I’ve always loved the movies.  One of the greatest freedoms I gained with my driver’s license was being able to go to the movies whenever I wanted.  Long before smartphones let us check showtimes online, I always had the week’s movie listings in my wallet, torn from the paper, so I knew what was playing when.  Multiple viewings were the norm.  During the free time-filled adulthood your early twenties bring, it wasn’t uncommon for me to see a movie I really loved six, seven, or even eight times in the theatre.  Then the count really went up once I had it on DVD!  I’ve had this idea for a new series for ages, to go back and rewatch the movies I loved most during my young adulthood and see how they feel now.  This isn’t an analysis but an off the cuff stream of consciousness journey.  What holds up?  What makes me nostalgic?  And what feels a bit cringy and uncomfortable now?  While I considered many films to kick off this series, there was really only ever one choice.  Released on 9 July 2004, I had just turned twenty-two when Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy hit theatres and it was love at first viewing.

By way of a quick plot summary, Anchorman is a satirical look at the male-dominated world of television journalism in the 1970s.  Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell) is an anchorman and San Diego’s favorite son, reporting the news every night with his crack news team – Champ Kind (David Koechner) on sports, Brick Tamland (Steve Carell) on weather, and Brian Fantana (Paul Rudd) as their reporter on the street.  Their world is shaken when, in the name of diversity, their station manager Ed Harkin (Fred Willard) tells them Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate) will be joining their team.  The budding romance and sexual tension between Ron and Veronica quickly turns to a bitter rivalry when Ron realizes, to his utter astonishment, Veronica aspires to be an anchor herself one day.

There are few movies I’ve seen more or quote more often than Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy.  With that being said, let’s jump in and see what thoughts and feelings come to mind as I rewatch this!

1)  I have the suspicion a lot of movies I loved from this era of my life won’t age well (it’s hard to imagine Wedding Crashers is as funny in the post-MeToo era, for example) but I bet this film will hold up better as it’s satire.  The whole thing was written to poke fun at the sexism of the time so the more asinine the way they act feels, the more it drives home the point.

2)  From the first moment of the opening shot it feels familiar.  It’s like I watched this yesterday.

3)  I still quote his opening bits over the credits ALL THE TIME – ribs, how now brown cow, Lanoline, unique New York, I love scotch, arsonist, I’m on now? I don’t believe you, the Human Torch, his wailing – I love it all!  I often slip into these lines without even thinking.  They are second nature, almost instinctual.  In fact (save the Lanoline and scotch bits for obvious reasons XD), I often use these in class when I find myself stumbling over the same sentence a few times!  I start in on these lines and tell the kids I didn’t get to do my vocal warm-ups before class.  Then I take the line I flubbed from the top once I’m through this.   

4)  The satire-makes-this-okay doesn’t extend to Brick and his whole “funny because he’s stupid” bit.  As he introduces himself he says, “Years later, a doctor will tell me that I have an I.Q. of 48 and am what some people call mentally r*******.”  That made me uncomfortable and disappointed then and it still does now.

5)  The soundtrack for this film is SO GOOD.  Certain movie soundtracks stay with me, taking on a life of their own even beyond the movie.  Dirty Dancing, Footloose, 13 Going On 30 – and Anchorman is one of those, too.  The fact that Will Ferrell does bits as Ron Burgundy between each song on the soundtrack album just makes it all the better!

6)  “I don’t know how to put this but…I’m kind of a big deal.  People know me.  I have many leather-bound books and my apartment smells of rich mahogany” is another quote I slide into all the time.

7)  Yep, so is, “Diversity is an old, old wooden ship used during the Civil War era.”  And I can’t tell you how many faculty meetings I’ve been at where I can hear Ed Harkin saying, “Ron are you paying attention?” and Ron replying, “Nope.”  Then Ed says, “Well this concerns all of us,” and Ron says, “Okay”…and I think of this as opposed to paying attention to what’s going on XD.

8)  What’s funny and sad is how many assholes – especially online – still act like this with diversity in the media.  Everyone who said Doctor Who became “woke propaganda” when Jodie Whittaker was cast, everyone who harassed those women who worked at Marvel when they posted a picture of themselves getting milkshakes after work, everyone who review bombed Captain Marvel or She-Hulk: Attorney-At-Law, everyone who said Birds of Prey and the Fantbulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn ruined Harley because she wasn’t presented as a sexual object like she was in Suicide Squad (2016), everyone who ranted and raved and decried Jane Foster becoming Thor or Riri Williams becoming Ironheart or Rey in The Force Awakens or Jyn in Rogue One are the butt of soooo many of the jokes in Anchorman.  They are still living the close-minded, arrogant, sexist mentality of the ’70s Will Ferrell and Adam McKay were mocking with this film.

9)  The casual littering!

10)  Oh, “It’s a formidable scent.  It stings the nostrils,” is another quote I still love and still use.

11)  Oh my gosh…when Veronica finally agrees to go out with Ron and he gets “a massive erection” and tries to blame the “pleats in the pants”…I can’t watch this without cringing a bit.  One of the many times I saw this in theatres, one of my former youth group kids (who was in college at the time (hence their getting into an R-rated movie)) ended up sitting right next to me and I was so uncomfortable during this scene :8. 

12)  Something as wild as the jazz flute scene now feels familiar.  Unlike the majority of the film, its humor lessens with each viewing as the surprise was what made it so funny, at least for me.

13)  Their singing “Afternoon Delight” is still EPIC.

14)  The “It’s called jogging or yogging, I don’t know if it’s a soft j…” is another line I still love and still use!

15)  Similar to how they play Brick, Champ’s funny-because-he’s-gay bit gets more and more frustrating and unfunny with age.

16)  The news team rumble is another classic scene!  Though, on this rewatch it struck me how awkward it is that Ben Stiller plays the anchor for the Spanish Language News.

17)  Christina Applegate is brilliant throughout this whole movie but how she plays the shock and surprise when Ron actually reads, “Go fuck yourself, San Diego” off the teleprompter without realizing it is on a whole other level.  It’s my favorite scene of hers in the whole movie!  It is so real and so hilarious.  Naturally, there was no other image from this film I could use for the header image for this very piece!

18)  Oh my gosh!  “Baxter, is that you?  Bark twice if you’re in Milwaukee” is another quote I use ALL THE TIME.  I don’t even have to be on the phone!  I could just be walking down the steps, alone in my home, and I’ll say it. 

19)  After Ron becomes disgraced, he tries to go back to Tino’s restaurant and when Tino (Fred Armisen) makes him eat cat poop…yeah, that grosses me out as much now as it did when I first saw it.  I dry-heaved a bit watching it.

20)  “Milk was a bad choice!” is another oft-quoted line for me.  Is half of this reflection just me pointing out lines I still quote often?  It’s starting to look like that’s the case.  But I don’t care!  I’m speaking my truth!  And my truth often comes out of my mouth via lines from Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy I suppose.

21)  When Ed’s on the phone with his son and he tells him to put down the gun and let the marching band go – they’ll play it off as a prank – it feels so much darker now.  There were three school shootings in 2004 with a total of six people killed and seven people wounded.  At the time of this writing we’ve already had eighteen school shootings in 2023 with eight people killed and sixteen people wounded.[1]  How can you hear this joke about Ed’s son who’s always “getting in trouble” at school and not hurt at the reality of our country now?

22)  Yes, I’m forty-years-old.  Yes, I’ve been a teacher for twelve years now.  And yes, “I make fart noises with my mouth,” is another quote I use all the time.  What can I say?  I’m complex and multifaceted.

23)  There are so many Marvel references in this movie!  Ron talks about the Human Torch in the opening credits.  When Ed calls him back to report the news, he uses a conk shell to call the news team and he shouts, “News Team Assemble!”  When he’s shocked at what he said on air he says, “By the hammer of Thor!”  This makes me wonder if we’ll ever see Will Ferrell in the MCU…

24)  Okay and the last line I’m gonna tell you I still quote all the time is when Ron jumps into the bear pit and says, “I immediately regret this decision!”  I’ve never jumped into a bear pit (nor do I plan on it) but there have been plenty of decisions of varying degrees of consequence I’ve immediately regretted.

25)  The bear fight is so nuts XD.

26)  When they are doing the “Where are they now?” bit at the end they say Brick becomes “one of the top political advisors to the Bush White House.”  9/11 happened in the fall of my freshman year of undergrad.  I came of age during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  It was during the Bush II Administration that I first became politically active.  So yeah, this line takes me back to that moment in time and that sort of critique of Bush II’s presidency.  I also remember how often I though I’d never see a worse president or a worse time in our country…and then 2015 came along :/.

27)  Watching all the bloopers play as the credits roll (because why wouldn’t I watch the bloopers??), the very last thing Will Ferrell says is, “This is the most ridiculous thing.”  He was so spot on!  And it was a perfect way to end the film!

I had so much fun with this.  Anchorman is one of those films that always makes me laugh, no matter how many times I see it.  It’s familiar.  It’s comforting.  It’s a mood lifter.  And the satire works just as well now and sadly, looking at what our culture has become and how – in some places, in some ways – we’ve regressed, it cuts even deeper.  I’m glad I started this series here.  I don’t imagine all the films I’ll return to will hold up as well during a rewatch.  Nor do I expect I’ll even enjoy some of them as much (or even at all?) when I return to them now.  But as far as Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy is concerned, it always goes down smooth.

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[1] John Woodrow Cox, Steven Rich, Linda Chong, Lucas Trevor, John Muyskens, and Monica Ulmanu. “More than 349,000 students have experienced gun violence at school since Columbine,” Washington Post, Updated April 11, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/interactive/school-shootings-database/?tid=usw_passupdatepg