Fanboys (2009)

“What if the movie sucks?”

Fanboys takes us into the wild world of a group of hardcore Star Wars “fanboys” who are intent on helping their dying friend see a rough cut of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace before he passes away. In order to do this, the group has to navigate cross-country to Skywalker Ranch, George Lucas’ working film ranch. As with any road comedy film, the gang encounters a number of interesting groups and individuals and get themselves into crazy situations. The film was released in 2009 and seems to have become something of a divisive film due to its troubled production and attachment to people like Harvey Weinstein, Harry Knowles, and Kevin Spacey, all of whom have been accused of and/or found guilty of multiple sexual offenses.

While I won’t go in-depth on the film’s production troubles, I will say that it faced quite the uphill climb to get released. Weinstein demanded re-shoots to add raunchier scenes and demanded that the film’s cancer subplot be removed. The director of the original cut of the film, Kyle Newman, as well as fans of Star Wars, fought to keep the cancer subplot in the film and Weinstein and re-shoots director Steven Brill ultimately caved. As a result of the chopped up nature of the final cut of the movie, its pacing and humor suffer.

Troubles aside, the film is still pretty funny. It features a ton of cameos from across pop culture, and a few from the Star Wars franchise itself. Seth Rogen pulls triple duty as a Star Trek fan named Admiral Seasholtz, a Star Trek Convention guard referred to as Alien, and a massive Star Wars fan….who happens to also be a pimp, named Roach. Other cameos include Kevin Smith, Carrie Fisher, Billy Dee Williams, Ray Park, Ethan Suplee, Jaime King, and Danny McBride, among others. I don’t won’t to reveal the biggest cameo of them all, just know that it’s a funny surprise.

The film’s main cast includes Dan Fogler, Jay Baruchel, Kristen Bell, Sam Huntington, and Chris Marquette. Other cast members include Christopher McDonald, David Denman, and Allie Grant. Fogler does a pretty good job as Hutch in the film, whipping out quote after quote from the Star Wars films. Baruchel is funny as the socially awkward Windows, who is looking for love online and excited to find out that he’ll be meeting his online girlfriend, Rogue Leader, on the cross country trip. Bell steals most of the scenes that she is in as Zoe, and is a perfect mimic of Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia in the original trilogy. Huntington is essentially the straight man of the group, Eric, and Marquette rounds the gang out Linus, the terminally ill fanboy who is the entire reason for the group’s roadtrip.

I enjoyed Fanboys. Of course, I love Star Wars (and Star Trek) and love it when both franchises are the targets of some good-natured humor. The film might fall a little flat with folks that have no interest or happen to be unfamiliar with Star Wars, however, and in that case, it’s nothing more than an average road comedy. Oh, and I’m sure a ton of red-blooded Star Wars fans tuned into this film only to see Kristen Bell in the Slave Leia costume so…..here ya go:

Thanks for checking out my review. May the Force be with you!