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Arts & Life
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- Written by: Tim Riley
THE BROTHERS GRIMSBY (Rated R)
No boundaries are apparently the operative words to describe the anarchic comedy of satirist Sacha Baron Cohen.
He’s jumped from faux-streetwise hip-hop personality-turned-talk show host Ali G to Kazakhstani journalist Borat on his first visit to America and to fame-seeking Austrian fashion icon Bruno.
Along the way, Baron Cohen has skewered a lot of targets, often to devastating effect. “The Brothers Grimsby” allows him to invent a wholly original creation, one that may have been inspired by spending too much time in a working class British pub during World Cup.
The Grimsby of the film’s title is a decaying seaport town that may have seen better days long ago. Now, it’s just a cesspool of rundown row houses and industrial rot, and fittingly, at least in the film, it is identified as the “Twin City of Chernobyl.”
Interesting to know (and you can Google this), the town of Grimsby has been frequently voted the worst city in which to live in Britain, according to some online websites and publications dedicated to revealing the underbelly of urban hellholes.
Baron Cohen’s Nobby Butcher, a lowlife subsisting on welfare, is a football hooligan fanatically devoted to the English national team.
He fits the stereotype of the booze-guzzling party animal when it comes to celebrating soccer matches with his pals at the local tavern.
Living with his plus-size girlfriend Dawn (Rebel Wilson), Nobby is a devoted family man given that he’s got nine (or maybe 11) kids, most of them looking like refugees from a punk rock band or candidates for reform school.
Nevertheless, the family is tight-knit, and Nobby has kept his long-missing younger brother’s childhood bedroom the way he left it 28 years ago when the brothers were separated after the death of their parents.
The more innocent humor comes from Nobby awkwardly carrying home a mattress on a city bus and from the names of his children, including Skeletor, Django Unchained, Tsunami and Gangnam Style. Luke gets his name from having a cancerous disease.
“The Brothers Grimsby” is a family reunion story, of sorts. Nobby stumbles upon the fact that his brother has returned to England and will be attending a special charity event to which he has somehow managed to get an invitation.
What Nobby does not realize is that his brother Sebastian (Mark Strong, playing the straight man) is a deep undercover MI6 agent on assignment to disrupt a terrorist plot.
Unfortunately, Nobby’s excitement at seeing his brother compromises the mission and results in tragedy.
Forced to go on the run, and being chased by deadly assassins, Nobby and Sebastian must use their wits to survive.
Of course, the problem is that Nobby is basically an idiot, so the challenge is for Sebastian to keep his older, clueless brother out of harm’s way.
The film’s plot, such as it is, puts the brothers in the crosshairs of the British government, which mistakenly believes that Sebastian is now a rogue agent, and at odds with a criminal cartel bent on a plot to release deadly toxins that are designed to reduce the world’s population to a more manageable and sustainable level.
Meanwhile, how does Penelope Cruz’s Rhonda George, the apparent target of an assassination attempt by shadowy forces, figure into overall plot given her leadership of World Cure, an international health organization that may or may not be the front for something sinister?
“The Brothers Grimsby” doesn’t much care about the details of coherent action, even though there are terrific sequences of the two brothers in shootouts and chase scenes that suddenly thrust Nobby into the realm of James Bond fantasyland heroics.
Mostly, the action, whether it involves the gritty streets and back alleys of England or the African plains, is just an excuse for Sacha Baron Cohen to dream up the most egregious scenarios for gross-out humor and bizarrely vulgar jokes.
There are things happening in this film that can’t be described or explained in proper company. Let’s just say there are some outlandish setups involving bodily fluids and body parts, both the humankind and those engaged by elephants during mating season.
The humor in “The Brothers Grimsby” is often mind-numbingly stupid and grotesque, but a lot of it very funny and you could find yourself feeling guilty or maybe even a bit ashamed for laughing.
As the brothers, Sacha Baron Cohen and Mark Strong have a great chemistry, with the latter, often irritably frustrated by his dimwitted sibling, nicely positioned as the comic foil. These brothers are indeed the yin and yang of comedy for “The Brothers Grimsby.”
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
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- Written by: Editor
Artists are invited to submit their original artwork to the 2016-2017 California Duck Stamp Art Contest.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) will accept submissions May 13 through June 13.
The contest is open to U.S. residents who are 18 years of age or older as of March 14, 2016. Entrants need not reside in California.
The winning artwork will be reproduced on the 2016-2017 California Duck Stamp. The top submissions will also be showcased at the Pacific Flyway Decoy Association's art show in July.
The artwork must depict the species selected by the California Fish and Game Commission, which for the 2016-2017 hunting season is the lesser snow goose.
The design is to be in full color and in the medium (or combination of mediums) of the artist's choosing, except that no photographic process, digital art, metallic paints or fluorescent paints may be used in the finished design.
Photographs, computer-generated art, art produced from a computer printer or other computer/mechanical output device (air brush method excepted) are not eligible to be entered into the contest and will be disqualified.
The design must be the contestant's original hand-drawn creation. The entry design may not be copied or duplicated from previously published art, including photographs, or from images in any format published on the Internet.
All entries must be accompanied by a completed participation agreement and entry form. These forms and the official rules are available online at www.wildlife.ca.gov/duck-stamp/contest .
Entries will be judged at a public event to be held in June. The judges' panel, which will consist of experts in the fields of ornithology, conservation, and art and printing, will choose first, second and third-place winners, and an honorable mention.
Since 1971, CDFW's annual contest has attracted top wildlife artists from around the country. All proceeds generated from stamp sales go directly to waterfowl conservation projects throughout California.
In past years, hunters were required to purchase and affix the stamp to their hunting license. Now California has moved to an automated licensing system and hunters are no longer required to carry the physical stamps in the field (proof of purchase prints directly onto the license).
However, CDFW will still produce the stamps, which can be requested online at www.wildlife.ca.gov/licensing/collector-stamps .
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- Written by: Editor
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The Lake Country Grand Jury is extending to next month the deadline for its art challenge for Lake County youth.
The grand jury is inviting young people ages 6 to 18 to submit their original artwork for inclusion in the 2015-16 grand jury report.
The grand jury publishes a written report every summer which is distributed to all departments in the county government and to the state archivist.
The artwork should express one or more of the following themes:
– The natural beauty of Lake County;
– Unique Lake County culture;
– Rebirth and renewal.
Winners will receive cash prizes: $200 for first place, $100 for second and $50 for places up to eighth.
To participate, submit a photo or a good copy of the original art that is packaged safely so it does not bend. Please do not submit original art work as they will not be able to return it.
Label the package “Grand jury artwork” and send it via the US Postal Service to Lake County Grand Jury, P.O. Box 1078, Kelseyville, 95451.
Digital files of the artwork – in JPG or PDF formats – also may be submitted to the grand jury at
All entries – whether hard copy or digital – must include the artist’s name, age, address, email address and phone number.
The deadline for entering is April 30.
If your artwork is chosen, the grand jury will contact you for further information.
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- Written by: Ted Kooser
In my limited experience, mothering and worrying go hand in hand. Here's a mother's worry poem by Richard Jarrette, from his fine book, A Hundred Million Years of Nectar Dances. He lives in California.
My Mother Worries About My Hat
Every spring my mother says I should buy a straw
hat so I won't overheat in summer.
I always agree but the valley's soon cold, and besides
my old Borsalino is nearly rain-proof.
She's at it again, it's August, the grapes are sugaring.
I say, Okay, and pluck a little spider from her hair—
hair so fine it can't hold even one of her grandmother's
tortoise shell combs.
American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. They do not accept unsolicited submissions. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2015 by Richard Jarrette, “My Mother Worries About My Hat,” from A Hundred Million Years of Nectar Dances, (Green Writers Press, 2015). Introduction copyright © 2016 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.
