Bad Eggs is a "deadly serious comedy" about corrupt cops in Melbourne, Australia, released in 2003. It straddles the line between drama and comedy with the same deftness as Hot Fuzz, which in some respects it resembles. Stars Mick Molloy, Bob Franklin, Judith Lucy and a slew of other Australian comedians and veteran actors, and directed by Tony Martin; the same team would go on to make Crackerjack and BoyTown, which are much more overt comedies. Compare the Swedish film Kopps.
This film contains the following tropes:
- Air Vent Escape: Discussed, Inverted and Defied in one sentence.
- Black Comedy: Hence the tagline.
- Brick Joke: Several.
- The Cameo: Tony Martin, the director, as the game show host, and Jane Kennedy as another TV host.
- Chase Scene: The slowest, awkwardest and most inept one ever filmed. Quite deliberately:Mike: Was that the most incompetent piece of driving in the history of high-speed pursuits or what?
- Chekhov's Gun: Ben and Julie's system of coded moves, and the Ridgeway case.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Mike.Ben: Did you make your one phone call?Mike: Yeah.Ben: Who'd you call?Mike: J. D. Salinger. I figure, if you only get one phone call...
- Cluster F-Bomb: True to life.
- Deadpan Snarker: The entire cast, even the normally nervous Northey. Judith Lucy's Julie takes the cake however, given this is basically her entire shtick in anything she's in.
- Digging Yourself Deeper: "And horrified shoppers."
- Funny Background Event: More like Funny Background Dialogue, mostly satirising the Australian media.
- Gilligan Cut: Ben asks What Could Possibly Go Wrong? if they attend Poulgrain's funeral. Cue a front-page story of them knocking over the coffin.
- Incoming Ham: Ted Pratt. "YYYYEP, I smell fuckwits."
- Lampshade Hanging: Mike, several times.
- Metaphorgotten: Mike falls into this while trying to recruit Northey to their scheme, talking about the very long brush that will apply sticky tar to the fence-sitters.
- Newscaster Cameo
- No Backwards Compatibility in the Future: Northey's database is "an old '70s system that no one's compatible with." Although when Ben accesses it, it's clearly running Windows 98.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Premier Lionel Cray is former Premier Jeff Kennett. Cray's slogan, "the state on the go", echoes Kennett's, "Victoria - on the move".
- No Party Given: The Premier only refers to "a family-first government". Australia now does have a Family First party, but it's made clear in one scene that it's his slogan, not his party.
- Oh, Crap!: Doug Gillespie's last moments.
- Once Done, Never Forgotten: No matter what Mike does, all anyone knows him for is the time he was an extra on Australia's Most Wanted and fell off a prop ladder on a live broadcast.
- Our Premiers Are Different: This one is a clear Premier Corrupt.
- Outrun the Fireball: Mike and Ben flee after crashing their car into a tank of flammable gas... which then doesn't ignite.
- Overly Long Gag: Ted, interrupted by a passing train.Ted: Where was I?Mike: "Fuckknuckles."
- Revealing Cover-Up: Ben and Mike were investigating casino boss Marcus Ridgeway, and the Poulgrain disaster results in the case being given to another detective. Unfortunately for the plotters, though, it starts them looking into the Poulgrain case, which ends up being tied to Ridgeway and exposing enough corruption to bring down the government.
- Riding into the Sunset: Well, more Walking A Few Yards Up The Road Before Remembering We Have A Car.
- Rule of Three: "Those three disasters have been taken completely out of context!"
- Stuff Blowing Up: A few times, but the one you'll remember is the Aversion.
- Too Much Information: Mike can't seem to stop telling people about his sex life.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: The opening sequence of a driverless car rolling through suburban streets, narrowly missing drivers and pedestrians, even as it enters a mall, completely unnoticed and unremarked upon until seconds before it collides with stage.
