Adventures of the Naked Umbrella

This old woman has heard every storyline and sleeps through most movies. But not this one. This one shook me wide awake. It's just the right movie for our increasingly weird times. It highlights the craziness of trying to navigate through a mad world where everyone is suffering some form of societal-induced insanity.

Every performance is a standout, and every character is so well written. I was particularly impressed by Jeremy Davies. He's always great, but he really gave this one his all. He somehow makes us identify and really feel for this pyromaniac conspiracy theorist. I'm easily drawn into seeing the world through his perspective.

Taryn Manning, who plays his wife, is the perfect counterpoint to his character. I fell in love with this couple and found myself rooting for them the whole time. His trans granny is the most loveable shotgun-wielding drug dealer you'll ever see on the screen.

Even the "bad" guy is completely sympathetic. You understand how/why he makes those bad decisions and I couldn't really fault him given his back story.

That leads me to the director/writer. I had never heard of Gerlad Brunskill before, and it looks like he's only done a little bit of directing. I sure hope he continues on this path, because I'll remain on the lookout for anything he does going forward. He wrote a great story and elicited some amazing performances. Brilliant stuff!

My husband couldn't sleep after watching it because there's so much to process and he woke up wanting to talk about it. Interestingly, it left him feeling rather sad/depressed at the end. However, I didn't feel that way at all. I was left feeling much more hopeful...and I'm the pessimist in this relationship. Go figure.

I don't think this movie is for everyone, but for those who love great performances and deep dives into human psychology, definitely put this on your watch list.

This is NOT a comedy. It's a drama. An odd drama.

There are multiple scenes and setting where the makers CLEARLY thought they were creating comedy... but there isn't any.

For the most part it's a pure drama focused ENTIRELY on "Sam Wanoutsky" (the "Naked Umbrella" according to his conspiracy theory pod cast). He's on screen a good 90% of the time. Frankly I didn't think the character was very interesting nor compelling. And with htat, the entire film felt unsatisfying and a waste of time. Many of these scenes are purely to try and show quirks that Sam Wanoutsky - but they weren't so much quirks as just stupid illogical actions. Much of it makes no sense.

Ultimately this film's plot COULD be written in two sentences, but I will avoid spoilers.

It's a waste of time with no real payoff.

For the record the perhaps the SMALLEST speaking part in this film is Tom Arnold's part. He is NOT a major character in this. He's a "known cameo" if anything.

----- PASS -------

What a tricky funny strange caper. I loved it. Keep them coming Gerold! I felt the character development was great and it was interesting that the bad guy was hard to pin point at first. But then we feel bad for that bad guy too. The cinematic movement was also well thought out and the stunts were fantastic. The acting was the key to the whole thing. The music really lifted this UFO off the ground too. I really hope this is seen by everyone with an imagination.... The choice of location was cool to shoot this film and Tom Arnold was his classic Iowa self. I hope it gets picked up by a major distribution company and if the critics who only watched the first scene before writing their review on rotten tomatoes will give it an actual look they might be surprised at what they might find.

Adventures of the Naked Umbrella is suppose to be hilarious judging by the so called reviews for this film!

Lets get something clear and this movie is far from funny. I couldn't muster up one solid laugh from start to finish!

Majority of the movie is what I call dark drama with little laughs to back it up!

The main two characters are based on red necks from the swamps of Lousina! Basically drugs seems to back his paranoia as well as his conspiracy theories! They are being chased by parole officers which are not funny at all.

Over acting and just a weak plot makes this movie just dull as well as boring!

Ignore the reviews for this movie giving it well over the top ratings because it is not hilarious at all.

I thought it was great. People don't seem to know what a dark rom com is. This was definitely a dark comedy and a love story. The only bad actor was the bald sheriff. He was bad, he must've had family in high places or wrote part of it. So bland. But otherwise, I laughed and cried. I didn't recognize Dr faraday at first, great job.

We went to see the Salton sea 10 years ago, if you've never seen it first hand you can't appreciate it as much. It is amazingly stinky, bleak and run down. It's awesome in a dark way. And I believe scene in the bar was at the old international banana museum, because I know the store scene was next door to it.