Ted (2012)
Seth MacFarlane (dir.); Mark Wahlberg, Seth MacFarlane, Mila Kunis
Grade: C+
At age 8, Bostonian boy John Bennett is blessed with a best friend in his living teddy bear. By age 35, the bear (voiced by MacFarlane) is a has-been, and we follow his and Bennett's (now Wahlberg) blasé adventures.
'Ted' is a first-class example of a movie I wish I liked more than I did, and about which I wish more people felt than they do. I guess that's what it means to find something overrated.
First, it is touching (if not magical) when John as a boy first meets Ted, and the main titles are among the film's best parts. Unfortunately, the plot's fatal decision to make him a has-been means that basically it's the adventures of the average people. It would have been better, I believe, if he'd tried to make a comeback.
Also, the movie is at its funniest when it's profane or raunchy. The rest of it is just pop culture references, and pretentious beginning-and-end narration by Patrick Stewart, which is in any way as "legendarily unfunny" as the kind of humor in 'Date,' 'Epic' or 'Disaster Movie,' made by the people referenced in this review's title - Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer.
Actually, maybe it's not as unfunny, given that it's not a spoof. It is good enough that we can all end up caring about it when Ted gets into trouble. But Mark Wahlberg has already talked about a 'Ted 2;' and unless it's one of those (rare) sequels that's better than the original, I'll be left with an endearing character in a worse movie than he deserves.
