STandup veteran Jerry Seinfeld makes his directorial debut with this decent family comedy that puts a surreal twist on the history of one of America’s most beloved snacks, the Pop-Tart. The sheer stupidity and disposable pointlessness is hilarious.
Seinfeld is written by Spike Feresten, the same writing team that wrote the 2007 animated film Bee Movie, which Seinfeld starred in, produced, and co-wrote. He co-produced the film with Andy Robin and Barry Marder. It’s like a Bee movie, but with a constant flow of excellent gags, creating a rising crescendo of silliness with an effect similar to Seinfeld’s own distinctive falsetto-hysterical declarations in moments of ultimate joke consciousness. There are also great supporting roles and cameos, including an exceptional double walk-on by Jon Hamm and John Slattery, reprising their ad executive Mad Men characters Don Draper and Roger Sterling.
Seinfeld stars as Bob, an executive at Kellogg’s in the early 1960s who (of course) works on developing a breakfast cereal whose genius is that he can “eat and drink at the same time with one hand.” he says. He teams up with Edsel Kellogg III (Jim Gaffigan), a descendant of the company’s founder, and Donna Stankowski (Melissa McCarthy), a NASA scientist seconded to Kellogg, to develop a secret project for Kellogg. We are developing. It’s going to be the next big thing in breakfast foods.
The company is in a fierce race to get its ideas into American homes before its deadly rival, the Post Corporation, led by Amy Schumer’s Marjorie Post. As the space race heats up, they fight for their lives while inventing the Pop-Tart.
The comedy is not at all innocent, as almost every gag has something captivating about it. When Kellogg’s team has to ask President Kennedy for a favor, President Kennedy keeps getting frustrated. Didn’t you hear my inaugural address? The president says his wife gave him the great idea for a breakfast cereal called Jackie Os. It’s not until much later that they realize this doesn’t make sense, since his wife is indeed called Jackie Kennedy. But they simply conclude that the president must have meant something like Cheerios.
Add to this a strange errand where Bob had to wear 27th President William Howard Taft’s old morning suit at the White House because he didn’t have any other clothes, and from the remains of the smoke There’s also an outrageous sight gag in which Ed Harris, who played John Glenn, appears. In “The Right Stuff”. All in all, it’s not a masterpiece, but it’s endearing and funny in a way that’s much harder to achieve than it might seem.
