I really, really, really wanted to like this film. It features some of the best comedic talent working in the ‘States at the moment. So it’s hard to figure out why the film just doesn’t work. Maybe they just got too crazy with the improvisation stuff, and forgot you still need jokes, not just gags. Maybe the story itself, about a 70’s T.V. Anchorman just isn’t really that funny. Maybe it’s because no-one can be funnier, or more self obsessed than the best anchor ever, Ted Baxter, on the great ‘Mary Tyler Moore Show’. Maybe the film is just too overloaded with cameos (Jack Black, Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughan all pop up), and when Jack Black isn’t funny, you know something is wrong. Maybe Christina Applegate should have stayed on television, as she doesn’t seem to have the chops to carry a major motion picture. Whatever went wrong, the film is irritating rather than funny, and in the end will only appeal to fans of absurdist, pratfall-ridden films. So, that is about 75% of the possible audience.