Is your boss a slave-driving mad man? Overly sexual and less than ethical? How about an outright sleaze? According to Warner Brother’s summer hit ‘Horrible Bosses’, more often than not the blue collar workers of the world have at least one of the three writing their paycheck.

Friends Nick (Jason Bateman), Kurt (Jason Sudeikis) and Dale (Charlie Day) live ordinary and uneventful lives, with the exception of their extraordinarily intolerable bosses. The three dutifully work and contribute to society while suffering the orders of professional bullies, sexually aggressive dentists and ignorant superiors. While many average citizens feel that their bosses have no real purpose to their existence, these three friends decide over beer and bar food that they have been driven to the edge and must kill each others bosses. Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston and Colin Farrell are the head honcho menaces stripping our three protagonists of their sanity and happiness, one day at a time. Dave (Spacey) corporate pressures Nick into Scotch chugging—at 8:15 am. Julia (Aniston) repeatedly fondles unconscious patients as well as Dale, Bobby (Farrell) constantly discriminates against the overweight and handicapped while putting Kurt in the middle. Turning in their two weeks notice is not an option for the gang, so instead they venture into the shady world of suburban homicide. There they meet Jamie Foxx as Motherfucker Jones, who mentors the harmless middle class citizens looking to pull off the perfect crime with absolutely no weapons, no training, no clue.

Packed with crude and sexual content, which is in large part thanks to Aniston’s man eating role as Dale’s dentist boss, this R rated comedy stands to prove it’s a bit spicier than what viewers usually encounter. Director Seth Gordon, who’s other movies include, “Four Christmases” and “The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters”, said that there is, “No redeeming message” to the movie, rather that it is,”just for laughing and laughing hard.”

So, why should we?

With an all star cast of established favorites and again, Jamie Foxx playing a character named Motherfucker Jones, the simplicity of the initial premise provides something that all viewers can relate to and few hopefully have had the chance to live out. With the plan of killing each others bosses and attempting to make it look like an accident, the successful outcome of all three murders is anyone’s guess. However, while Horrible Bosses has the disgruntled and poorly treated workers of the world go up against the few which hold all of the power, they are still merely blue collar workers, making their means of espionage counterproductive mayhem.

Here in lies the promise of the movie and why it is worth seeing amidst a sea of many comedies which all, frankly, have no redeeming message. If it can give us the laughs we want but provide them through plot development instead of a completely typical ending, then why not enjoy it for enjoyments sake? Do we want to see a successful stake out, or the gang settle in for a day of surveillance only to realize come nightfall that no one checked to see if anyone was actually home? Would we like the murders to just be taken care of in suave and technologically savvy manner or watch as Dale hands Spacey a peanut butter sandwich which he has a deathly allergic reaction to—only to have Dale stab him with an EpiPen and save his life? We want to see this story play out because the truth is that there are a lot of bad bosses out there, and we want to see our own beer and bar food loving doppleganger employees win.

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About the author

Margaret Gerber

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