The Machine

The first 20-25 minutes are pretty cheesy/over-the-top setting up the motivation for the plot and getting Bert & his dad into position. But it actually gets fairly watchable after Irina shows up. It's by no means going to win any awards, but if you're a fan of BK & enjoyed this story from his set, you'll probably enjoy watching this enough to not shut it off.

I was pretty dubious on how BK was going to be as an actor, but I was pleasantly surprised once the story left LA. It's a testament to the caliber of talent Mark Hamill that he was able to raise whatever abilities BK came to the table with to a place where you actually feel invested during their scenes.

The ending is also surprisingly engaging and fitting.

I think 6/10 is very fair here. It's not a great movie, and that's ok. If you like Brent Chrysler, you'll be entertained by this movie. I can see why he was so happy with how the movie turned out, it's just all him being something he's not for two hours (which again, is fine!). I can tell this was really just something that everyone involved with had a lot of fun with, from the actors to the editors with those kitschy transitions and strange Russian subtitles. It's quirky, and I think it works here.

Mark Hamill was a crazy get for this movie and I can't believe he agreed to do it. It definitely helped the movie's case. Jimmy Tatro was a good casting for young Bert as well.

One observation to make- Bert's character in this is literally Po from Kung Fu Panda. It's just a fat guy who dumb lucks his way through everything until the very end when his actions seem a bit more intentional and he accepts who he really is inside.

Bert Kreischer gets a lot of hate and a part of me would've loved to see him come out with a terrific film to shut all his haters up. Unfortunately that was not the case. This film was not a lot of fun to watch at all.

Kreischer has no comedic timing and no sense of when to let a joke breathe. Comedy isn't easy and people only think it is because the best make it look so effortless. The biggest mistake they made in this film though was casting Mark Hamill, who is also painfully unfunny, giving Bert no one to play off. Hamill is trying so hard in every scene he's in, but he's not a funny guy and doesn't have any charisma.

So all you're left with is the story, and the story gets old pretty fast. This film is only 112 minutes but it feels much, much longer than that. The concept might work in a 13 minute stand-up clip, but stretched out to this length it becomes pretty tedious. 4/10.

Full disclosure, I am russian. Bert is very funny guy and he should stick to comedy. His machine routine was funny enough but it didn't translate well to movie. His story actual story is quite dark, and it goes through very bad time in Russia, but he makes a good humor story of this mess in his standup. Where he makes a funny standup, the movie falls well short of his act. Romanian setting with western actors speaking horrible, bearly understandible Russian, with even worse translation; was the funniest part of the movie for me. Over the top caricature characters can only take movie so far, it needs a good script.

The movie itself was pretty funny for the most part. I would also agree that it was a little slow at times too. Burt performing on-stage is truly authentic and amazingly funny. For a 1st time actor, I thought he did really well. Some have rated this movie with low scores forgetting that this is a stand-up comedian acting in a major motion picture about his life and never experiencing the acting role before. If you hated this movie and decided to post negative remarks and ratings, I cannot relate. I have read some of these negative reviews and it is clear that some people believe that they themselves are Siskle & Ebert themselves. The movie is funny, was it the best comedy I have ever seen NO. But to bash a movie just because it wasn't your cup of tea is an insult to reviews as a whole. When I dislike something, I simply choose to remember the morales my mother and father taught me as a young child. I keep my opinions and negative thoughts to myself. Go see the movie, it's pretty funny.