Review: Zoolander

It’s a one-joke movie, but a funny one nonetheless.

Zoolander
Photo: Paramount Pictures

This season’s Saturday Night Live may be sans late-night goddesses Molly Shannon and Cheri Oteri, but Zoolander is proof positive that Will Ferrell is still the show’s greatest asset. Although Ben Stiller’s newest isn’t as gut-busting as a Mad TV sketch, it’s a wickedly absurd jab at the male modeling profession: Think of it as VH1 meets Austin Powers meets SNL—never offensive, instantly forgettable, but deliriously fun. Fashion designer Jacobim Mugatu (Ferrell) spearheads an attack against the Malaysian prime minister by brainwashing supermodel Derek Zoolander (Stiller), famous for his “Blue Steel” look (uncannily similar to Sarah Jessica Parker’s Sex and the City mugshots). Male models are at the center of the world’s most famous assassinations; from Lincoln’s anti-slavery stance to Kennedy’s Cuban embargo, every political action seems to place a direct burden on fashion’s trendy strongholds. Indeed, Zoolander paints a pointed picture of the modeling industry as a ludicrously self-contained unit. Inter-personal strife is taken to the underground, where strutting competitions aren’t unlike Mexican cockfights. With the aide of Time reporter Matilda Jeffries (Christine Taylor) and an ex-hand model (a scruffy David Duchovny), Zoolander and fellow model Hansel (Owen Wilson) bring down Mugatu and his evil bitch-mate Katinka (a devilishly delectable Milla Jovovich—yes, we want to eat her). Mugatu’s brainwashing video is so preposterously wacky that it sticks out like a sore thumb (much like Reese Witherspoon’s application video from Legally Blonde) in an otherwise hit-or-miss comic landscape. Yes, male models are idiots (three of them accidentally kill themselves in one of the film’s finer moments). It’s a one-joke movie, but a funny one nonetheless.

Score: 
 Cast: Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson, Will Ferrell, Milla Jovovich, David Duchovny, Jerry Stiller, Christine Taylor  Director: Ben Stiller  Screenwriter: Ben Stiller  Distributor: Paramount Pictures  Running Time: 95 min  Rating: PG-13  Year: 2001  Buy: Video, Soundtrack

Ed Gonzalez

Ed Gonzalez is the co-founder of Slant Magazine. A member of the New York Film Critics Circle, his writing has appeared in The Village Voice, The Los Angeles Times, and other publications.

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