.  The two biggest examples are the mall manager, Mark (Dan Backedahl), and security officer, Charles (Jesse Plemons).  Both of them have a big character moments where they choose to side with Ronnie, but neither of them are developed enough for those choices to make sense.

Aziz Ansari has a small role in this film as a pervy salesmen, but his scenes with Rogen don't work.  There is one brutally long scene with the two of them swearing at each other.  It isn't funny at all and it's painful to sit through.

Finally, I wish this film had done more with the location of the shopping mall rather than focusing so much on Ronnie's desire to be a cop and his love life.  There is so much to do with a shopping mall and this movie had a ton of potential, but I think a lot of it goes unrealized.

Verdict:

Observe and Report is a mildly entertaining movie with some decent action, a good performance from Seth Rogen, and an excellent 3rd act, but the movie suffers from unlikable and underdeveloped characters and wastes a lot of its potential by not doing as much with its setting as it could have.

 6/10: Okay