30 Minutes Or Less

Like his calling card Zombieland, director Ruben Fleischer’s latest film is short on running time, high on quotable dialogue, well acted, but still unlikely to demand repeat viewings. You’ll still get plenty of enjoyment out of your one watch though. Fleischer has the knack for getting right into the meat of the story as soon as possible and though this means his characters have little back story, the films move along at an enjoyably breezy pace. 30 Minutes or Less stars Jesse Eisenberg as a pizza delivery boy who, after being kidnapped by drop outs Danny McBride and Nick Swardson, has a bomb strapped to him which will only be defused once Eisenberg has stolen $100,000 for them. Enlisting the help of his best friend (Aziz Ansari), they plan to rob a bank and we’re off on 80 minutes of nonthreatening mayhem. Though we mainly concentrate on Eisenberg and Ansari, giving the impression that this is a buddy movie, it’s actually a buddies movie as we flick between Eisenberg and Ansari and McBride and Swardson. The banter between both couples provides some decent laughs and some surprisingly tender moments. McBride is the best he’s been for a long time here. He still has the curse of saying a four letter word whenever he wants a laugh, but in this, whilst still playing a bit of a slob, he’s actually the brains of the outfit and a much more believable character than the usual dumb persona’s he portrays. Eisenberg is fine as you’d expect (he can already do this slacker with smarts shtick in his sleep) and though Ansari may be a bit of an acquired taste for some with his high pitch moaning voice, he delivers the necessary here as Eisenberg’s increasingly exasperated mate (and speaking of exasperated Michael Pena also does well in a cameo as a confused hit man). In terms of content, the film is basically just a series of set pieces added together with most of them nicely handled by Fleischer. The problems come in between where the screenplay is too light and, despite a high number of zingers, ideas are jettisoned in favour of unimaginative verbal filth. However, despite the swear words (believe me there are a lot), the charm still shines through thanks to decent performances from all and Fleischer’s let’s not hang around direction.

The OC Film Sting Final Verdict

Crude, silly and fun, but the title is a perfect description for how long you’ll remember this for. Rating: 7/10.