No. 359 : Wild Men (2021)

 

Wild Men at the IMDb

 This subtitled Danish film was offered up to me on the BBC iPlayer and I was glad that I gave it a go. Most Scandinavian films involve murders and detective work in the dark, but this was mostly good fun and it had a strong heart.

The film opens with a large man dressed in animal skins attempting to shoot a goat with his homemade bow and arrow. He fails to nail his quarry and ends up having to settle for a toad instead, which causes him to be sick. He’s obviously a novice at the outdoor life and he soon heads to a petrol station/grocery store where his lack of money leads to him fighting with the staff and making off with a basket of shopping.

Meanwhile three more urban young men come a cropper when they hit an elk in the road and crash. There is seemingly only one survivor, and he staggers off with their large holdall of money. He soon stumbles into the path of our fur clad hero Martin, who manages to carry out some pretty decent first aid, including some stitches on a nasty leg gash.

Elsewhere the police are looking into Martin’s shop heist and into the crashed car, which now has no bodies, unless you count the elk hanging out of the front, which I do.

Two hapless policemen find the injured bagman but Martin decides to help his new friend and handcuffs the two cops together. The bagman, whose name is Musa, convinces Martin that they should head to an idyllic village where people live as Vikings did, off the land. As they set off on their quest a jaded police chief ramps up the investigation and Musa’s erstwhile colleagues set about recovering their cash. Who will achieve their goal? – and is it one that is worth having?

I quite enjoyed this film which was for the most part a gentle comedy, but one laced with a bit of gore, torture and some killings. The central theme was one of isolation and of people struggling with the modern world.

We didn’t get a lot of backstory to Martin’s plight but we know his life in the woods amounted to only ten days when we first encounter him. His seemingly long-suffering wife and his two daughters – and their rabbit! -set off from Denmark to find him in the Norwegian forests and, to be fair, she does a lot better than the cops!

The ‘tired of life’ policeman was a bit of a cliché but I liked his curmudgeonly attitude, and he got a fitting end, something akin to that of Mike in ‘Breaking Bad’. There was some commentary on immigration and the dilution of traditional values – some of it deliberate, such as the monetised Viking village and some of it less so with the drugs trade seemingly following the incomers. This slant was tempered by the Martin/Musa relationship which ended on a positive note.

I don’t think I learned much here – certainly nothing about surviving outdoors! – but it was a warm good-natured film that offered some social commentary and a few laughs along the way.

Best Bit - Viking Village Visit

W Rating 15/23

No. 355 : Weird : The Al Yankovic Story (2022)

 

Weird : The Al Yankovic Story at the IMDb

This film was offered up to me by Amazon who are obviously aware of my dubious tastes. I am not immune to the acquired taste of Weird Al and I can honestly say that ‘Hardware Store’ is a rock solid classic.

I was a bit reticent about Daniel Radcliffe playing Al in this parody bio-pic though. I’ve never rated him as an actor and I’m sure all of his career stems from the fall out from his stint as Harry Potter. It must be easy to get a film green lit when you have such an established fan base behind your star. He also seems unlikeable as a person and regardless of your position on the debate I think his behaviour against JK Rowling, who effectively gave him his entire career, is indefensible.

 

Still, we all like a laugh so let’s have a look. The film lost points for me right away when it was clear that our old friends the non-linear narrative and the unreliable narrator were being employed. The film opens with Al being rushed to surgery but as so often happens the narration guides us back to the subject’s childhood. This sees a young Al being held back with his parents with his Dad assaulting a door to door accordion salesman. I appreciate that this was done for laughs but when the film is a biopic it annoys me when stuff gets totally made up. How can you trust anything that’s said going forwards?

 

The film doesn’t concern itself with accuracy however with Al’s affair with Madonna and his dealing with Pablo Escobar covered in detail. There were a few laughs as Al’s fledging career is helped by Rainn Wilson’s ‘Dr Dememto’. His parody and polka-based songs soon take off and there is a knowing nod to his niche popularity when a star-spangled pool party has all the celebs, such as Devine and Pee-Wee Herman fawning over Al.

 

The film was produced by ‘Funny or Die’ and they clearly used some of their influence to get a load of guest stars who showed up for a single scene such as Jack Black, Michael McKean and Conan O’Brien who managed a very poor impression of Andy Warhol. The pool party was the best scene and it went downhill from there. Basically, as soon as Evan Rachel Wood’s Madonna shows up you should bail out.

 

The film sees Al rise to greatness and then succumb to the temptations of stardom. He overcomes Michael Jackson parodying his song ‘Eat it’ with the inferior ‘Beat it’ and manages to reconcile with his father. Will All see a happy ending, or will it be one awards show too many?

 

This film was OK, but I thought Radcliffe was miscast. They clearly used Al for the songs and Potter’s buff body didn’t really suit the wimpy character he was playing. I could see the argument that the casting added to the self-serving bio-pic nature of the film but he just looked like a British guy in a wig.

 

The format and narrative of the film was a lot like ‘Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story’ and it was about as 20% as good as that stone cold classic. It also borrowed heavily from Howard Stern's 'Private Parts' and again it doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as that wonderful film.

 

Al himself shows up as a music executive who turns himself down for a contract and it almost seemed that the whole film was nothing but wish fulfilment on the part of the Polka Prince. I would have preferred more laughs and less self-reverential stuff barely disguised as satire. It was fun for the many cameos, but I came away learning little about the subject and having had too few laughs to justify my 100-minute investment.

 

Best Bit: The pool party.

‘W’ Rating: 13/23

No.337 : Wheels of Fortune (2020)

 

Wheels of Fortune at the IMDb

Badger out of ‘Breaking Bad’ stars in this redneck inheritance comedy which registered a single smile with this viewer. We open with Jeff Fahey, who we liked in ‘Machete’, out for a sky dive. His chute and backup fail but he is saved by a friend who  grabs him and eases him back towards Earth. Sadly the rescuer’s parachute is cut by a drone, but at least he softens Jeff’s landing. It’s not Jeff’s day however as he is then hit by a truck and seemingly fatally injured.

He runs a large company and his grasping children arrive at his bedside to hear who will inherit the business. Instead they are told of his long lost son Bo (Badger) who was the product of him slumming it some years ago. Bo is a mechanic for a tractor pull champion and he still laments the day when the lack of a clutch cable meant he couldn’t win the big race as a child, sending him on a losing spiral that has persisted ever since.

His fortunes look up however when Jeff, who has died off-screen, sends his lawyer to Bo to offer a challenge, the like that is only ever heard of in movies. The challenge is that if Bo can get a podium finish in four races over the next month he will inherit something that isn’t really specified. He isn’t keen at first, but the offer of $100 a day expenses for him, his idiot friend Noodle, and the love interest Mandy seals the deal.

The film then takes many predictable turns with the conniving relatives trying to stop Bo’s progress, him becoming an ‘internet sensation’ and of course him losing sight of what’s really important. With three podium finishes in the bag it all comes down to the monster truck racing - can Bo win the challenge? And what inevitable surprises lies in wait?

This was an awful Netflix find that has very little to recommend it. It was like a mash up between ‘Brewster’s Millions’ and ‘Run Ronnie Run’ but not nearly as enjoyable as either. It was a comedy, so the ridiculous premise can be excused to some degree, but how does a guy who dies unexpectedly manage to have an elaborate plan all set up, including a message dispensing suitcase and a schedule set up that begins the day of his untimely demise? That’s your clue actually; I just wonder if in real life the lawyers would tell him to piss off with the relatives getting him declared mental from the off.

Badger is kinda likable in the lead but his shtick runs thin early on and he doesn’t have what it takes to hold the whole thing together. The conniving relatives weren’t menacing at all and their characters were underwritten. I did like love interest Mandy, but she could have done without the inflated lips.

The only chuckle raised with me was the wise ticket collector who got the sack for dispensing sage advice. Other than that it was a dull ride though various motor sports with real footage inter-cut with our hero doing the ‘driving’.

The redneck humour offered no laughs with exchanges like ‘It’s a retinal scan’ / ‘You’re not sticking that up my butt’ being the standard on offer. If you are on your third bottle of wine you may snigger at the man being trapped in a porta-potty, but this was low brow fare that won’t last ten minutes in the memory.

Best Bit : ‘You're fired’  ‘W’ Rating 7/23

No.334 : Where’s the Money (2017)

Where's the Money at the IMDb

Hmmm, for a film centred about higher education it’s disappointing that the interrogative statement that is the title hasn’t been furnished with a question mark. Still we’ve went over this old chestnut before with the question mark being considered unlucky in Hollywood. It begs the question therefore; how bad would this film have been if the correct punctuation was used?

Actually, it’s not that bad - it’s horrible, unfunny and morally dubious but I did get a few chuckles from the characters who were all desperate not to cause offence and be seen as racist. 

The film opens with some narration and an overview of L.A. and specifically South Central. Our hero, Del, works in a gym that his father and uncle started to keep kids away from crime. Sadly they didn’t practice what they preached and ended up in jail for a $1m bank robbery. Del is a bit hopeless and is constantly nagged by his Mom to fix an overhead air conditioner that isn’t properly secured. This is possibly the first use of Chekov’s air conditioner in a mainstream movie, so remember it for later.

Del’s Dad gets in touch to say that his Uncle is due to get out and he’s worried that he’ll grab the hidden bank job loot before he can. He tasks Del with recovering the cash, but alas the derelict house in which the money was hidden is now a frat house for a bunch of white college kids.

Del tries to get to the basement where the money is hidden by posing as a fire marshal but is costume is rumbled and he has to start another plan. There’s no suggestion that he should maybe get a job and report the money to the authorities, so instead he poses as a pledge to join the fraternity. The frat lads know that they need a token non-white, so Del stacks the deck in his favour by leading a revolt of all the minorities that he fails to join in with.

Del now has to go through a variety of initiation rituals to gain entry to the fraternity and the money laden basement. Will he get the hard to please girl and will the money be found - and kept?

The best part of this film was it’s approach to racism and social hang ups in general. The white characters dressed in KKK suits for the initiation, pointing out that their frat actually predated the KKK and their hats are less pointy. This led to some fun scenes in the ghetto where every character had a gat and said ‘motherfucker’. I don’t know if they were mocking stereotypes by having loads of them, but I don’t think so.

The whites were constantly conferring over the correct language to use with Del gaining mileage by calling them out for their use of ‘slaves’ and ‘auctions’. The whites were all embarrassed and the blacks had a good laugh with their faux outrage. It was a bit one note however so it was good that they had a couple of gross out scenes to balance the political commentary - the man licking out a rat was lovely.

The big showdown at the end went as you’d guess and it seemed bizarre that they just shared out the cash with no worries about the prospect of life in a super-max prison if they were found out. There was some measure of redemption and bonding all round, but what about the poor insurance company who had the rightful claim to that cash? No wonder my Aviva shares are in the toilet!

Overall a decent fun take on contemporary attitudes to race where no one got offended and we all learned a bit about acceptance, tolerance and stealing money.

Best Bit : Stealing the Time Capsule -  14/23

 

No.331 : Where’s That Fire? (1939)

Where's That Fire? at the IMDB

OK, who asked for a black and white comedy that survived the Blitz and is now in the public domain? Oh everyone? Good news, ‘cos that’s what we’ve got.

Will Hay stars as hopeless fire chief Captain Viking. He manages two underlings and the three of them make the Stooges look like intellectuals. They get up to some funny hijinks, but how many have burned to death whilst they are squirting hoses at each other?

They work in a sleepy town, but one that seems to beset with fire related issues. They have had sixteen call outs and have not put out one fire - well they have, because otherwise they’d still be burning, as they point out to the councillors. The lads’ ancient fire engine takes ages to get set up and after the town hall burns down their bosses put them on a warning - modernise and put out one fire or they’ll all be sacked. 

This warning puts a light under our guys, so to speak, so they head off to a modern fire station to see what they can learn. Back home, Chief Viking who is a part time inventor, sets up some automation and the guys set about installing a fireman’s pole. This takes ages to get in the door and results in the breakage of just about every window in town.

Meanwhile a couple of scouts show up and ask to rent the fire engine for a film for £30. Our negligent heroes grab the money but unbeknown to them, the men are in fact criminals intent on stealing the crown jewels. The ancient engine is the same as that in the Tower of London and the baddies hope to ‘Trojan Horse’ their way in.

Can our heroes thwart the crime and save their jobs?

You know a film is ancient when Charles Hawtry is cast as a schoolboy. He’s actually quite good in it as he offers Viking some mathematical formulas as a solution to his fire pole issues.

The film is slapstick throughout with just a tad of drama tacked on at the end so they can claim a story. The three main cast members bounce off each other well, with each being more idiotic and greedy than the next. I liked Moore Marriott’s old coot who loved the bottle and wasn’t shy about lighting fires to earn a couple of quid.

Some of the set pieces were great fun with the fire pole manoeuvring being funnier and funnier the more ridiculous their schemes got. I usually bail out on something when you can see where it’s going, but there was a good ten minutes of broken windows and wilder solutions that didn’t waste a moment.

It was gentle fun with their horse Percy the brains of the outfit. At one point they are trying to put out a fire at a petrol station and they connect the hose to the petrol rather than to the water - deaths and massive property damaged must have ensued!

There was the odd kick in the pants a la Chaplin, but this was a lot more British with class issues and a stiff upper lip all present and correct. At only 70minutes this one doesn’t ask much of you and you will be rewarded with more than a few laughs and a nostalgic look at a long bygone age.

Best Bit : Automatic Horse Saddling  ’W’ Rating 17/23

 

No.327 : When We First Met (2018)

 

When We First Met at the IMDb

Watching this film you may get the feeling that it’s Groundhog Day, not because it's is a funny and well crafted piece of original entertainment, but because it rehashes large portions of the Bill Murray classic. That’s not to say it just rips off ‘Groundhog day’ - it also rips off ‘Big’ and ‘Back to the Future’ too.

Still these films are all 30+ years old so let’s see if this modern take adds anything to the overly familiar genre. Adam Devine, who you’ll know from the ‘Pitch Perfect’ films as well as ‘Why Him?’ stars as Noah, a jazz bar pianist, who is attending the engagement party of Avery and Ethan. He remembers that three years ago he met Avery at a Halloween party and fell for her. He wasn’t able to seal the deal however, and the next day Avery met Ethan and his chance was lost.

He gets drunk and gets a ride home from Avery’s photographer flatmate, Carrie. The pair stop off at Noah’s jazz bar and he forlornly wishes in the antique photo booth that he had the chance to do things differently. Happily the photo booth seems to have been made by the same people who made Tom Hanks’ ‘Zoltar’ machine and Noah wakes up three years earlier on the day of the fateful Halloween party.

He spends a lot of time coming to terms with his situation but eventually chooses a different costume and approach towards Avery to get out of the friend zone and into the loving relationship he thinks is his destiny. As you will probably guess things don’t go to plan and after the party he wakes up in a now changed present to see where he is and what kind of relationship he has with the elusive Avery. As the present days flounder he retreats back to the photo booth to try again...and again.

Sometimes he’s rich and discontented - others see him branded a stalker, or with Avery but with her not loving him. Will his repeated trips back in forth in time lead to the problem being fixed or does his true route to happiness lie in a different direction?

This Netflix film was OK as a Sunday afternoon distraction but it offered nothing new and the outcome was no real surprise. The whole film was essentially that scene in ‘Groundhog Day’ where Bill Murray tries to fast forward his romance plans by remembering lots of details about Andie Macdowell’s life and creeping her out. No self respecting film will ever let the hero profit with such knowledge and, as ever, they demand that their character learn, grow and accept some truths before he can move on.

Of course there was no reason given for the magic in play and that’s fair enough, but acceptance came easy to Noah and at no point did he try to but Facebook shares or bet Leicester to win the league. Still, it said fantasy on the tin and that’s what you get.

I liked that they didn’t make the love rival an asshole, with Noah coming off the worst due to his manipulative machinations. The same scenes played out several times and it would have been good to have seen them from different perspectives, as it did come across as a bit dull and lazy.

There were no laughs or surprises, but the young and good looking cast seemed to be having fun and, if you don’t demand too much, you may get a slice for yourself.

Best Bit : Oh I’m Fat Now  ‘W’ Rating 14/23

No.320 : What About Dick? (2012)

What About Dick? at the IMDb

I chanced upon this one on Netflix and thought I’d unearthed a gem given the stellar cast, but alas it was a rough in the rough.

The film is a live performance in the style of a 1940’s radio play complete with a man making all the special effects noises. A partisan L.A. audience laps it up but I didn’t laugh at all, at the puerile humour which is usually my thing.

Eric Idle wrote and starred in the film and plays a piano which charts the decline of the British Empire. He’s not a piano, but wears a piano key tie so that we remember he is the constant who relates and narrates the story whilst the cast ham it up as various characters.

The plot is wafer thin and serves only to get a few songs in as well as barrels of innuendo and funny voices. Tracey Ullman was probably the best value doing good voice work and clearly getting into the spirit of things. You also get Jane Leeves and Big Suze as a pair of sisters and Russell Brand as the titular Dick who manages to make the part his own, in his usual style.

You also get Eddie Izzard as an Indian manufacturer of rubber dildos and Billy Connolly as a police inspector cum private eye who has a lisping voice that he at least finds very funny. You also get Tim Curry and Jim Piddock who mostly just do funny voices and patch the whole thing together.

A couple of the songs were decent but the whole thing just seemed awfully lazy with characters called ‘Bastard’ and Dickhead’ for example. There were also old jokes on parade with the Indian Regiment called ‘The First Foot & Mouth’ © ‘Carry on up the Khyber’ and someone saying ‘I opened the door in my pyjamas - why was there a door in my pyjamas?’ - yawn.

The runtime of 80 minutes may seem short but it does drag on once you get an idea of the humour and writing on show. It’s a great cast who are clearly enjoying themselves; it’s just a shame they didn’t invite the viewer along.

Brand and Connolly were unintelligible in places and you have to wonder what the American audience made of them. Funny eccentrics I guess, but I was cringing at the mirth free and faintly embarrassing wacky antics on show.

It may have been a good night out after a few beers but as a Netflix offering it fell flat with a lot of the seemingly period humour already dated - Berlesconi ‘bunga bunga’ references anyone? Actually it would probably have been painful to see live as a lot of transitions were added in to show flashbacks as well as caption cards, which suggested the whole thing was edited down to afford the audience at home a small measure of mercy.

For me this was a self indulgent and unfunny mess that offered no laughs, but if you want to see some of your favourite comedians ham it up, fill your boots. You’ll just never convince me that saying ‘dick’ as a euphemism for ‘penis’ 200 times qualifies as entertainment.

Best Bit : Not Russell Brand’s Dick ‘W’ Rating  8/23

No.313 : What If (2013)

What If at the IMDb

First world problems now as a group of attractive 30 somethings try to navigate the exciting world of relationships in this likeable comedy drama.

Harry Potter himself stars as Wallace, a medical school drop out who found his girlfriend had cheated on him, just as his parents had on each other. Not surprisingly he’s cynical about relationships but feels a spark when he meets Chantry, a cute animator whose illustrations pop up throughout the film. She does that annoying thing of mentioning her boyfriend a lot, but we suspect that the pair will get together because, you know, films.

Wallace has a flatmate in the shape of Adam Driver who gives out terrible advice. He has a girlfriend and is a cousin of Chantry and is against the ‘incestuous’ proto-relationship - but he’s not really.

Our dream couple enter the friend zone and find out they have a lot in common such as Elvis sandwiches and going to the pictures on their own. Chantry is torn when her boyfriend’s job takes him to Dublin for a year and she spends more time with the puppy dog Potter. After some initial shyness, when she makes him close his eyes before helping her off with a dress, they soon graduate to full on skinny dipping.

A few obstacles fall into our heroes' paths but can they get together before the film ends? You bet!

I’m always a sap for a romantic comedy and this was no exception. Harry was good in the lead doing his self effacing Englishman part. He has some good lines and a cynical outlook - I like his reply ‘Nothing’s too slutty for you’ when Chantry asked if her a dress made her look easy.

It was good that the boyfriend wasn’t portrayed as a total dick with only a small hint that he may have been cheating on Chantry. Potter did come across as a bit of a creep when relegated to the friend zone and I imagine in real life the girl would just have had him collecting her dry cleaning forever more in the outside hope he may get a drunken fumble one day.

As always Adam Driver, the best thing in the film with our blog enjoying his recent outing in While We're Young. He was clearly deserving of a big break and it’s just a shame it came in those lamentable 'Star Wars’ films. In this he was very much a supporting character but I always enjoyed his scenes which were usually full of some outrageous patter and advice.

Zoe Kazan was good as Chantry although her character was a bit annoying. It was like she kept engineering ways to avoid the inevitable. The fall out scene at the café was classic ‘pain in the arse’ woman and why Potter went back for another try can only be explained by her looking cute in her undies.

If you are looking for surprises or even some sex and violence, you won’t find it here. I could see this film having a large following amongst those looking for a way to be more than just good friends with the option of their affections. Still a chance!

There was no peril and no doubt as to how things would turn out but that’s not what the film aspired to. Get them matched up in 100 minutes and it’s warm feelings all round - Romanticanus!

Best Bit : Beach Party  16/23

No.312 : Water (2019)

Water (2109) at the IMDb

You know your picture isn’t going to be of the best quality when the best credit you can find for any of the cast is something called ‘Atomic Shark’ which has a shark with a nuke on its back for the poster. In fact most of the cast don’t even have their photo on IMDb which is probably explained by the fact that none of them appear to be actors.

We open with a man getting frisky on a lounger by the pool with his lady friend at night. She asks him about leaving his wife and fortunately she can ask her herself as she’s just come home. The wife has rushed home with news of her pregnancy but when she sees the sexy goings on she grabs a knife and goes on the rampage. There is a quick cut so we don’t know what happens but the wife ends up stabbed in the pool.

The girlfriend is quite happy with this turn of events and the pair chop up the body with an axe and burn the pieces. The man, Frank, decides he might as well go for the double and kills the girlfriend too. He calls in the cops and has enough influence as a top doctor to ally any suspicions. A year passes and Frank gets a call fro the insurance company - how would he like the wife’s $11m insurance payout? He celebrates with his new girlfriend in the pool but just as she’s getting down to earning her cut both she and Frank disappear into the water.

All the while, simpleton handyman Daryl is wandering about seeing things and talking to himself. He too gets a tickle in the pool but gets out after monetarily blacking out. Time passes and a real estate agent and his girlfriend take a midnight dip they soon regret before another family move in. This chap is an English movie producer and they move in after their adopted daughter is saved from drowning in the pool by a realtor. At least that’s what they think - we get an underwater shot of a mermaid like creature rescuing the girl.

The family sense something not right about the house - mostly water based things like the shower going cold and taps turning on. Maybe it’s haunted by the ghost of Super Mario? They try an exorcism but that’s a waste of time and we have to wonder who will get dragged into the pool next and what is behind this horror? Apart from the script, acting etc.

This was an awful film with the worst acting you’ll have ever seen, as long you missed ‘Albion Market’. The cast all crash each others lines and a lot of the script looks improvised, as characters trail off without finishing their…

There is plenty of sex to spice things up with the ladies of the cast looking like a job lot form some backstreet boob implant emporium. One lady takes her top off and her boob remains in the same flattened shape as her basque top. Breath out luv and it will pop straight back out.

I’m not sure of the pool’s motivation - it was a sort of moral guardian allowing only those not getting up to hanky panky to escape its watery tendrils. No one really notices the pool based issues, especially the police who keep telling people not to leave town and that’s it. The characters tend to avoid the pool later on but this is solved by the pool’s mystical ‘drag ‘em in feature’.

There was no effort at an explanation - maybe it used to be an ancient Indian burial pool? To be fair I did have a few laughs and the cast didn’t seem to be taking it that seriously so there’s no reason for the viewer to either. The film probably just hits the required level to be deemed ‘so rubbish it’s good'. But not that good.

Best Bit : The overacting albino priest doing an exorcism ‘W’ Rating 9/23

No.306 : Who Am I? (1998)

Who Am I? at the IMDb

Before this offering I’d never seen a Jackie Chan film, believing them to be shit. Having watched this one, I have not seen my original hypothesis disproved. Chan gets credit for direction, stunts and screenplay, in that order, so you have right away an idea of where the focus was - not on story or character but on kicking people a lot.

Chan plays the cleverly named character ‘Jackie Chan’ who is part of a military unit in South Africa. We have seen a meteorite being mined and its explosive power. Chan and his team carry out a mission to retrieve some fragments of the meteorite but are double crossed by some shits in suits who crash the helicopter they are travelling in, off camera, to save some money and to deny us a small thrill. Chan falls out before the explosion and is saved by a forest canopy and some natives who nurse him back to health - but oh no! Jackie has lost his memory.

After having difficulty in making himself understood to both the natives and the viewing audience, Jackie soon speaks the language and wears the garb and make up of the tribe. He finds the rest of his dead crew and the body of one of the bad guys who was tossed from the helicopter. Their multiple passports suggest there is more going on, and a matchbook with some writing on it may hold the answers - new one that!

Jackie then encounters a rally car where the driver has been bitten by a snake. He uses his new found tribal abilities to cure the bite and his kick ass driving talent to win the stage and deliver the man to the medics. This heroism gets press attention and soon the evil shits in suits are after our man who calls himself ‘Whoami’ due to his amnesia. A trip to Rotterdam ensues, where there are innumerable fights and chases before we learn who he is (Jackie Chan) and what becomes of the meteorite which has the potential to unleash untold energy.

Like a Van Damme film, it’s hard to criticise a Jackie Chan movie for bad acting or too much fighting. It was really dull however and I couldn’t see the end quick enough. Jackie seems a lovely bloke, but he lacks leading man charisma and seemed badly dubbed throughout. Indeed, everyone was, with the scientists especially, sounding like someone had phoned in some random voices for them.

There were a couple of decent set pieces but they went on too long with the big finale rooftop fight taking at least ten minutes during which one blow may have landed. The plot was atom thick with there no sense of danger as the disc with the meteor data changed hands every five minutes and the double crosses piled up.

Jackie’s lack of identity didn’t really matter to the plot and the whole thing seemed facile especially as his name is over the title. The film does need your buy in to the fact that no one gets killed by our man, and that all the bad guys queue up to get their faces nearly kicked. You also have to love Jackie with lots of small amusements thrown in so you can say ‘Ooh that Jackie!’. fair enough for his fan base but him getting it in the nuts once with a gear stick is fine - the other several events of this I could have done without.

It was obvious that this was a multi country co-production that was not shot in English. The dubbing was risible as was a lot of the stunt work, which saw the older characters turn into stuntmen when they were getting hit before turning back into themselves as they recovered from the fall.

I enjoyed no laughs or thrills throughout this film and despite some decent locations and stunts it was a complete waste of time. Who am I? Don’t care mate.

Best Bit : Streets Get Clogged  ‘W’ rating 8/23

No.303 : Wish I Was Here (2014)

Wish I Was Here at the IMDb

Writer /Director Zach Braff gives us another slice of an unfulfilled melancholy life in this feature, which is similar to his earlier effort ‘Garden State’ albeit with him a lot older, as the relentless passage of time demands.

Zach plays Aidan, a struggling actor who is married to the lovely Kate Hudson and has two kids who have more than a bit of stage school about them. Zach can’t get an acting job and has money worries. His Dad, Saul off ‘Homeland’ is paying for his grandchildren’s orthodox Jewish education but has to pull the plug owing to the treatment costs for his aggressive cancer. Kate is working at the Water Board and is being harassed by a creepy co-worker who has a talking penis.

Zach has a friend in that ‘Bazinga’ guy whom he sees at auditions, including one for an African American part where he is rightly beaten for it by Stanley out of ‘The Office’. Despite his lovely wife and kids Zach is unfulfilled and escapes into a fantasy world where he runs about in a spacesuit followed by a helpful drone sidekick. He also has a brother who is a waste of space, but has ambitions to make a kick ass Comic-Con outfit with the help of his useful HUD display which finds parts for him in the junk pile.

With him being unable to meet the fees, Zach takes his kids out of school and enjoys some quality time with them as they learn about life and their heritage whilst standing on rocks and fixing a fence.

Kate meanwhile is resentful of her crappy job and that Zach is using her income to pursue his dream of being an actor - she didn’t sign up for that. Things take a turns for the worse with Saul's health and Zach has to try and repair both his and his brother’s relationships with their dying Dad, whilst also trying to save his marriage and deal with his wife’s employment issues. Can he find contentment in his frankly over privileged life?

I enjoyed this ‘slice of life’ but it was a bit tiresome in places with Zach not knowing how well he had it. That was part of the point, but with Kate Hudson welcoming you home with a vest top and no bra it was hard to be sympathetic to the needy Zach. Kate was good but she didn’t look like a harassed Mom of two kids in a dead-end job. She looked like she’d walked off a modelling set most of the time, and although we were grateful for her presence her issues didn’t ring true either.

Better was Saul whose voice got frailer with each passing scene. His acceptance of his fucked up offspring was as touching as it was unbelievable. The laughs were mild at best and you’d say the whole thing was more affecting than humorous. I did like the scene in the Aston Martin dealership where a test drive was given as the salesman though the daughter's wig was due to cancer and not because of some Jewish tradition.

There was a lot of Jewishness in the film, which was fine, but it did make it very personal to the lead and made it a bit inaccessible to those of us who don’t have an intimate knowledge of the Torah or an interest in chanting. I get it that this was a necessary backdrop to the father son dynamic but it was overdone.

Overall this was an enjoyable trip in the California sunshine. There were no great learnings to be had, just some growth and a bit of redemption with a couple of smiles thrown in.

You could do worse, but you could do a lot better too.

Best Bit : Anything With Kate Please!  ‘W’ Rating 16/23

No.281 : Who’s Your Daddy? (2002)

Who's Your Daddy at the IMDb

Back to school once again in this straight to video romp that more or less follows the plot of every rags to riches film you’ve ever seen. Indeed it is a near carbon copy of recent ‘W’ movie shitefest 'Whatever it Takes‘ which preceded this effort by a couple of years. Despite it having a plot revolving round a porn empire this one is worse, a lot worse.

Our hero is Chris a senior at high school who looks about 30. The actor, whose career was pretty much killed by this film was in fact 22, but a lot older looking that his supposed 18 years, which makes it extra creepy when his mother walks in on him choking the chicken. He hangs around with the usual cast of dweebs and losers and fantasies about the hot girl in school, whilst failing to notice the cute school paper editor has the hots for him. Sound familiar?

We get a full half hour of dorky activity such as the gang trying to entice girls to their party and Chris being hit on the head by a ball three times in one scene. It wasn’t funny the first time but let’s see if repetition adds anything?

Eventually a lawyer named Mike Hunt (Thanks ‘Porkies’) shows up and tells Chris that his natural parents have died and that he is now the owner of the leading stroke mag in the country ‘Heaven’. All is not well however as the lawyer and an evil Uncle are trying to cheat Chris out of his inheritance. It’s like the script was on autopilot!

Chris heads off to the Playboy, sorry Heaven mansion and meets all the ‘Angels’ - various women with their knockers hanging out - and Lin Shaye’s secretary who ill advisedly wears suspenders throughout. After a few fumbles Chris goes full on prick mode and starts lording it over his fat hanger on and his classmates. He hooks up with the hot girl who has her own agenda and dumps on the pretty school paper editor. She won’t remember!

Soon enough, the baddies wrest control of the Empire from Chris and he has to win it back. Can he and some bimbos and nerds produce a magazine in time and come up with some unlikely twists to regain control? Of course they can! Just in time to get the nice girl too - she didn’t bear a grudge!

This was an awful effort and you can see why it earned its ‘video premiere’. You’d think for a film with dozens of topless women high marks would be earned but the plot was so basic and dull no amount of eye candy could save it.

Chris was a terrible character both in nerd and prick modes and you genuinely couldn’t give a toss for his endeavours. There were some decent actors showing up such as the asshole reporter out o the ‘Die Hard’ Films but they’ll all have Tippexed this one off their CVs. Special mention to Patsy Kensit who must have experienced her career low here, fondling a giant butt plug and trying to sell herself as ‘Miss May’ at 34 amongst a gaggle on teenage and enhanced models.

The morals were all pretty dubious too, with the principled school paper editor happily taking over the porno shoot. The idea that the magazine’s subscribers would take to her tasteful shots and feminist articles was one of the few chortles in the script.

You’d probably do well to find a copy of this dud but if you see it in the charity shop save yourself some embarrassment and hide it in a copy of ‘Razzle’ when you take it to the counter.

Best Bit : Arriving at the mansion.  ‘W’ Rating 10/23

No.270 : Why Him? (2016)

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No.263 : Wild Honey (2017)

Wild Honey at the IMDb

Another unheralded release courtesy of Amazon Prime now - so much more variety on there than Film 4 who offer little but ancient westerns. Still more of them coming soon! This film is a bit like the movie version of Alan Partridge’s ‘Problem People’ with everyone on show with issues to spare.

Our heroine here is Gabby, a phone sex operator from Chicago whose 49 years and ample frame are at odds with her dial up persona. She has issues at home with a cheating boyfriend and financial problems that see her car repossessed in the first five minutes. She moves back in with Mom and shares here woes with Reggina, a phone sex colleague with whom she unsuccessfully cruises bars seeking male company.

Things take a turn when she gets interrupted mid filth by a caller named Martin who’d rather have a nice chat than hear any more about your clit, thanks very much. At $2 a minute he’d be better off trying wrong numbers! They soon become close and his hefty bills mean a fat pay check for Gabby - more Funyuns for her! Martin asks for a photo and after some uncharacteristic shyness Gabby sends one over. She’s quickly told that’s she’s beautiful and gets all excited about her prospects with the pervert caller. Maybe his guide dog will like her too!

With indecent haste Gabby decides to fly to L.A. to doorstep her new friend, under the guise of catching up with her sister with whom she hasn’t spoken in two years. The sister is everything gabby is not - thin, neat and successful. She also has a pregnant assistant Greta who is charged with taking Gabby about town. Gabby gets dropped off at the park where Martin, a successful screen writer, has told her he sometimes works. Inevitably the two meet up and enjoy a blissful day of smoking dope, visiting the theatre and eating in a pretentious restaurant.

Gabby stays the night but is awoken the next morning when Martin’s brother shows up - it seems that Martin doesn’t own the house after all and the screen writer is his brother, not him. Shocked by his sudden loss of wealth Gabby flounces off. Meanwhile after her chats with Gabby, Greta grows a set and ditches her P.A. job with Gabby’s sister, who in turn is also breaking down, unable to keep up the façade of having a successful life.

With everything collapsing Gabby’s cheater boyfriend shows up and after some drug and sex action, (hope she had clean pants) he proposes marriage. Is it her he wants or her unlikely talents as a manager of his apartment block? Can each of the damaged souls find some happiness and is there hope for  a reconciliation with Martin, even at two bucks a minute?

I enjoyed this film. Rusty Schwimmer does well in the lead, a part that probably had Melissa McCarthy’s fingerprints all over it. Her dirty chat was pretty full on and she wasn’t shy about her ample frame or modest looks - real people that’s what we need!

There weren’t many out and out laughs, but I did like the ridiculous fancy restaurant with the 11 year old chef and the arty play involving Martin’s naked daughter tipping a tin of beans over herself .
The twist that Martin wasn’t what he seemed was signalled from Mars but it turned out a lot more mundane than my idea that he was a serial killer with plans for Gabby. In truth is was a nice film with no one coming out of it terribly. There was a lot of swearing and a few bits of nudity but I’m all for that if it helps the story along.

The ‘wild honey’ of the title was a reference to the bee hive that Martin kept. I’m sure there was an attempt at a big metaphor here, especially as he pointed out the queen and that ‘everyone has a job, even the workers’ but as my regular reader knows subtext isn’t my thing!

Over all it was a fun 90 minutes with gentle humour, slight character development and a topless woman covering herself in beans. Got to be pass marks for that alone!

‘W’ Rating 15/23
Best Bit : Beanz Meanz a good shower is required.

No.257 : War on Everyone (2016)

War on Everyone at the IMDb

 Well we’re back after a brief year long absence. I know the appetite for ‘W’ based movie excitement is unabated but fear not, the wait for the four of you is now over!

‘War on Everyone’ is the first American film by English director John Michael McDonagh who impressed with his last two offerings, ‘The Guard’ and ‘Calvary’ both of which starred Brendan Gleeson. I say ‘American film’ but I noticed that it was partly funded by the National Lottery despite starring two ‘B’ list Americans and being set in Albuquerque. Still if anyone likes a gamble it's them.

The film is billed as an ‘action comedy’ but the laughs were few and the action was low rent.

Michael Pena, last seen (by me) in ‘The Martian’ and Alexander Skarsgard who was Tarzan in his previous film before this, star as couple of New Mexico police detectives. They play fast and loose with the rues but can’t afford a scriptwriter to supply them with any zingers - “Where’s my X-Box?” “Do ya wanna look up my ass?” Titter you will not.

They highlight their badness by drink driving and swearing a lot but they just come across as a pair of tiresome jerks who are trying too hard to impress. The plot is lifted almost entirely form the ‘Starsky and Hutch’ movie but at least you don’t have Vince Vaughn as the baddie. Here the budget is clearly limited so you have to make do with the guy who got shit on his nose at the end of ‘The Inbetweeners’ movie. To be fair he is backed up by a guy channeling Malcolm McDowell in ‘A Clockwork Orange’ but he’s even worse and exudes the menace of a declawed kitten made out of cotton wool.

Our heroes set out on a quest to gain some drug money but soon get distracted by an exotic girlfriend who was better in ‘Westworld’ and a cute child who offered nothing, not even the intended softening of Pena’s character. The limited plot drags along with the investigation following no logical path and offering no laughs or thrills. At one point they do travel to Iceland for five minutes which seemed totally pointless and probably used up the script polishing budget as well.

The two leads were poor and didn’t gel at all. They were set out to be bad boys but you didn’t care about them at all and have nothing invested in their schemes. The direction was OK but I couldn’t help but think the director was out of his comfort zone and relied on tired old tropes rather than doing anything original. When Paul Reiser showed up as the police chief and demanded our heroes’ badges and to leave the prime suspect alone someone must have called ‘foul’.

The action sequences amounted to some low speed car crashes and a bin through a window so you can tell this isn’t exactly ‘Die Hard’. They also have the familiar trip to the strip joint where all the strippers were fully dressed. This looked like they were trying to secure a lower certificate but when they went back again it was all topless - had they went on Prudish Tuesday the first time around?

The locations were great and it did bring back memories as I too had traveled in that Albuquerque cable car. It wasn’t enough however; the film was dull and predictable and the Frankenstein’s monster of every buddy cop film that you’ve ever seen...

Best Bit : Let's check out the strip joint again...
‘W’ Rating 10/23

No.255 : Which Way Is Up? (1977)

Which Way is Up? at the IMDb

Richard Pryor takes on three roles in this 1977 comedy which is about as un-PC as you can imagine. Not only would it never be made today, being caught with a copy would probably see you get time in jail!

Still we are a broad church here at the ‘W’ Movie Quest so let’s see we if we can be offended.

The film opens in the run down shack that Pryor shares with his wife and extended family. He wakes up all horny but his wife isn’t in the mood. No problem as he tries to pry her legs apart in a scene that could be used in a ‘rape within marriage is still rape’ information film. The wife is saved when a young boy wanders in looking for his breakfast. Meanwhile elsewhere in the house Pryor’s father is getting some noisy sex in - luckily for Pryor he plays both roles!

Pryor plays Leroy Jones, a hapless everyman who works in the fields of California picking oranges. Their work is interrupted when a union march passes and when they ask for someone to volunteer to lead the orange pickers - Pryor lands the role when he falls off his ladder into the union leader’s arms. This doesn’t go well with the white farmers who run Pryor off for trying to unionise the workers - some of the language they use is just plain racist!

Our hero heads to the city and his brief foray into workers’ rights holds him in good stead with the local co-operative who give him a job as a painter. Pryor dispels any racial stereotypes by immediately slacking off the job and chasing a leggy lady who is impressed with his union credentials. After some downright stalking she gives in and lets Pryor into her bed - on one condition; he never sleeps with another woman, even his wife. This lady has class!

He sets up home with the lady and gets a couple of promotions when he interrupts an assassination attempt. Is ‘The Man’ seeing something in Pryor and will the man with the shiny ring be as menacing as is being implied?

Despite a couple of laughs this film fell flat after an hour and totally lost it’s way. It follows the same path as ‘The Jerk’ which followed it two years later, with an idiot rising up the ranks due to happenstance. I thought it was going to have Pryor make a difference and have some say in workers’ rights but the last section was nothing but him trying to have sex with the wife of the man who had sex with his long abandoned wife. Again the rival lover was played by Pryor in a thinner moustache - the man has range! - so the message seemed to be that all the woman, even the pastor’s wife, can't get enough of our man!

The language and slurs - both racial and sexual - certainly dated the film and while no one took offense it would cause ‘Points of View’ to explode if it were shown today - and rightly so. The good people at Blogger would shut me down if I repeated even half what was yelled throughout the film and although I did laugh, it was only in an ironic and uncomfortable way.

The film ends with a sort of lesson with Richard’s rise up the career ranks costing him on a personal and emotional level so much so he didn’t know which way up was any more. That said if he kept his dick in his shorts he’d be a lot happier regardless of what ‘The Man’ had planned.

I did laugh without reservation or justification at the thin coffin laid on for the man who was run over by a steamroller. Everything else is condemned outright!

Best Bit : Piano lessons at church
‘W’ Rating 14/23

No.239 : What Now (2015)

What Now at the IMDb

The other night I watched ‘Deep Impact’ and it was funny to see how the fledgling internet was shown with the marvels of search engines a wonder to all. That film was from 1997 and has dated poorly, but not as poorly as ‘What Now’ will have in the next 20 minutes - and it was made in 2015!

I suppose the producers would say that it captures the zeitgeist of the moment but when a film is hung entirely on online dating apps you can tells it’s not going to get a place in the National Archives. To be honest, it has dated already with Ashley Madison talked about as a going concern. Someone also references Miley Cyrus’ ‘Wrecking Ball’ so there’s another zinger for the folks in 2525!

The film concerns five LA single blokes who are trying for love online. They mostly work in a strip joint so you think there would be the odd woman there but they are ore interested in the ‘swipe right’ kind of ladies. They are presented as a mixed bag of personalities and types but they come across as assholes to a man.

The lead is DJ who works as the strip joint DJ - imaginative naming there. He’s in his 30s and keen for love but for some reason for a guy in the music and stripping businesses he’s a bit shy. He confides in his friends who are all similarly unattached and unsuccessful with the women. After a night of swiping hundreds of ladies they get no matches and decide something has to change.

Sadly the film has no ambition to rehabilitate its characters so one shaves his head and they take new profile pics before broadening their search beyond Hollywood and hey presto - dates! They all take the first girl available with predictably mixed results. One gets an S&M loving MILF while another gets one who is clearly mental as she’s a vegan and spots him as a jock.

Meanwhile a group of girls are also on the dating hunt and rating our men. Can love be found and will our men’s’ shallow approach pay dividends or will they need to see woman beyond a 2-D image to find true love and happiness?

This was a gawd awful mess of a film but I have to confess its terribleness was strangely compelling and I stayed through to the end to see what facile fates our heroes were granted. The old standard of the macho man inadvertently dating a transsexual was rolled out along with many other dating nightmares no doubt designed to get the hen nights cackling at the men’s inadequacy.

To be fair there are plenty of nightmare woman too from the socially responsible nightmare to the moody goth ; but they are all caricatures except for the lovely girl who balks at our hero’s strip show job but we hope to see back to give us all a hope of dating redemption!

The acting is terrible and you get the impression the whole affair was done with favours and cameos from the director’s softball team. One chap ‘Richard’ has the worst English accent you’ll ever hear and the rest have all the charming small talk and chemistry of an SS guard. For some reason Ice-T  shows up as himself and you can only imagine he walked onto the wrong set and earned a credit as a result.

It’s certainly not a film to track down, or even one to watch if you have put off the ironing for a couple of days, but if you are semi conscious and it shows up late night I wouldn’t say you have to turn it off. Fainter praise than that I don’t have.

Best Bit : The worst (at acting) English rock group ever.
‘W’ Rating : 7/23

No.237 : What We Did On Our Holiday (2014)

What We Did On Our Holiday at the IMDb

 If you like films about bickering couples (and who doesn’t?) this may well be the one for you.

Tenth Doctor David Tennant takes his family on a journey through time and space - well, it happens over a couple of days and they go to Scotland - where marital and family differences are all played out around the celebrations of his father’s (Billy Connolly’s) birthday.

Tennant is married to Rosamund Pike and rather than thank the Good Lord he spends all his time fighting with her - to be fair e never really got over Billie Piper. The pair live in London with their three stage school kids and have a daunting trip ahead of them to the Scottish Highlands where his brother (Ben Miller) and father live.

Ben is a total asshole who bullies his son and values his money over everything else. Bet he learns a lesson soon! He also has the worst Scottish accent you can imagine and it must have been that Alexander Armstrong was busy that weekend.

The family gather and we start to learn some home truths including some infidelity and that Billy has cancer. The innocent kids give away a lot of the family secrets to which wise old Billy dispenses increasingly annoying homilies, as he tries to protect them from the fractious family difficulties.

As the day of the day of the big birthaday party arrives an event occurs that leads all of the family to reevaluate their values and relationships. Yes, I’m afraid it’s that dull!

This was a largely inoffensive film but one that became increasingly annoying as it progressed. The characters were all thinly drawn and I didn’t really care why they were bickering never mind hope that they could become reconciled. The kids all did their best but there were a lot of fluffed lines and the wisdom of their innocence quickly became a real niggle.

The pivotal scene after an hour was as mawkish as it was unlikely - some of the impromptu building work carried out would have stumped Brunel!

It was a good cast with a lot of familiar faces popping up for five minutes but they were largely underused with shouting and yelling taking centre stage over any attempts at wit or charm.

The film was written and directed by Guy Jenkin and Andy Hamilton of ‘Drop the Dead Donkey’ fame and it’s a shame they produced such an anodyne and forgetful comedy rather than take a few chances, as we’d expect from them. It’s definitely not one to hate but just a twee and forgettable bit of fluff with nothing really to say and no laughs offered either.

Best Bit : No Osprey? Let’s paint one on the film!
‘W’ Rating 10/23

No.235 : Wild Target (2010)

Wild Target at the IMDb

Some people say British comedies are all the same predictable rubbish and feature the same old faces. Well if it’s ‘Wild Target’ they are commenting upon it’d be hard to argue with them!

Bill Nighy plays a hit man with mother and emotional issues. He’s had a long and successful career as an assassin, which he puts down to meticulous planning and not getting emotionally involved. We can see he’s hurting as he learns French from a tape and has dinner on his own, but surely nothing can break his granite like façade?

Meanwhile free spirited Emily Blunt is organising an art scam. She has hooked poor sucker Rory Kinnear to paint her an exact copy of an old master which she will then sell to Rupert Everett having shown him the original (Rory works at the National Gallery) before switching to the fake. The plan goes well and she makes £900k but the scheme falls apart when the paint is discovered to still be wet - art forgery mistake number one, you’d think!

Anyway Rupert hires Bill to kill Emily and after following her about town for a day Bill starts to take a shine to the thieving harlot. He is however about to shoot her when a rival hit man, Rab C Nesbitt, shows up and Bill has to decide to take the contract or the girl. Things are further complicated when Ron Weasley shows up and Bill, Ron and Emily have to escape together.

The remainder of the film is more or less padding as the three unlikely bedfellows get to know each other and themselves before evil hit man, Tim from the Office, tracks them down for a final showdown.

I don’t think I cracked a smile once during this alleged comedy. I normally quite like Bill Nighy but his character here was such a cliché it was hard to care. The meticulous hit man undone by a target plot is a lot older than Bill and frankly he is getting on a bit for his romance with Emily to be believable or even seemly. She is meant to come across as a free spirited rock chick but only manages ‘shallow thieving bint who gets lots of folk killed’.

Ron’s part is pretty superfluous and although he’s meant to be the son Bill never had he’s more like the guy who can’t act who’ll bring in the Harry Potter audience. Things should have been improved by adding Tim from ‘The Office’ to the mix but he lacked the menace his character was supposed to exclude and his comedy dentures were a mistake.

The climax, which has the most blatant foreshadowing I can remember (“be careful with that gun it explodes when fired”), was terrible but at least welcome as it signalled the film was nearly done.

I wasn’t bothered by the film’s shaky moral compass, only by it’s dearth of laughs and predictable plot.

Best Bit : Bill listens to his radio set
‘W’ Score : 9/23

No.226 : Why Stop Now? (2012)

Why Stop Now? at the IMDb

There’s no question mark on this movie’s poster but it appears on the title card at the end, and that’s good enough for us!

That poster is all wrong - it also contains the sub-title ‘A funny thing happened on the way to rehab’ and that’s patently false advertising!

Jesse Eisenberg plays Eli, a piano playing prodigy who looks after his drug addled mother while battling with demons of his own. The film opens with his arriving at an important audition for a select school with a cut hand. His teacher tries to calm him down from his hyper state and we are taken back a day to see how we arrived at this situation.

Things start at a teenage party where we witness Jesse’s social awkwardness amongst his peers and especially girls. He manages to impress with some virtuoso piano playing before spewing up - you hardly ever get that with Richard Clayderman! He has some chat with a girl who clearly likes him before heading off home to his demanding mother.

Mum is due to check into rehab the next day and Jesse sees this as a way to get her off his hands so that he can start a new life at his fancy school. Things fall apart however when Mum’s pee tests positive for nothing meaning she can’t get the state sponsored care she needs. A nurse tells her that if she can get high and ‘fail’ the drugs test she can get into the facility and Jesse can get on with his plans.

From here things start to fall apart in a predictable manner. Mother and son try to buy drugs but the dealers are out of stock. Jesse’s command of Spanish allows a deal to be set up but can the drugs be sourced, the mother committed , the girl won and audition passed?

This was an OK ‘one crazy day’ type film but I never felt invested in Jesse’s frantic and random character. I got that he was at least as mixed up as his Mom but it was hard to care when his annoying mannerisms and selfish behaviour were all that we were offered. There was a degree of redemption reached but he still came across as a dick who was making bad choices. I mean who would agree to go and broker a drug deal for some random and dangerous dealers?

That said the dealers were very nice and would no doubt be chased out of business in five minutes in the real world. One was the ‘Sheeeeit’ guy from ‘The Wire’ and he didn’t even do his line! Melissa Leo was pretty good as the hippy Mom but the potential girl friend was as wet as an otter’s pocket and clearly not worth the effort.

The piano playing was good and having the final scenes set amongst a Revolutionary War re-enactment added a bit of colour, but over all this was a bit dull with no laughs at all. Why Stop Now? Because we all got bored after half an hour!

‘W’ Score 14/23
Best Bit - Party Puking Recital