Teddy Bears' Picnic

I agree with the prior comment that this film is in the spirit of Christopher Guest's movies, but it does not quite reach those standards (although, of course, that is setting the bar pretty high). Certainly an amusing film, but one wishes that perhaps the actors had been given some flexibilty to show their comedic muscle (particulary John Micheal Higgins, whose improv in Best in Show was off the charts). Unfortunately, it's not only the fire that fizzles out a little towards the end. Overall though, clearly superior to most comedies out there (and some great satire re TV news), but with someone like Shearer and a cast of this quality one enters the cinema with such high hopes it is easy to be disappointed.

Its not a good film. It's not very funny.

But what's worse is that this is little more apologist piece on behalf of long term Bohemian Grove guest Harry Shearer.

Quite how this film managed to get made leads to some very worrying thoughts. Viewers might want to catch Alex Jones's "The Order of Death" for an alternative view of the goings on at Bohemian Grove.

But politics aside, is it anything more than a grown up a very of Animal House? I'm sorry to say it's not. In fact to be honest, it makes Animal House look like Citizen Kane by comparison and I can only imagine this would be because of the poor concept at the start of production.

Not very original at all.

So would I rent it (again)? No. Would I watch it on TV? (not again!).

I was fortunate enough to see this film at one of its world premieres as part of the St. Louis International Film Festival. Unfortunately, Harry Shearer could not come and talk to us about it, as was scheduled, but from what I hear, his make-up Q&A session a few days later was riotous.

Naturally, this comes as no surprise. In the fashion of earlier works such as *This Is Spinal Tap,* *Waiting For Guffman,* and *Best In Show* (not all of which had anything to do with Shearer himself, necessarily), the comedy relies heavily upon quirky yet somehow realistic characters in situations to match. Improvisation and satirical exaggeration combined with portrayal of bizarre characters by some unexpected performers and comic pacing that only someone like Shearer could pull off make this one of the better comedies of the year. While I'm unsure of how well-distributed the film will be, all fans of the aforementioned films should make an effort to see it.

I found myself consciously suppressing chuckles because several of the early jokes were racial slurs designed to make you cringe, but the movie audience was decidedly multi-ethnic. I bet it fares better on home video where the audience won't be so self-conscious. George Wendt has the juciest role as a general who goes overboard in trying to cover up Zambizi Glen's, and his own, secret. My personal favorites are Howard Hessman's portrayal of a grossly-overqualified theatrical director, and the actress playing the TV news producer. Morgan Fairchild has a very welcome, if small role.

I wanted to see this in a theater because it was shot in 480P video. My amateur's eyes couldn't see any difference between this and traditionally filmed movies-- quite surprising because this is lower resolution than even HDTV.

This film adds up to much less than the sum of its parts, and by parts I'm referring to the fantastic and star-studded cast. With Fred Willard, Michael McKean, George Wendt, Bob Einstein, the guy from Sledge Hammer (sorry I forget his name but he's great) and a ton of other people I am surprised at how bad the movie turned out. I think the big problem was with the script (lacks laughs and isn't a very meaty story, it's just a bunch of gags one after another and they aren't that funny) and mostly with the production value, the sound and video are of very poor quality. This cast deserves better and so does Harry Shearer, who also wrote and directed this. Maybe he was busy working on the Simpsons or something but he is usually much more funny than this movie would have you believe. 3 out of 10.