What happened to the ‘Simple Jack’ trailer?
August 9th, 2008Introducing “Tropic Thunder” are a series of comic shorts — a raunchy ad for a fictional drink called “Booty Sweat” and a couple of trailers for movies that don’t exist. Their purpose is to introduce the “Thunder” characters as actors by showing their previous work.
But something’s missing: the “Simple Jack” trailer.
In the screening I attended yesterday, there were trailers featuring Robert Downey Jr. as a gay monk, Jack Black playing several members of “America’s favorite obese family,” and Ben Stiller as an action hero who saved the world half a dozen times. But no Simple Jack.
Where’d he go?
The DreamWorks marketing site www.simplejackmovie, now taken down, referred to a trailer. The site featured lushly photographed footage of Stiller as Jack romping through fields of wheat hitting butterflies with a sledgehammer, and blowing the seeds off a dandelion. A woman’s voice was heard saying, “Chet, I’ll talk to any retard I like.” And an accompanying plot synopsis described the “Simple Jack” film this way: (Text from the now-removed DreamWorks marketing site)
Set in the depression era midwest, down on their luck farmers Chet Chetkinson and his wife Rebecca get dealt a winning hand when a traveling carnival leaves a “freak” behind.
The stitching on his shirt says “Simple Jack,” but Rebecca quickly learns that he is anything but simple when a ferocious junkyard dog lunges for her and Jack calms the growling beast with a few soft words and some hand gestures. Rebecca runs to tell Chet, who is hard pressed to believe her stories of an “idiot” that can “talk to animals.” Chet succumbs to Rebecca’s pleas, and they take Jack in.
Testing Jack’s “ability,” Chet makes him train and groom their wild, unbroken mustang, Nutmeg. Sure enough, after a few short weeks, Nutmeg is the pride of the Dust Bowl circuit. Things are looking up, but how will Chet deal with Rebecca’s growing platonic love for Jack? Can he “simply” let it be?
Tugg Speedman stars in what one critic called “one of the most retarded performances in cinema history.”
All of this leads to the conclusion that there must have been a trailer.
Did the studio pull it? And if so, why?
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September 22nd, 2008 at 11:03 am
Does anyone have a right to not be offended?
September 16th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
Maybe I’m a little bit late to this comment feed, but I’ve read through most of what you people have had to say, and all issues with the movie aside…
“the history of disability being taught in elementary school”
The history of disability? Do you honestly think kids ages 6-11 will understand concepts like genetics, mutation, and the biological perspective of psychology? If a given disabled person – let’s call him Jimmy – wasn’t disabled in elementary school, the kids would have found something else to tease him about. It’s what kids do.
August 30th, 2008 at 6:27 am
Jennifer,
Please never have children. I truly fear that the propagation of your genes will RETARD the progress (technological and otherwise) of our society.
Seriously, girl, you need to relax. As a lot of people have mentioned, they’re not making fun of the fact that Simple Jack is …well, simple. They’re laughing at how exaggerated the whole situation is. Exaggeration = funny. If I look at things through your eyes, I should be incredibly offended by the Chuck and Larry movie (the one where Adam Sandler pretends to be gay), I’d be offended by The Nutty Professor (I mean really… their portrayal of a crude, over-the-top overweight black family… heart-breaking, truly)… the list can go on for a while.
No one is bending your arm to go see this movie, or any other movie for that matter. I love film because it allows a person to express themselves however the hell they want to be expressed and it’s because of pretentious and up-tight people like you that these expressions are being reprimanded and shunned. I think Tropic Thunder was hilarious and I see no reason why anyone should take offense to the movie.
August 28th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
Jennifer, why don’t you follow your own advise and step out of your own point of view and see the big picture: we are not laughing at the ‘ mentally disabled,’ we are laughing at ben stiller’s ridiculous and inaccurate portrayal. We aren’t the insensitive baffoons you make us out to be. I haven’t seen anybody laugh while watching I Am Sam or Radio. Those are serious and sincere portrayals of people. We know when it is and isn’t okay to laugh. Oh, and also take a hard look at yourselves, those supposedly protectors of PWD, you do more harm to them by labeling them as ‘mentally challenged etc.; they are people like you and me. They may need a little more help than other, but they are people, stop treating them as less.
August 18th, 2008 at 10:27 am
Oh come on. People protesting this movie are hypocrites. We all laugh at and make fun of retarded people (if only in private). Anyone who says they don’t is lying. Everyone in this world gets made of for something. Black, white, Asian, gay, straight. Everyone. We make fun of retarded people, just like they may make fun of amputees or some other group. Same as making fun of someone’s ethnic background. No one is protected from being made fun of. That’s the way we deal with life. Just because you wear a crash helmet doesn’t make you off limits.
August 17th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
I love the comment that mentally impaired would not know if someone is making fun of them. Sorry to inform you, but you are wrong. But everyone is upset because people have the right to go see the movie if they want. No one is saying they don’t have the right; however, we also have the right to voice that we are offended. Most established societies are judged by how they treat the less fortunate in their society. Remember the Nazis killed the disabled people first. Of course, we don’t do that here in the USA; we just pay millions of dollars to the people that can think of ways to humiliate them.
August 16th, 2008 at 11:06 pm
Dear Jennifer B,
I can understand where you would be coming from but at the same time people have the choice to see or not see this movie. That is a fact. It is also a fact that this movie was making fun of Ben’s character and not the mentally impaired.
I’m African American. Does this mean that I should fight for all history textbook manufacturers to remove any references to Jim Crow laws and the likes? Let’s face it… these groups aren’t fighting for the mentally impaired(they wouldn’t understand the “insults” anyway) they are fighting in an attempt to numb the pain that comes to you when someone you love is mentally impaired. And there isn’t anything wrong with that at all.
August 15th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
The movie was hilarious.
Simple Jack was hilarious.
Mentally handicap people are too “intellectually impaired” to get offended. Who is it hurting? Answer: overprotective parents and other stupid (or retarded, if you will) people.
Mentally handicap people are cool, just like that one dude up there my little brother is mentally handicap and I don’t take offense to the word, “retard.” It’s just a word, you can’t let everything piss you off.
You all need to calm down and think like intelligent people, this country is becoming too censored, too politically correct and imo it’s destroying what this country stands for. For the love of God, it’s people like you who want “..under God” taken out of the Pledge of Allegiance!
That’s just my 2 cents anyways
August 14th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Two people wrote in on behalf of PWD. Why don’t these people write in for themselves?
I hope PWD mobilizes and does a full-scale march as people have in Paris and Costa Rica. Any ideas? This is not about a stupid movie or a word. This is about the systematic exclusive of ALL PWD from employment, housing, schools, affirmative action and so on. I say we should finally mobilize, march, and stop being the tail end of the civil rights movement.
August 14th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Nobody is making fun of mentally challenged people. The idea behind the trailer is making fun of how an actor can play a mentally challenged individual and automatically be nominated, no matter how insensitive or offensive the performance/film may be. If anything the trailer would be an advocate for the rights of the mentally challenged as it is lampooning the patronizing works that we so often see.
August 14th, 2008 at 11:17 am
This movie’s dialogue is pitched to the public as funny and insightful!
When is it funny to call anyone,
“totally stupid, moronic, moronical, imbecilic and the stupidest M*****F***** ever?”
All on the backs of individuals being homogenized as all the same “qualities”?
To believe this is insight, the public and the films author must believe that these are indeed the characteristics of people with disabilities.
They must believe that people with intellectual disabilities lacking any depth or value.
I pity Stiller and others whose life experiences have been so narrow as not to allow them a more accurate and nuanced view of people with disabilities — and I am appalled that the writer’s and producers would make their boorish, insight-less remarks in a public forum in 2008!
WHY SHOULD WE JUST STAY HOME AND TAKE IT?
It’s time to stop the INDIFFERENCE and MARGINALIZATION perpetuated by the use of WORDS!
August 14th, 2008 at 8:02 am
A larger issue is that people do not even know what the word means. I am a professor with CP who has been called ‘retard’ by people who are obviously less educated than me. Frankly, I’m sick of it. I hope this (silly) argument leads to what PWD really need — equal respect, equal job opportunities, inclusion in schools and the history of disability being taught in elementary school.
August 13th, 2008 at 9:23 pm
People, get over yourselves. My brother is handicapped, yet we don’t roll head over heels every time we here the term “retard”. Who cares? Don’t teach your kids that every time they here that word that it so harmful to them.
August 13th, 2008 at 6:45 pm
Movies have a rating for a reason. Tropic Thunder is rated R to warn the parents of content that is not suitable for all people or ages. If you brought your special companion (careful not to use the R word!!!!) with you to this movie without checking why it is rated R then you are to blame. If they did change this movie because of these ridiculous protests than we are turning into a censored state. Free speech was not intended to protect popular speech.
August 13th, 2008 at 8:27 am
Dear Brian,
Please, please, please grow up already. What part of ‘this isn’t funny to us’ did you NOT understand?
For a minute, get outside of your own point of view, and imagine (just imagine) that you are the parent of a child with a developmental disability, or that you have one yourself. Imagine that you’ve paid money to go sit in a public theater to watch, what you thought, was a war-movie spoof. You are expecting a comedy about — oh, I don’t know — war, maybe.
And there, in the dark, in public, you have Simple Jack sprung on you for the first time. You get to watch Mr. Stiller out-stupid Jerry Lewis, and you get to hear the unending mantra of ‘retard! retard! retard!’.
What do you honestly think a parent of a child with a developmental disability or an adult with a developmental disability would be feeling at that moment in time? Do you REALLY think they are going to marvel at Ben Stiller’s nuanced creativity? They’re not. They are going to be so shell-shocked, humiliated and hurt, that the ultimate point of this joke will be lost on them. All they know is that someone is playing a ‘retard’, looking ridiculous, and everyone around them is laughing at it. Laughing at them.
And Dreamworks, Stiller and writers really want us to believe that they never even once considered this scenario as a possibility? Oh, wait, I forgot! They never had a disability focus group to tell them, like they had a racial focus group help them tweak the racial jokes.
Thank God for Patricia and all others for saving us a unique and unnecessary form of public humiliation cleverly disguised as summer entertainment.
I’ll take a pass, thanks.
August 12th, 2008 at 10:57 am
@ Charles:
You need to lay off the thesaurus, buddy. Your comment is complete gibberish.
@ John V
You completely missed Ben Stiller’s point. There is a difference between exploiting sensitive subjects for cheap laughs and using them as a tool to critique social issues. At it’s core, most humor stems from an exposure of the taboo. Intelligent humor can layer that taboo with a deeper commentary about human behavior.
Maybe you should watch the trailer before you judge it, otherwise you just appear ignorant.
August 12th, 2008 at 5:52 am
I believe I read an article a few months ago where Stiller referred to the “Simple Jack” trailer, saying that they actually had shot a full trailer for the movie (featuring his wife, Christine Taylor) and that it was going to be an extra on the DVD. I don’t think it was ever intended to be seen in full in the actual movie, but I hope they’re not planning to remove it from the DVD release because of this controversy. When you see the movie, it’s easy to see that “Simple Jack” is making fun of actors who try to get nominated for an Oscar by portraying mentally challenged characters in films, and is not actually making fun of the retarded. If anything, the joke is on Stiller’s actor character; he is the one who comes off looking stupid.
August 11th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Well, most people either mistakenly use the tarrnated confounded word because they are exacerbated, or they love using it for people who they think conforms to a certain image in their own mind. The former is forgivable, the latter is not so easily dismissible.
I would like everyone to understand that.
August 10th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
To call those once deemed retarded intellectually impaired or intellectually disabled is a step forward.
These appellations must become more widespread.
August 9th, 2008 at 6:28 pm
As a father of a daughter with disabilities, I am tired of people in both prominent and everyday positions in life finding humor in denigrating people with intellectual disabilities.
It is time we as parents and advocates make a strong statement equating the word “retard” among the most repulsive demeaning words in our vocabulary. Shame on Mr. Stiller. Maybe we can convince him to embrace our cause and act as a spokesperson for the ARC advocating for jobs and housing for people with intellectual challenges.