Taglines: A comedy about sex, power and spreading the wealth.
Generally humble Bob Pickler has found his niche in life as a butter sculptor, handily winning the Iowa state Mastery in Butter carving championship fifteen years running. His ambitious current second wife, Laura Pickler, parlays Bob’s local fame to further her own egotistical aspirations to be known as a person doing social good, her eye on the Iowa state governor’s seat, and perhaps even the White House.
When Bob agrees to a request by event organizers to take himself out of further competitions to allow others to have their moment of butter fame, Laura believes their life and her aspirations are shattered, as the centerpiece of what gave them renown has been taken away from them. So she decides to enter the competition herself to continue the Pickler legacy.
In doing so, Laura expects to intimidate any other comers not to enter. What she doesn’t expect is the entry of ten year old Destiny, a black foster child. Destiny, who doesn’t even know her last name as her parentage is uncertain, has been shuttled from foster home to foster home, never finding a place where she wanted to stay and where the foster parents wanted to keep her, and in the process not finding her own place in life, she having been told that she has no talent.
Concurrently, she believes she may have found both when she is placed into the home of who she considers extremely “white” Ethan and Jill, who do whatever they can, above and beyond, to make Destiny feel like she’s at home. Regardless, she still believes something will happen to sour the relationship with Ethan and Jill.
At the same time, she is inspired when she sees Bob’s fifteenth winning butter sculpture, a life sized rendering of the Last Supper. As Destiny carves and sculpts from the heart, Laura will do whatever required to beat Destiny, even cheat. Thrown into the mix is Brooke, a bicycle riding stripper cum hooker who has her own vendetta against the Picklers, especially Laura.
Butter is a 2011 comedy film directed by Jim Field Smith, from a screenplay by Jason Micallef, starring Yara Shahidi, Jennifer Garner, Ty Burrell, Olivia Wilde, Rob Corddry, Ashley Greene, Alicia Silverstone, and Hugh Jackman. It was released on October 5, 2012 in the United States and Canada by The Weinstein Company through its RADiUS-TWC distribution arm. The film is said to be a satire of the 2008 Democratic presidential primary. Butter received mixed reviews from critics who questioned Smith’s direction of the film’s script in terms of humor and satire and the performances from the ensemble cast.
Film Review for Butter
For Butter’s Toronto premiere, executive producer Harvey Weinstein served up the soft political satire laced with salt: he invited potential Republican presidential candidate and Minnesota congresswoman Michele Bachmann to help him unveil the film at a gala screening in Iowa.
Although Weinstein was at the premiere, he issued a statement which was read by one of the film’s stars, Olivia Wilde, in his place. In the statement, the studio chief said he would like “to formally invite Republican congresswoman from Minnesota and Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann to co-host with me the big premiere of ‘Butter’ in Iowa in a few months from now.
“We could take some math classes in the morning to help balance the budget, brush up on the constitution in the afternoon, play some ping-pong and then maybe some verbal ping-pong on gay rights and women’s rights (especially the right to choose).”
A similarly dollopy approach to satire runs through the film itself: a liberal comedy which may or may not attempt to parody the Republican race for top office through the fable of a lard-carving contest in a midwest town. Jennifer Garner is Laura Pickler, the Tea Party-style candidate and a ruthless dragon with an apparently motiveless lust for power and a distaste for what she perceives as the victim vote that’s thwarting her: “I’m sorry I was born tall and white and pretty and I haven’t sat in front of the TV eating pork rind and soiling myself.”
She’s married to the “Elvis of Butter”, carving whiz Bob (Ty Burrell), who for 15 years has reigned supreme at the town’s annual contest with his ambitious tableaux, including the Last Supper and Schindler’s List. But the organisers ask him to step down in order to give newcomers a shot, so Garner, irrationally offended, takes up the spatulas in his place, and finds herself pitted against a stripper (Wilde) to whom Bob owes money, as well as an impossibly sweet 10-year-old African-American girl, Destiny (Yara Shahidi), lately fostered by loving lefties Alicia Silverstone and Rob Corddry. And, in fact, another contender: a cat-mad Bob-groupie played by Kristen Schaal, who ambles off with every scene she’s in.
That Schaal’s character is the only one who doesn’t turn out to be an inspired artist of some kind or other is just one of upsets in an alternatively smooth and claggy product. There’s a badly ill-judged cameo from Hugh Jackman, but also a good spoonful of laugh-out-loud gags, particularly those involving the red tape of local civic talent contests. Garner, generally subtle and funny, is too broad, but Wilde laps up a role that’s more than just eye candy (that her character must make her dramatic exits on a BMX bike is a lovely touch).
Weinstein presumably won’t be receiving any reciprocal Tea Party invites anytime soon. He can no doubt feast on the cream of Butter instead. But there’s something about this film’s churn of goo and grit that lingers ambivalently, difficult to digest.
Butter (2012)
Directed by: Jim Field Smith
Starring: Jennifer Garner, Yara Shahidi, Ty Burrell, Kristen Schaal, Garrett Schenck, Phyllis Smith, Jason Yudoff, Kelly Tippens, Dodie Brown, Deana Ricks, Jeanne Evans
Screenplay by: Jason A. Micallef
Production Design by: Tony Fanning
Cinematography by: Jim Denault
Film Editing by: Matt Garner, Dan Schalk
Costume Design by: Susie DeSanto
Set Decoration by: Cynthia La Jeunesse
Art Direction by: Greg Richman
Music by: Mateo Messina
MPAA Rating: R for language and sexual content.
Distributed by: The Weinstein Company
Release Date: October 5, 2012
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