Awfully Good: The Brothers Grimsby

Let's kick off the new year by looking back at one of the worst movies of 2016. Also, Donald Trump's Presidential Inauguration is next week, so it seems fitting to feature a film where he gets AIDS.

The Brothers Grimsby (2016)

Director: Sam Firstenberg
Stars: Sacha Baron Cohen, Mark Strong, Mark Strong's Fleeting Dignity

British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen discovers some horrible blackmail on respected actor Mark Strong and uses it to destroy his career.

It's hard to accurately describe THE BROTHERS GRIMSBY. It's not great film; a tired spy parody with a plot that's essentially the same as the much superior KINGSMEN (also starring Mark Strong). But on another level, it feels like Sacha Baron Cohen’s FREDDY GOT FINGERED—and I mean that in the best way possible. It’s constantly outrageous and disgusting and goes above and beyond the boundaries of good taste just for the sake of a cheap laugh. There are seriously things in this movie that make the nude fight scene from BORAT seem tame by comparison. One in particular, a graphic sequence involving an elephant penis (just like FREDDY), is probably one of the worst things I've ever seen on film. You may think, "Oh I can see where this is going." No, you cannot. And you cannot unsee where it has gone.

Not everyone liked the movie RACING STRIPES.

It's not easy to shock and surprise audiences nowadays, but Cohen is more than up to the challenge. Perhaps a bit too much, as there are definitely parts of THE BROTHERS GRIMSBY where you will find yourself asking "What in God's name am I watching?" and later "What am I even doing with my life?" The British comedian is fearless in GRIMSBY, constantly putting things up his ass or having male and female private parts shoved in his face, both in ways that no stuntman could replicate. And that's just the tipping point. Here are a few examples of what Cohen has in store:

Daniel Radcliffe was willing to play a farting corpse in SWISS ARMY MAN, but not cameo in this movie. Understandable.

He shares a passionate sex scene with Rebel Wilson set to R. Kelly's "Bump n' Grind" that is revealed post-climax to have taken place entirely in a mattress store.
He accidentally shoots a wheelchair-bound kid whose AIDS-tainted blood flies in to HARRY POTTER star Daniel Radcliffe's open mouth, giving him HIV. Later, he accidentally shoots Radcliffe, this time transferring his blood in to Donald Trump's mouth, giving the President-Elect AIDS.
He and his family later use the handicapped kid as a weapon, tossing him and his wheelchair off the top of a stadium in order to stop a hitman.
He pretends to jerk off a cardboard cutout of an impoverished African child.
He attacks a man in a spa and in the course of their fight, has his face dipped in hot wax and immediately attached to the man's crotch, ripping it off to give himself a pubic hair goatee.
There's a Three's Company-style mix up where a beautiful woman shows up to seduce Cohen, but he thinks she's there to unclog the toilet. Many scatological misunderstandings ensue.
He says the line "Get off him! A man can only take so much jizz!" in completely serious fashion.
MI-6 activates Cohen's spy glasses, just in time to get video of a close up of PRECIOUS star Gabourey Sidibe's vagina as the spy performs oral sex on her.

A successful Tuesday!

There's a surprisingly decent supporting cast that joins Cohen, including Ian McShane, Isla Fisher and Penelope Cruz, but everyone is completely wasted, spending their entire screentime looking at monitors or talking on the phone. And then there's Mark Strong—poor Mark Strong—who's subjected to the absolute worst, most embarrassing stuff in GRIMSBY as Cohen's super spy brother. I have no idea what the respected British actor was thinking when he agreed to do this movie. I imagine Strong reading the script and getting to his line, "You can suck my scrotum or you can let me die. SUCK MY BALLS!" and calling his agent and saying "Yes, sign me up!" Or calling the authorities and agreeing to do the movie in exchange for Cohen releasing his family unharmed.

When you know you're going to be a target for critics.

If you're curious about the context of that line, Strong gets shot in the junk with a poison dart. He has 40 seconds to get the toxin out before he dies, so he whips out his balls, grabs his brother's head and forces him to suck them. When that's not effective enough, he pushes Cohen down on the ground and essentially teabags him so that gravity can do the work. He may or may not also have to say the line, "It was a trickle of pre-ejaculate at most. Grow up."

Sacha's ACE VENTURA: WHEN NATURE CALLS cosplay was on point.

Still don't feel bad for Mark Strong? Alright, let me spoil the big elephant scene for you so you can truly understand his pain. Strong and Cohen climb inside an elephant vagina in order to hide from some bad guys. (Don't ask.) The plan works, but not before a bunch of horny male elephants begin to have sex with the female elephant with the men still inside. In order to get it to stop, Olivier Award-winner Mark Strong has to stroke the elephant dong to completion. Let me put this in layman's terms: Mark Strong has to rub a giant fake elephant penis while inside a giant fake elephant vagina until it sprays gallons and gallons of fake elephant semen all over his face and body. Mark Strong, why are you in this movie?!

TLC really isn't The Learning Channel anymore, is it?

Okay, surely that one crazy scene is it and Mark Strong gets to spend the rest of the film playing a cool, suave spy, right? Nope! The final climactic scene, a touching moment where the two brothers finally reunite as a family, involves the pair emotionally connecting while being rectally penetrated. You see, there are two rockets filled with poisonous gas about to be launched and Mark Strong and Sacha Baron Cohen decide the best solution is for the two of them to sit on the rockets with the tips shoved up their asses so their anuses can absorb the poison. This actually happens and director Louis Leterrier shoots it with the visual style of any climactic action moment—spinning the camera around the two men, underwear pulled down around their ankles, holding hands while they use an active missile as a butt plug.

Considering everything they'd been through, the wrap party for this movie was a somber affair.

Mark Strong, if you or your family are not safe or in need of assistance, my email is at the bottom of this article. Please reach out and let me know that you're okay.