Perfect casting in ‘Cedar Rapids’

Director: Miguel Arteta

Cast: Sigourney Weaver, John C Riley, Anne Heche, Ed Helms

The traditional discomforts and misfortunes of the fish-out-of-water central character are given a mild, though charming, workover as career stalled insurance salesman Tim (Helms) – the guy everybody predicted would be going places fast, but didn’t – is sent from his small town to an annual convention in slightly bigger city Cedar Rapids to try to save his company.

Such a promotion has come later than Tim had expected so how does he cope in the bright lights, what with the more worldly, not to say devious, guys who take him under their wayward wings and the sexy prowler eager to educate the innocent in the ways of the wicked world?

Helms is perfectly cast as the bemused hero; never quite grasping how the world works, never quite shaking off his home town attitudes.

Star Rating: 3/5