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Film Review: ‘Get Hard’

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Kevin Hart and Will Ferrell in the comedy "Get Hard" (Courtesy Photo)

Kevin Hart and Will Ferrell in the comedy “Get Hard” (Courtesy Photo)

 

By Dwight Brown
NNPA Film Critic

Pairing Kevin Hart and Will Ferrell is like mixing gasoline and fire. You know there’s going to be an uncontrollable explosion. Though Get Hard’s paint-by-numbers script is merely serviceable, and screen writer/turned director Etan Cohen (Tropic Thunder) hasn’t a clue about what he’s doing, the ebony and ivory actors pull this comedy off. They’re so damn funny!

The story commences in two disparate parts of L.A: In upscale Bel Air, James (Ferrell), a millionaire hedge fund manager, is about to marry his super-wealthy boss’s (Craig T. Nelson) shallow daughter (Alison Brie, Mad Men). In the working class neighborhood of Crenshaw, Darnell (Hart) lives with his wife (Edwina Findley Dickerson), a nurse, and young daughter (Ariana Neal). He owns a small carwash/detailing business that operates out of the garage of James’ high-rise office building.

James hardly notices that Darnell is the guy who services his car, until the rich dude is arrested and convicted of fraud. He’s sentenced to 10-years hard time in San Quentin and is scared to death he won’t survive. Assuming the man who washes his car has done time himself, he hires Darnell to teach him how to toughen up for the big house. James is wrong. Darnell is as middle class as the Brady Bunch, but he needs the dough to put a down payment on a new house. It’s on!

Screenwriters Jay Martel and Ian Roberts (both vets of TV’s Key and Peele), with the aid of Etan Cohen, have written a script, in the vein of Trading Places, that is a framework. They probably knocked the whole screenplay out over a game of poker and figured that the two comic actors could fill in the laughs. Cohen, who tries his hand at directing, shows little talent for the job. He sets up the camera, then he falls asleep. Minus some imaginative editing (Michael L. Sale, Tammy) in a staged prison riot scene, the film lacks style. It feels like a half-hour situation comedy that runs on for 100 minutes.

That said, it’s not like Hart or Ferrell care. They work their shtick like champs regardless. Ferrell is arguably one of the best comic actors of his generation, and Hart is the same for his. They improvise this film out of the danger zone and make it an uproarious comedy that will keep you in stitches.

Ferrell’s James is so aloof, naive and caught up in his whiteness that it is a joy to watch him transition from a snob, to a street-smart hoodlum with heart. Darnell tries to butch him up for two-thirds of the movie, but James just doesn’t get it. By the time he catches on, he reels off hostile one-liners like he was a real prison thug. As he pretends to tell off a sexually aggressive con in prison, he warns, “Hope you brought your Costco Card because you are about to get d— in bulk!” Ferrell’s characteristic charm goes a long way.

Hart moves around the set like an impish gazelle. You don’t have time to target him because he is that fast. He uses his self-deprecation, animation, vulgarity and street smarts to play a middle-class man who is pretending to be a hoodlum. Sometimes he is the aggressor in a scene, and sometimes the foil. He punches Ferrell with conviction, and takes a slug from his wife like a wimp. Together Hart and Ferrell are as funny as Laurel and Hardy or Abbott and Costello.

As the story uncovers who stole the money and unravels Darnell’s rouse, it peppers itself with nudity, cursing, violence, racial slurs (derogatory terms for Blacks, Latinos and Jewish people), oral sex, cruising in a gay bar, hoodwinking an Aryan Race gang and gun-toting gang scenes with Darnell’s cousin Russell (T.I.). If offensive humor and situations bother you, stay home.

Check your social consciousness at the door. Forget the formulaic script and lackluster direction. Get Hard features two genius comic actors working their craft like magicians. Hart and Ferrell make this movie raunchy, silly, hysterical and fun.

Visit NNPA Film Critic Dwight Brown at DwightBrownInk.com.

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Oakland Post: Week of June 25 – July 1, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of June 25 – July 1, 2025

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Oakland Post: Week of June 18 – 24, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of June 18 – 24, 2025

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IN MEMORIAM: Legendary Funk Pioneer Sly Stone Dies at 82

Sly Stone’s musical approach radically reshaped popular music. He transcended genre boundaries and empowered a new generation of artists. The band’s socially conscious message and infectious rhythms sparked a wave of influence, reaching artists as diverse as Miles Davis, George Clinton, Prince, Dr. Dre, and the Roots.

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Sly and the Family Stone play the Opera House in Bournemouth. Mojo review. Photo by Simon Fernandez.
Sly and the Family Stone play the Opera House in Bournemouth. Mojo review. Photo by Simon Fernandez.

By Stacy M. Brown
BlackPressUSA.com Newswire

Sylvester “Sly” Stewart—known to the world as Sly Stone, frontman of the groundbreaking band Sly and the Family Stone—has died at the age of 82.

His family confirmed that he passed away peacefully at his Los Angeles home surrounded by loved ones, after battling chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and other health complications.

Born March 15, 1943, in Denton, Texas, Stone moved with his family to Vallejo, California, as a child. He began recording gospel music at age 8 with his siblings in a group called the Stewart Four. By his teenage years, he had mastered multiple instruments and was already pioneering racial integration in music—an ethos that would define his career.

In 1966, Sly and his brother Freddie merged their bands to form Sly and the Family Stone, complete with a revolutionary interracial, mixed-gender lineup.

The band quickly became a commercial and cultural force with hits such as “Dance to the Music,” “Everyday People,” and “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)”—all penned by Stone himself.

Their album “Stand!” (1969) and live performances—most notably at Woodstock—cemented their reputation, blending soul, funk, rock, gospel, and psychedelia to reflect the optimism and turmoil of their era.

Sly Stone’s musical approach radically reshaped popular music. He transcended genre boundaries and empowered a new generation of artists. The band’s socially conscious message and infectious rhythms sparked a wave of influence, reaching artists as diverse as Miles Davis, George Clinton, Prince, Dr. Dre, and the Roots.

As the 1970s progressed, Stone confronted personal demons. His desire to use music as a response to war, racism, and societal change culminated in the intense album “There’s a Riot Goin’ On” (1971). But drug dependency began to undermine both his health and professional life, leading to erratic behavior and band decline through the early 1980s.

Withdrawn from the public eye for much of the 1990s and early 2000s, Stone staged occasional comebacks. He was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1993, received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Grammys in 2017, and captured public attention following the 2023 release of his memoir “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)”—published under Questlove’s imprint. He also completed a biographical screenplay and was featured in Questlove’s documentary “Sly Lives!” earlier this year.

His influence endured across generations. Critics and historians repeatedly credit him with perfecting funk and creating a “progressive soul,” shaping a path for racial integration both onstage and in the broader culture.

“Rest in beats Sly Stone,” legendary Public Enemy frontman Chuck D posted on social media with an illustrative drawing of the artist. “We should thank Questlove of the Roots for keeping his fire blazing in this century.”

Emmy-winning entertainment publicist Danny Deraney also paid homage. “Rest easy Sly Stone,” Deraney posted. “You changed music (and me) forever. The time he won over Ed Sullivan’s audience in 1968. Simply magical. Freelance music publicist and Sirius XM host Eric Alper also offered a tribute.

“The funk pioneer who made the world dance, think, and get higher,” Alper wrote of Sly Stone. “His music changed everything—and it still does.”

Sly Stone is survived by three children.

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