The Comedy

People say the characters are hard to relate to and be empathetic towards which is completely wrong. If you hate the characters you are empathizing with them because they obviously hate themselves even more than you. With that being said it was very hard to watch some scenes and they dragged on too long, but the feeling of pointlessness in life that so many in this generation feel (including me) makes it understandable why the movie is the way it is. The repetitiveness, hopelessness, and boredom of modern life depicted through a 90 minute movie. All of us are looking for happiness but very few actually find it.

I'm a big fan of Tim & Eric Awesome Show Great Job, and that is essentially why I wanted to see this, but this film is another animal. There's the humor that fans of Tim & Eric are used to scattered here and there throughout the film but I think it mainly works to compliment the mood of the entire piece. Be warned, this is not a regular film, if that's what you desire than that's just fine, see something else. The Comedy is that piece of art on the wall, when you see it for the first time, that makes you think of how you act and who you are and what you're doing. It's that thing that someone said to you that stuck in your head and brought up memories you'd forgotten about and lies that you've told yourself. But this is just how I felt, reviews are flawed because they can only tell you how that particular person felt about that particular thing. You may see it and just see one big, boring piece of crud. I'm not going to say that I think the movie was trying to say one thing or another because I believe any good art isn't clearly defined or pinned down. All I know is that it affected me. I really do hope more people see it because I believe we need something like this to level out everything else that's thrown at us. Give it a chance.

There is something to be said about this film. It is real and uncomfortable, but I believe that there is something deeper going on here.

We watch a bunch of genuinely unpleasant people go from place to place, and in a nutshell that's it. At least on the surface that is.

This is could be a commentary on what freedom can do to someone. Our main character seems to have no real connection with people outside of his small group of friends. He has the possibility to inherit his father's fortune, instead goes from place to place and seems to exists.

The protagonist is a deplorable person, don't get me wrong, but you can connect with him in his longing to have something meaningful to happen. I can see some people not liking the fact that nothing seems to really happen in the film, but because our main character doesn't have anything purposeful happen to him, the film reflects that.

The cinematography in the film has a lot of up close shots allowing us to really read into the emotions of the main character.

One thing I haven't really mentioned is that the dialog is very interesting. It can go from something funny and seemingly lighthearted, but then does a complete 180. There we're several scenes where the humor is really there.

Overall, this film is not for really a wide crowd, but if any of this sounds interesting, I wholly recommend it.

Suffice to say, "The Comedy" is not a comedy (even though it does contain laughs) nor is it necessarily about comedians. Spearheaded by a shockingly inspired performance from Tim Heidecker, what Rick Alverson's quietly brilliant film is, is in fact about pointlessness, indifference and mocking sincerity. Sounds riveting right? Well, it is…in a very experimental way. "The Comedy" is deep and poignant and fascinatingly layered with subtle jabs at society, as well as those who have so much in life, that they have become bored with everyday existence.

Opening with a sequence involving male nudity that is so awkward it may cause some viewers to say to themselves "what did I get myself into?", "The Comedy" follows a man named Swanson (Heidecker) who is seemingly unfazed by his father's impending death. Instead of a real job, he spends his days hanging out with his buddies, engrossed in inane verbal and physical (and sometimes sociopathic) games of one-upmanship. From impersonating store clerks and gardeners, to making the most inappropriate jokes during the most depressing and even life threatening moments, to degrading others in public in order to fulfill some kind of personal enjoyment, as this film progresses the activities of each of these men (including Swanson) become progressively offensive in order to maintain a sort of continuous high. And while this could be the plot to any crude Danny McBride piece of trash, it is Alverson's ultra serious tone, along with the fact that he throws these would be offensive but clownish comedic characters into a real world where people die, have disorders and are struggling to feed their families, which allows "The Comedy" to rise above the "crudeness for the sake of being crude" films of today.

As much as I enjoyed "The Comedy", this is one movie that will assuredly come under heavy scrutiny from a majority (that's right, I said majority) of movie going audiences, because, for one, while there is a subtle story arc here, this film is not pushed along by heavy conflict. And secondly, many unfamiliar with Heidecker's form of comedy will undoubtedly be turned off by the amount of absurdist drama which is played out by a group, whom on the surface seem too spoiled and flippant to care about. In short, even those who loved the terribly long "Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie" or are fans of their show and have been eagerly awaiting more of the same skit driven comedy, may find "The Comedy" a bit too tonally heavy or obscure to take (and that is truly saying something).

Side Note: Some have said that the Tim Hiedecker's style of comedy is a form of avant-garde comedy or apart of the anti-comedy movement. Meaning, that much of his shtick consists of making his audiences (television or otherwise) highly uncomfortable, to the point where they either laugh at his awkwardness or dismiss his actions as strange. And while Hiedecker's awkward style of comedy is featured prominently here, his performance is anything but comedic. In fact, he gives a quite emotionally dramatic performance in a movie that, if it were a straight forward comedy, would have seen Zach Galifianakis in the starring role. Thankfully, this is not the case because Hiedecker's performance is absolutely magnificent (and dare I say award worthy?) in this role that was obviously tailored specifically for him.

Final Thought: I will reiterate, and I can't say this enough, how "The Comedy" is not for everybody; especially if you are expecting a comedy. To some audiences this is all going to seem as an exercise in pathetic nature and nonsensical mannerisms, but rest assured that there is something happening here on a very highly conceptual level that is not only meant to make viewers uncomfortable, and cringe and laugh at the most inappropriate things, as well as think these characters are pathetic while at the same time feel sorry for them, but is also a subtly laced work of a very skilled writer, whose entire point seems to be an analysis/criticism of the reaction of "normal people" to those who wish to push the limits of comedy. Not since Lars von Trier's "The Idiots" have I witnessed a movie that was this skillfully successful in demonstrating the complex struggles of a generation built on a doctrine of nihilistic irreverence. In short, if you chose to see "The Comedy", you will either absolutely love it or absolutely hate it.

Written by Markus Robinson, Edited by Nicole I. Ashland

In all honesty I hate this film. I hate the characters. I hate the story. I hate the dialogue, the costumes...everything. I hate the fact they wasted great music and overlayed it in various scenes that showed the pointless and hollow lives of the privileged hipsters. There is absolutely nothing here, for no one learns any lessons, no one evolves, no one seeks redemption for bad actions and no one really strives to be a better and interesting person. This is why it is such a brutally brilliant film.

There is nothing like this film, and it's amazing that it is fronted primarily by two guys who did weird postmodern TV shows on Cartoon Network and a indie singer who did not become "famous" until he and his band retired (of course they made an eventual comeback, for people actually wanted to hear LCD Soundsystem for some reason). The story on the surface seems like a stunning indictment on trust fund hipsters, but it ultimately is a deconstruction of what happens to people when they lack ambition, desire and heart due to the mundanity of their comforting and unsatisfied lives.

Eric Heidecker is Swanson, an overbearing hipster who is on the verge of inheriting his dying father's fortune. While he grapples with the situation, it is clear he has no clue what to do with his life. He provokes and taunts people to ferry reactions out of them, with one might surmising he is doing it in hopes of getting seriously injured or even killed. Anything to feel something beyond apathy. At least that is what it seems like when he enters the African American bar and openly talks about gentrifying the neighborhood and insulting the other patrons. Of course, it could be ignorance considering Swanson might believe that since he likes hip-hop music and other forms of minority culture, that he somehow has the right to speak in such generalities. Trust me, I wanted the men at the bar to pummel him but then again, it would have been dishonest.

I think this is what makes this film so unsettling. While we hope Swanson and his friends eventually grow up and continue their life journey, they just continue to be awful human beings. Before the social media world gave such bad behavior a monetary feed, being this type of person was unexpected. Now it has sadly grown into a norm.

Like I said before, I hated Swanson and ultimately wished he had an end like Harvey Keitel in Bad Lieutenant, but that would not have been a sincere outcome. You can't feel any sympathy for the characters and this is what is so provocative about this film. Considering Heidecker's career this is a wild subversion on his filmography, and it seemed perfectly tailored for someone like him. It will be years before I want to see this again, but damn this is provocative.