Butter [2 Discs] [Blu-ray/DVD]

Director: Jim Field Smith Jim Field Smith

Overview

Jim Field Smith's gentle satire Butter stars Jennifer Garner as Laura Pickler, the wife of the longtime winner of a local butter-carving contest. When he decides to bow out of this year's competition, she can't imagine the family not having the title, so she begins to train herself. Her biggest rival turns out to be a young adopted African-American girl named Destiny (Yara Shahidi), who has a natural gift for sculpture. As the competition gets more and more fierce, Laura resorts to drastic measures, convincing an old flame to perform some dirty tricks in order to get the upper hand. Butter screened at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival.

Product Details

Release Date:	12/04/2012
UPC:	0013132323398
Original Release:	2011
Rating:	R
Source:	LIONSGATE - 600000-AEC LGE
Region Code:	1
Presentation:	[Wide Screen]
Sound:	[Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround]
Language:	English
Time:	1:31:00
Sales rank:	33,103

Special Features

Gag reel; Deleted and extended scenes

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Jennifer Garner	Laura
Ty Burrell	Bob Pickler
Olivia Wilde	Brooke
Ashley Greene	Kaitlen
Hugh Jackman	Boyd Bolton
Alicia Silverstone	Jill
Yara Shahidi	Destiny
Rob Corddry	Ethan
Kristen Schaal	Carol-Ann
Phyllis Smith	Nancy
Garrett Schenk	Orval Flanagan
Andrew Daly	Announcer
Judy Leavell	Helen Flanagan
Joe Chrest	Butter Fan
Deanna Ricks	Butter Fan's Wife
Kelly Tippens	Mrs. Moore
Dodie Brown	June Carmichael
Jeanne Evans	Mrs. Gunderson
Cindy Creekmore	Danielle Mattingly
Christine Scheller	Transitional Home Assistant
Brett Hill	Hayden
Corena Chase	Miss Schram
Mark Oliver	Martina Caswell
Pruitt Taylor Vince	Ned Eaton
Garrett Schenck	Orval Flanagan
Mateo Messina	Composer

Technical Credits

Jason Micallef

Jim Field Smith	Director
Jason Micallef	Screenwriter,Screenwriter
Jennifer Garner	Producer
Alissa Phillips	Producer
Bob Weinstein	Executive Producer,Executive Producer
Juliana Janes	Executive Producer
Carmen Cuba	Casting
Ed Novick	Sound Mixer
Shauna Duggins	Stunts
Josh Hakian	Special Effects Supervisor
Monika Petrillo	Script Supervisor
Kelly Carmichael	Executive Producer
Ben Ormand	Executive Producer
Michael DeLuca	Producer

Editorial Reviews

Jim Field Smith's mild political satire Butter is a thinly veiled spoof of the 2008 race for the Democratic presidential nomination between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, transplanted to a quirky contest in America's heartland. The movie stars Jennifer Garner as Laura Pickler, the high-strung wife of local superstar Bob Pickler (Ty Burrell), who has won the town's annual butter-carving contest every year he's competed in it. Bob is a legend thanks to his prowess in the event, but this year he decides he's done with it and gives his highly ambitious wife the chance to step into the spotlight. She enters the competition, in part out of her own outsized need to win, and also to get back at Bob for his endless string of infidelities that she's quietly lived with throughout their marriage. With her stiff posture, pinched mouth, and driven-by-sheer-tenacity glare, Laura Pickler will remind many of recent right-wing presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann. However, she also resembles Hillary not only due to the allusions to Bill Clinton's hounddog past, but because Laura's biggest adversary turns out to be a preternaturally even-tempered, elementary-school-age, adopted black girl named Destiny (Yara Shahidi). At that point, the events of 2008 echo loudly. Annoying Laura even further, a third party enters the contest in the form of Brooke Swinkowski (Olivia Wilde), Bob Pickler's sexiest and most persistent mistress. Unable to accept that she might not be victorious, Laura resorts to drastic and unethical measures to win, including calling on the services of an unscrupulous ex-boyfriend (Hugh Jackman). The script by first-time screenwriter Jason Micallef certainly has originality in its favor. The unique collision of offbeat Christopher Guest-inspired small-town insanity and insistent (though never explicit) political satire makes it difficult to know what twists and turns are coming. In addition, Smith's direction is solid, getting laughs out of the various jokes and giving the actors room to be as broad as something this silly requires without making them overly cartoonish -- "overly" being the key word. There are laughs to be had throughout Butter thanks to the fine work by the cast: Shahidi has a wonderful face and delivers a number of monologues with winning ease, Garner's control-freak meltdowns are a kick, Rob Corddry finally gets to play something other than an obnoxious jackass as Destiny's dad, Wilde is heart-stoppingly sexy, and Burrell turns Bob into a himbo of the highest comedic order. If only Butter added up to a little more, all of their fine work would have coalesced into something much better. It settles for cute when it could have had more bite, and it aims for amusing when it had hilarious in its sights.