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Internship, The (AF)

3/10

Stars: Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson, Rose Byrne, Max Minghella, Aasif Mandvi, Josh Brener, Dylan OÂ’Brien, Tobit Raphael, Tiya Sircar, Jessica Szohr, Will Ferrell, John Goodman

Director: Shawn Levy

Product placement appears to be taking over the movies.

Even James Bond has switched from his traditional martinis “shaken, not stirred” to swigging a product-placed beer in Skyfall while Morgan Spurlock served us the product placement picture to beat all others with his tongue in cheek (at least, I hope it was) tribute The Greatest Movie Ever Sold which overtly plugged more products than your average supermarket.

All of which is simply to say that the only sensible reason for this witless alleged comedy is that it was made to celebrate Google rather than entertain.
Google has to be its sole raison dÂ’ĂŞtre since it boasts fewer laughs than a botched amputation without an anaesthetic and simply exposes the inadequacies of the Wedding Crashers stars who, reunited after far too few years, are simply embarrassing as over-aged out of work watch salesmen who manage to wangle themselves coveted internships at Google where they are inevitably like rotting fish out of water among the young techno-nerd geniuses who are training for GoogledomÂ…

The only interesting thing about having to watch Wilson is trying to figure out how his nose got into its unique shape while Vaughan scores a triple tragedy as star, producer (with Shawn Levy) and, with Jared Stern who is unlikely to thank me for giving him a name check, co-writer of the largely laugh-free zoneÂ…

Rose Byrne tries hard as the romantic lead and a scad of supporting players (John Goodman sensibly appears and disappears in a flash) do their best – and largely fail – to overcome the screenplay or Shawn Levy’s largely leaden direction.

It’s one of those movies whose cheerfully out-of-context dialogue (OK, I admit it!) reviews it better than I can. “What the sh*t is this?”, Vaughan’s all too apt comment “Nothing seems to get better” and a lecturer’s remark “I don’t have time for this” sum up The Internship perfectly.

Google got their moneyÂ’s worth. ItÂ’s highly unlikely you will if youÂ’re looking for laughs.

Alan Frank

USA 2013. UK Distributor: 20th Century Fox. Colour by deluxe.
119 minutes. Not widescreen. UK certificate: 12A.

Guidance ratings (out of 3): Sex/nudity 0, Violence/Horror 0, Drugs 0, Swearing 2.

Review date: 07 Jul 2013