Waiting... (2005)

Very Cool!!!

Lack of good storyline.

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

Anyone reading this review is sufficiently familiar with the internet to understand the precision with which internet search engines can target potential customers. And the movie industry is well-aware of the built in audiences for its products: to wit, the success of the "Harry Potter," "Twilight," and "Lord of the Rings" franchises demonstrate the viability of the formula: Movie+cultural familiarity=An audience. The only variable is; is the culturally familiar audience large enough to make a movie profitable? By this formula, "Waiting" is enough of a sure thing to answer another question: Why was this movie commercially successful? "Waiting" is simultaneously an accurate (if, due to being overly-condensed, unrealistic) depiction of the life of food-service employees and a "warning shot" to the customers of this industry (aka: Everyone else). And while it succeeds at both of these, it fails to be funny, which I believe is its ultimate goal. Instead it focuses on food-service workers as under-achieving, low-brow and resentful people who should be feared for their for their emotional dysfunction and their capacity/position to appropriately handle the anger and frustration that are part of every work situation."Waiting" lacks wit, which I define as intelligent, insightful humor. It seeks to be a Kevin Smith film ("Clerks") but lacks the intelligence and wisdom of Kevin Smith. "Waiting" is gross and vulgar, even containing physical archetypes of Jay and Silent Bob, but is absent the self-awareness of Smith's characters."Waiting" serves adequately to warn restaurant guests that they are interacting with people. But that is not funny.

Not even Ryan Reynolds' humorous delivery could save this yawn fest. It was supposed to be funny, but it wasn't even "black comedy" neither did it have much to keep the viewer interested. Set in "Shenanigans" a typical American style restaurant, it covers 24hrs and the induction tour of the facility and training of one new member of staff. Monty (Reynolds) is responsible for the tour and fills the newbie in on all the silly goings on in the restaurant (mainly centered around a game the male staff play where they show each other their genitalia).As a film it is trying to say something about existential dilemmas of young people with more potential than their current lives offer them, but unfortunately I didn't care about any of the characters, and everyone was rather ridiculous. Dean (Justin Long) was the only vaguely sensible character, and the only character played in a real and recognisably genuine way but it all seemed fatuous and pointless. Whilst I didn't warm to any of the characters, nor the premise of the film, the actors were committed to their characters and the film itself was good in terms of dialogue and production, despite my not enjoying it. I can see how many people would consider it better than I did.There were amusing parts, but nothing laugh out loud for me, and I felt it would probably appeal more to student-stoner-male humour as many of the potential laughs were genital-based, so certainly not something for everyone. Many of the characters were horrible, but it did highlight how NOT to be in a restaurant. There was one despicable character (a woman diner) who you were pleased was treated to "extras" on her meal... remember to be nice to your wait-staff as they handle your food!

In sharp contrast to the majority of advocates for this movie, I can provide refutation to the idea of its esoteric appeal because I also have worked in my share of restaurants and found no pleasure in watching this sleaze. You don't have to have such experience to become easily nauseated by the superficial atmosphere of community and collectivism that is about as force-fed in this flick as a real dead end job. I will not bother to write much about this one because it simply doesn't deserve the attention, and aspire only to warn others to avoid it unless they happen to be a preteen or otherwise entirely devoid of taste. If it weren't for the competent editing and cinematography this movie would have scored absolutely no stars from me, but instead I give it two for the effort. In a nutshell, the funniest actors in this movie (Long, Faris) play straight roles that brink pretentious, and the wild card in Ryan Reynolds is under utilized by a typical typecast of being "the dick". And WHAT a dick he is. His character would be the sole source of WAITING's sexist undertones if the women characters weren't so poorly written. The plot is shallow, as expected, but is made worse by the futile effort to portray a seriously conflicted protagonist who juggles a mirage of "important" choices. The intended setpiece is a scene consisting of the restaurant staff collaborating to botch the dinner of some unruly customer in the least imaginative, yet most disgusting way possible. Yes, the sole source of amusement in this movie is gross-out humor, placing it in the category of the lowest form of entertainment there is besides pornography.

Having devoted years of my life to customer service, I thought this might be a funny anecdote and a prelude and homage to the poor schlep just trying to etch out a living by putting up with difficult people.Instead I was sadly disappointed at what seemed to be little more than bathroom, sex and genitalia jokes that dominated the movie and culminated into moments of "who cares?" and it makes no sense. If you could imagine filming grade school aged boys in the privacy of their own thoughts and circles of friends, then you might get a similar result to any given moment of "waiting". If you worship Beavis and Butthead to the point of enacting their every move and mindset, you'll enjoy "waiting."The thing is, everyone in this cast i've seen in other movies and enjoyed, it's not that there's no talent, I don't blame the actors, what a genuine shame at a waste of everyone's time and talent. I'm not even sure who to pinpoint the blame on. There's nothing funny, amusing, or thought provoking, about "waiting". There's nothing funny about the "game" played amongst the male staff, messing with food, bathroom sex, nervous urinating, crude discussions, nothing. In fact the only sympathetic or relate-able character in the whole movie is Mitch, who seems to escape the charade of stupid and genuinely acts like a real human being. The rest of the overtired, clichéd one dimensional staff are so unlikable that it's impossible to feel empathy towards them when they have horrible customers.I'm giving a generous 1 star, for the cast who I felt sorry for, and for the story thats suckitude is legendary.