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Blue Collar Comedy Tour is exactly what the title would suggest, and answers the long-asked question: What do you get when you put Jeff Foxworthy, Bill Engvall, Ron White, and Larry The Cable Guy on tour for a year and, against all reason, film it for future viewing by human beings? The answer: Exactly what you paid for. Make no bones about it — for sheer, overwhelming dumbness, this is going to be the one to drop your $9.50 on, assuming you're into sheer, overwhelming dumbness. The only other reason I could imagine paying the $9.50 would be if youd been to see the Comedy Tour live, fell asleep in your seat, lost your keys when they fell out of your pocket, and you now want to see the film solely for the audience pans, in the hopes of spotting them under a seat. Our trailer opens with a surprisingly apt warning: "The following trailer contains four men in scenes that may cause audience members varying degrees of discomfort and embarrassment." I don't doubt this for a second. The warning then goes on to clarify, to my mind unnecessarily: "...especially if you're a redneck." In my opinion, "...especially if you have values and a semblance of taste and aren't a horrible person" seems a little closer to the mark. Then some good ollllll' shitkickin' music a-thumps on in, and, as the warning predicted, four men are shown in scenes that are embarrassing and uncomfortable for all concerned, whatever the color of your neck or collar might be. We are shown Foxworthy and company — that's company with a "K", as my old pal Jeff might jokingly and self-effacingly have put it, were he here and had I not already killed him — lined up across the stage in a manner demonstrating their power and command of the audience, as if to suggest that the presence of these four comedic talents is such a rare and momentous event, its only equivalent would be found in astrology when all the planets, the sun, and both the Voyager satellites are in alignment. Striding across the theater stage like the Colossuses of comedy they assuredly think they are, the crew — that's crew with a "K", mind you — take turns throwing out their abominable stand-up routines to uprorious and wholly undeserved laughter. Here are some of the unique and informed takes on Southern life you'll hear in the trailer, mingled in between foot stomps and people killing themselves laughing: "If you ever stared at a can of orange juice because it said concentrate…you might be a redneck." "I had the right to remain silent, but I didn't have the ability." "Dreamt I drunk the world's largest margarita. Woke up, there was salt on the toilet. Thank God I didn't eat the worm." "The new slogan is 'Diamonds: Render her speechless.' Why don't they go ahead and say it? 'Diamonds: That'll shut her up.'"
You'll notice I have so far not bothered to distinguish between any of the four comedians. I will not do them that justice, since they are all essentially sharing the same act. Besides, the only way to tell them apart is through careful examination of their dress, which runs the spectrum from tasteful suits to outfits lifted straight from the costume trunk used in Deliverance. One comic does his entire act wearing a cap and fishing vest, and may or may not even be wearing shoes. Not to be outdone, Jeff Foxworthy appears in shirtless overalls, with a corncob pipe in his mouth, carrying a tractor on his back. I must also note that the makers of this picture do themselves an injustice by showcasing only Southern working-class comics. They could really broaden their appeal by including ignorant, pandering comics from other cities, like Boston, New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Each region of the nation offers its own brand of stereotypes, third rate premises and fourth rate punch lines, after all. An example of humor they could have used from Maine: "Isn't it funny the way people from the city talk fast? And how they all have cell phones and AIDS? I wonder what a city man with soft hands who's never done an honest day's work in his life would look like if he tried to scale a fish. I think it would go a little something... like this…" It's debatable whether or not this movie was made because the parties involved saw how well Spike Lee's The Original Kings of Comedy did and wanted some of the action, or if the Blue Collar Comedy Tour was instead made as some sort of blasting retort to Kings, letting them know in no uncertain terms who the dumbest, loudest four road comics in America really are. If this is the case, they strike a near deathblow. Here are four Southern white guys with no salient opinions on any meaningful topics, jes' insultin' and a-panderin' to the lowest common denominator from the moment they open their mouths — but NOT four urban black guys with no salient opinions on any meaningful topics, who create the illusion of thought by playing the ever applicable race card, even when talking about things as innocuous as hang gliding or quiche. Though Blue Collar — and that's blue with a "K", mind you — can't rightly be called a "film," or a "movie," or say, "watchable," it is in fact about 90 minutes long and features at least one name familiar to most people, making it to our American eyes, "close enough, I suppose." And oddly, many times the worst movies have the most effective trailers. It's pandering to morons, certainly — the only problem might be that these are the same morons who went and saw the tour live. Still, the makers of Blue Collar probably know that anyone willing to sit through a ninety-minute Jeff Foxworthy routine is most likely up for sitting through another ninety-minute Jeff Foxworthy routine. And the trailer, for its part, reminds these same people that, very soon, they will be able to wedge their enormous asses into a theater seat to do just that. So, with much grimacing and not just a few winces, I award Blue Collar Comedy Tour the highest rating I have ever given and ever hope to give. I award to thee, Southern stereotypes, 5 Billy Crystals. Now let's go kill
us up a big ol' pile of Jew bankers! Yeeeeehaw! (fires gun in air;
across room; eventually, despondently, at self)
RATING:
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Live
from the Extra Chromosome Theater in downtown Ignants, Mississipppi,
it's the reason white people are hated around the world! Ladies and
gentlemen, put your hands together in a show of manual dexterity you
may or may not be capable of for…The Blue Collar Comedy Tour!
And
oh, the hootin' and a-hollerin' and a-foot-stompin' and a-stupidin'
that the audience doles out to these guys. Now, keep in mind that these
are only the lines I heard that are actually structured in a vaguely
joke-like manner. The rest of the act seems to be composed entirely
of observations that play off of some of the many facets of stereotyped
Southern folk — which are, in this order of importance: trailer
life, wives or sisters what be always preg'nt, basic redneck stupidity,
and, of course, misogyny.