Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World

Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World
Studio: Warner Independent Pictures
Rated: PG-13
Website: http://wip.warnerbros.com/lookingforcomedy/LFC_content.html
Release Date: 2006-01-27
Cast: Albert Brooks, Sheetal Sheth, Jon Tenney, Fred Dalton Thompson, John Carroll Lynch
Director: Albert Brooks
Screenwriter: Albert Brooks
WorkNameSort: Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World
Our Rating: 1.50

Before you buy the PR line that Albert Brooks’ post-Sept. 11 mission of mercy got the distribution runaround for political reasons, you might just want to see the thing first. What starts out as a typically wry Brooks picture – with the C-list star dispatched by our government to find out what makes Muslims laugh – hurtles headlong into stultifying triviality. Allah knows why Brooks chose to fixate on all the wrong issues (will our hero be able to write the 500-page report he’s been assigned?) and wipe his nose with the right ones (like, what do Muslims really think and feel, anyway?) It’s an ego trip wrapped in a Jerry Lewis movie, except that Lewis might have remembered to make it funny in a few places. To wit: Having Brooks perform a dud of a stand-up routine before an audience of unimpressed Indians would only be a boffo idea if we didn’t have to endure it, too.

This article appears in Jan 25-31, 2006.