[.ca] Saturday Night Live: The Best of Chris Farley (ISBN 157362862X)

From Amazon.com:
The Best of Chris Farley blasts through 68 minutes of the wildly hilarious characters the comic actor created while with Saturday Night Live in the early 1990s. Farley was a comedic gem--not only because he created such bizarre, repulsively funny characters, such as Matt Foley, Motivational Speaker, or Lori Davis, cosmetics infomercial queen, but because he lived completely inside the character, delivering lines with whatever fury, stupidity, hypertension, insecurity, or femininity the situation demanded. Clearly, Farley loved making people laugh and he wasn't afraid to use his big bulk to do it, whether it entailed stripping as a Chippendale's dancer, belly flopping on coffee tables, rolling around on a couch as Tom Arnold, or punching his forehead in dismay on the "Chris Farley Show." What's great about this collection is all of those characters appear; what's disappointing is that some don't linger long enough, while others appear a bit too long. The cafeteria-lady number could've been cut short in lieu of a longer Tom Arnold segment, or Herlihy Boy could've been removed altogether in favor of complete "Chris Farley Show" segments. Still, if you forgot how side-splitting Farley's portrayal of Dom DeLuise or the French-fry-stuffing Gap girl was, this video will happily jog your memory. --Karen Karleski

chris farley funny goodness:
I can't believe anyone doesn't know about the where he's talking to the news guy dennis miller or kevin that one guy that does the weekend update. He forms his fingers into quotation mark things and says funny stuff on his imperfect things about him. like i'm not that attractive and "i dont wash regularly"its really funny and how come know one says anything about it. Your only cool if you write a review about this skit so every review writer who wrote one your not cool enough to write about chris farley. I think its the funniest skit and its not my fault that all of you people suck ass.

Strong start... poor finish:
I dunno what it is, but I've always enjoyed Chris Farley's "loud-obnoxious-fat-guy-falling-down-and-breaking-stuff" routine that he did in the handful of movies he starred in prior to his untimely demise. Keeping this in mind during my last visit to the local Hollywood video, I decided to check out this collection of SNL sketches that he starred in, just to see if I had a possible "keeper" to place alongside 'Tommy Boy' and 'Beverly Hills Ninja'. As soon as I got home I threw this into the player, pressed 'play', and relaxed to what was hopefully gonna be a good show. Which it was... at first. After gettin' past the way-too-love-fest-y "in memoriam" intro by Tim Meadows (jeez, whatever happened to that guy, anyway?) I found myself yukkin' it up over the opening sketch of the titular star playing then-NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani's (Kevin Nealon) obnoxiously hyper son. After that, he showed his range by playing... an obnoxiously hyper motivational speaker who tries to set a couple kids straight with his bellowing "living in a van down by the river" spiel. Then there's the so-wrong-to-laugh-at-but-I'm-laughing-anyway alternative lifestyle-themed beer commercial with Adam Sandler, followed by the infamous 'Chippendale try-out' with Patrick Swayze... which I consider to be Farley's greatest SNL piece. Oh man, was that sketch a hoot! A very disturbing hoot, but a hoot all the same! Unfortunately, after this initial volley of sketches and commercial parodies, things really go downhill. Save for his 'quotation-finger'- laden commentary on one Weekend Update segment, I hardly uttered a chuckle the rest of the way. I never did find any of those 'Da Bearsss' sketches all that amusing, and the one they show here with guest star Michael Jordan is no exception. And the string of stammer-laden 'Chris Farley Show' bits with Jeff Daniels, Martin Scorsese, and Paul McCartney were downright tedious. And it didn't help that two of the pieces centered more around Adam Sandler (his retarded 'Lunch Lady Land' tune, and the just-plain-lame 'Herlihy Boy House-Sitting Service' piece), while Farley basically acts as a sideline character for Sandler to play off of. Speakin' of Adam Sandler: his inexplicable success with those lame movies he does is proof positive to me that there is no God. No Supreme Being who truly cares for His creations would have let this unfunny yutz become such a profit-generating force in Hollywood while allowing Chris Farley to shuffle off this mortal coil from a coke overdose... Needless to say, I'm definitely NOT gonna add this one to my personal video collection. It was hardly worth the rental fee I plopped down for it, let alone what they're askin' for it to own! Guess I'll just hafta settle for another viewing of 'Black Sheep' to get my Farley fix... 'Late

One of the funniest DVDs--You can watch over and over:
This is one of the funniest DVDs I own. Chris Farley is incredibly funny and will do anything for a laugh. My favorite skits are: The Drug Counselor. David Spade and Christina Applegate each have difficulty keeping a straight face during this skit where their parents surprise them with a drug counselor played by Chris Farley. The coffee commercial. I must have played this one 50 times. Watch Chris go crazy on a waiter who has the never to switch his favorite coffee with instant. He even quotes Scarlette O'Hara. This is a must have DVD.

I Was A Little Disappointed:
Well, I was a little disappointed in this dvd. Chris Farley was one of the greatest comedians to emerge in the past 20 years, and I was hoping that "Saturday Night Live" and Broadway Video would put together a concise tribute dvd that would feature about 20 of his greatest skits, plus a bonus feature including tributes from fellow cast members like Adam Sandler and Mike Meyers who worked with him in countless skits over the years (instead we get a short tribute by Tim Meadows). What is included here is a few classic sketches, plus some montages ("Chris In Drag" ! Wow!). Which is not to say that this is a terrible dvd. "Matt Foley", "Japanese Game Show" (also available on "The Best Of Mike Meyers"), "Superfans". "Lunchlady", "Schmitt's Gay" and "The Herlihy Boy" are all classics in their own right. However, I was sort of disgruntled by the montages that are spread out across the dvd and butcher "SNL" standards like "The Gap Girls" and "Zagat's" to mere snippets. (Both these skits are available on other dvds). Similarly, the "Chris Farley Show" montage cuts out some of the best interviews (though I'm glad they kept in the Paul McCartney one). Still, you can't be upset by the inclusion of "Chippendales". So, overall it's an okay dvd, but nowhere as great as the ones dedicated to Mike Meyers, Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy, Adam Sandler and the countless others that have been honored with their own collection of classics.

Classic Physical Comedy:
In his short tenure on this earth, Chris Farley provided us with some of the funniest moments in "Saturday Night Live" history. Heavily inspired by John Belushi (not just in his comedy but his dangerous lifestyle), he suddenly became the show's most talented physical comedians, bringing the pratfall back to households. 5 years of classic comedy has been put on this dvd. Farley created for himslef a variety of classic charcaters for himself, including Matt Foley (who lives in a van down by the river!!!), Todd O'Connor of "Superfans" and Barney The Chippendale Auditioner. All of these classic characters are here. Also, there's his "exciting" impression of Laurie Davis in the "Focus On Beauty" sketch. There are several montages that just to show how funny he was: one where he's in drag, a montage of his talk show, one showcasing his physical comedy, an impressions montage, and one featuring outtakes from Dress Rehersal. Overall, very good. My one complaint may seem odd. There's not enough sketches featruing Adam Sandler! I know that the focus is supposed to be on Farley, but he and Adam shared so many great skecthes together, and they obviosuly bought out the best of each other. The ones with him are good, but it would have been better if "Zagat's" and "Gap Girls" (both featured briefly in the "Drag Montage) were on here. But still, it's an excellent dvd.