The Interview (2015)

When Evan Goldberg, Seth Rogen and Dan Sterling started writing the story for The Interview, they probably knew that it was going to receive some form of backlash, but clearly they didn’t quite expect it to go on to be cancelled from cinematic release almost entirely. With a plot (spoilers) that features the explosive death of North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un it has gone on to become the focus of a targeted campaign by a hacker group that the FBI believe to be linked to the North Korean government to shut it down, but have they just managed to bring even more attention to the comedy adventure in the process?

From our point of view, that’s definitely been the case and while the group has been successful in forcing Sony to can the release, they’ve also forced the world to take notice of The Interview much more than they would have done had it just been ignored. The reality is that it’s turned into an international condition of inadvertent reverse psychology in which the world has been told that they can’t see the film, resulting in them wanting to see it even more than ever.

Attack threats

The cyber attacks themselves took place on the 24th November 2014, as the group, calling themselves Guardians of Peace, managed to obtain large swathes of information, data and media from Sony Pictures Entertainment, including emails, salary details and unreleased Sony films. Things didn’t end there though, as the group demanded that the release be dropped and they went on to threaten the cinemas scheduled to show the movie, which has resulted in Sony officially cancelling the movie’s release at the big screen.

However, what North Korean officials have failed to understand is that the satirical content of the film says as much about the state of US politics as it does about their own, and in all fairness neither have been shining beacons of hope over the last fifty years or more. The problem is that there’s clearly not enough sophistication within the thought process behind the attack to be able to see beyond the need to desperately respond in a bid to appear to have strength, leaving them looking flimsier than ever.

Although, to make matters even more bizarre, it’s not entirely impossible that the attack and threats are nothing to do with North Korea whatsoever, which is in fact what officials there are claiming. They’ve even gone so far as to suggest a collaboration with the US in a bid to hunt down the group behind the attack and clear their erstwhile good name, but this was qualified by an ultimatum threatening grave consequences if the US didn’t take them up on the offer.

It amounts to something similar to Kim Jong-un calling for Barrack Obama at the front door of the White House and asking his parents if he can come out to play, only to qualify it by adding that there would be a dirty protest if they do not relent.

If it’s not them, though (and it’s probably them), then who could be behind the attack, and why were they so determined not to see the film reach the light of day? Maybe we’ll never know for sure, but one thing is for certain; The Interview will go on to be seen by millions of people eventually and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. We’ve already seen at least one of the more inflammatory scenes from the film and was always just a matter of time before we saw the rest.

Release date

As you’ve read above, the cinematic release date for the film has been officially cancelled by Sony as of the 17th December 2014. While it subsequently stated that it will press ahead with a release through other media, no date had been officially confirmed. However, the situation developed further on the 23rd December 2014 when it was announced that the film would be shown in some independent US cinemas on Christmas Day after all, but for the UK and the rest of the world we had to wait and see.

The situation may appear to be pretty dire for Colombia Pictures, its parent company Sony and everyone involved in the production of the film but the reality is that all the attention the film is getting will probably go on to be seen as marketing gold. However people manage to watch The Interview, it will be more popular as a result of the attack and as The Life Of Brian taught us, “he’s not the messiah, he’s a very naughty boy”.

The film was subsequently released on DVD, Blu-ray and digital download in the US on the 17th February 2015 and it went on to do the same in the UK on the 8th June that same year.

Storyline

The story sees trash journalist, David Skylark, pulling off the unlikely interview coup of the century as he manages to secure a face-to-face with Kim Jong-un with the help of his producer Aaron. It soon becomes clear that they’ve bitten off more than they can chew when they’re subsequently approached by the CIA to assassinate the leader of North Korea. This leads to a darkly satirical comic adventure that criticises the political isolation that the country has built up, the god-like power image that Kim Jong-un has in the eyes of his people and the excesses of American political intervention.

Cast

James Franco (Your Highness) and Seth Rogan (This Is The End) return to action together as Dave and Aaron following on from the success of Pinapple Express. They’re added to by Lizzy Caplan (Cloverfield) who worked with Franco previously on 127 Hours, Randall Park who puts in a pretty life-like performance as Kim Jong-un and Diana Bang plays Kim’s head of propaganda Sook-yin Park.

Production

The Interview has been written by Dan Sterling, with help on the storyline front from the movie’s directors Seth Rogan and Evan Goldberg. It was, eventually, distributed by Columbia Pictures as soon as it’s parent company, Sony, could get things in place to start shipping, which has eventually found a general release through DVD, Blu-ray or digital download.

Review

From the look of the trailer below, this was always going to be much more of a silly comedy than a darkly genius satire, despite the fact that it’s managed to rattle a fair few cages. Whoever is behind the attack should probably have realised that there’s no serious content included and that it’s literally a load of daft jokes with a little prod of criticism at North Korea and the US.

If it hadn’t been for the hack and subsequent threats we may not have even paid the film all that much attention, but as a result of the controversy it’s suddenly become a whole lot more engaging, despite the fact that the trailer hardly mustered much in the way of laughs from us. If we had to say who the real winners are in the situation, we’d have to say Sony, Columbia Pictures and the guys behind the development of the film, because it’s going to make a whole lot more money in the long run as a result of all the international drama.

If it turns out that the group behind the whole thing is in fact affiliated in some way to North Korea, we can only hope that it’s as a result of a wicked sense of humour on the part of Kim Jong-un. However, if it is more to do with a genuine sentiment that the film constitutes some form of American attack then they should probably watch the first episode of Black Mirror to see what real dark comedy is and recognise that it’s not just North Korean politics that can come under the glare of the cracked screen.

The Interview manages to pull off a lot of laughs in the end, with much better jokes than the trailer led us to believe. James Franco steals the show a little with one of his best comedy performances. Read our full review for more details.

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