The Internship
Now playing at Scotiabank
Bing must be pissed.
The Internship is not just a movie, it's free advertising: a two-hour homage to Google, showcasing the company and its ethos as a tech pioneer, workplace utopia, and champion of the underdog.
The underdogs in question are Billy (Vince Vaughn) and Nick (Owen Wilson), watch salesmen, who - not unlike film critics - are a dying breed. After a hilarious sales pitch with a would-be vendor, the guys learn that their company has folded. The men are a little behind the times, technology wise: "People have a deep mistrust of machines," Billy insists. "Haven't you seen Terminator?"
Nick reluctantly takes a job at a mattress store managed by his sister's pervy boyfriend (Will Ferrell, in the film's best cameo). But while looking for sales jobs online, Billy gets the genius idea to google Google and learns of their summer internship program. Seduced by nap pods and free food at the cafeteria, the boys discombobulate the interviewers just enough to land spots in the program.
The pair journey to Google's cartoon campus, a world of cars that drive themselves and communal, multi-coloured bicycles. They are ancients among the ivy league-educated intern hopefuls, who look like 12-year-olds. Nick and Billy find themselves last in a schoolyard pick of teams that will compete against each other over the summer. It's like a really nerdy summer camp. Or, as Nick puts it, "A mental Hunger Games."
The teams compete in challenges ranging from program de-bugging and helpline assistance to a Harry Potter-style quidditch match. After insuring that their teammates are indeed 21, the boys give them an alcohol-soaked lesson in letting go. Team bonding ensues after cliches and metaphors aplenty, and "life lessons buried under obscure '80s references."
All the elements are here: there's the snotty villain (Max Minghella), the Bad News Bears motley crew (Tiya Sircar, Dylan O'Brien, Tobit Raphael), the malevolent boss (The Daily Show's Aasif Mandvi) and the comely exec in need of taking off her glasses and letting her hair down (Rose Byrne).
Shawn Levy (Real Steel, Date Night) directs while Vaughn gets credit for the story, half the writing and producing, and works the nonsense in his trademark rapid-fire style.
The script cleverly utilizes layers of pop-culture references. So while older folks will giggle at Flashdance and Back to the Future references, more hip viewers will enjoy spotting the little green Android guy, discussions about cosplay, and quick shots of Google co-founder Sergey Brin cruising the campus.
Is the film predictable? Will it result in 40-somethings thinking a crayon resume will score them a job at Google? Yes and yes.
But the film marks a return to humour that doesn't have to be mean-spirited in order to be funny. There are just the right amount of PG moments (lap dances, rest-home innuendo) to keep things edgy, but the film is never cynical. Billy and Nick are like a wisecracking Bert and Ernie, even sharing a bed in one scene, but there's no need to exploit the situation for cheap laughs. Ditto Billy's attentiveness to a young hottie teammate: it's fatherly, not creepy. The audience is permitted to laugh without feeling like they have to shower afterward.
