Casa De Mi Padre, Mi gusta!

Casa De Mi Padre (2012) – Directed by Matt Piedmont, this Spanish language parody has all the finesse of a Latin tele-drama, and the style of an old Mexican Western movie, complete with elaborately ”painted” stage drops and fake horses. Casa De Mi Padre is an extremely funny action comedy spoof from Will Ferrell, and Adam McKay, written by Andrew Steele (Saturday Night Live) –the same team who bought the hilarious hit TV news comedy Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy. The entire film is spoken in Spanish–there are no English dubs to the DVD, although there are English (and Spanish) subtitles.

The plot is brilliantly non-complex: Ferrell is Armando Alvarez, the son of a powerful rancher. He lovingly works on his father’s ranch when he and his friends, Esteban (Efren Ramirez) and Manuel (Adrian Martinez), witnessed a murder on the ranch. Later, Armando finds that a dangerous drug lord Onza (Gæl Garcia Bernal) threatens the ranch; a place that Armando and his father, Miguel (Pedro Armendáriz Jr.) hold dear. When the ranch falls on hard times, Armando’s younger brother and international businessman, Raul (Diego Luna) returns along with his beautiful fianceé Sonia (Genesis Rodriguez) to save the ranch. Usually homecomings are a welcomed event, but in this case, Raul brings with him his business startling secret–he is in the drug trafficking business.

Therein lies the problem–Armando finds out that his brother is dealing in an illegal business and he is falling in love with his brother’s future wife. Eventually, the Alvarez family is at war among themselves–and at war with Mexico’s most feared drug lord. In the background of this war are the lurking DEA enforcement agents who more or less allow the conflict between Armando, Raul and Onza play itself out.

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Ferrell spent time with a dialect coach to help him with is language skills which are phenomenal in the film. To me he sounds really authentic and appeared very comfortable throughout the film. If I didn’t know or recognize Ferrell from his other films, there wouldn’t be a doubt that Spanish is his native language. As far as comedy, it just doesn’t get any better than Ferrell, and much of the film depended on his brand of comedic effectiveness.

Performances from Casa’s supporting cast members are equally fantastic. Ramirez and Martinez were amazing in their roles. They added to the off-hand comedic play to Ferrell’s character. The three carried the film pretty much throughout by inputting a few giggles here and there, but the film wasn’t as superbly funny as I would have hoped, considering it being a Ferrell, McKay, and Steele project. It was systematically funny–it is as if the audience is being queued in to laugh at specific moments; like when Armando and his companions witnessed a man being shot from a painted backdrop, crouched behind a bolder. If you weren’t really looking, you’d almost barely miss it when they were sneaking away. Actually, they didn’t. They merely “crouched” behind the rock–and removed their hats.

The film is inconsistently funny and this is the charm behind Casa De Me Padre. It did not matter if the backdrops or the fake horses were easily recognizable as such, it was all that went on in between. The brilliant off the mark acting, the music and the superb writing is what made this film awesome.

Overall, any film that stars Will Ferrell is worth a peek. Enough said.

Casa De Mi Padre on DVD is a courtesy from Lionsgate and the film presents with a host of amazing special features:

• Audio commentary with Will Ferrell, director Matt Piedmont and writer/producer Andrew Steele.
• An interview with Pedro Armendáriz Jr. 
• Outtakes
• A “Making of” featurette
• The Fight For Love music video - an original song performed by Will Ferrell and Genesis Rodriguez. 
• “Commercials” – which are 4 different faux commercials starring Will Ferrell, Diego Luna, Genesis Rodriguez, Efren Ramirez and Nick Offerman. 

Source: Lionsgate