Tuesday, August 30, 2005

The Aristocrats - Reviewed by the Five Paragraph Bitter Film Critic

This is the movie I have been waiting my whole life for.

As a former stand-up comic, I was introduced to the world of the titular joke in the late `90s, at a comedy club in Iowa. I had heard the joke before in it's basic sense - guy walks into the agent's office, tells him he's got a great act, a *family* act, and then proceeds to have sex with his kids. The act's name? "The Aristocrats!" In itself, it's not funny.

However, when told by a professional funny person, the joke takes on a life of its own. The sex gets naughtier, kinkier and, depending on the jurisdiction, probably illegal. The kids get younger, the man gets nastier, animals are involved. Nothing is sacred from the lengths this man will go to impress this agent - no religious, historical or political icon can escape the power of the Aristocrats.

This movie examines this truly tasteless joke, and is told from old-time funny men like Don Rickles and Larry Storch to guys who made their names during stand-ups boom in the 1970s and 1980s - Robin Williams, Taylor Negron, for example, and current stars like the South Park gang, Dana Gould and Doug Stanhope...whom I've seen naked. Thrice.

This is not a family movie. This is not a feel-good film. There are no heroes, no plucky young orphans fighting an evil lord. There is Sarah Silverman, though, and she's close. If you like raw, crude, in-your-face humor and can swim in a pool of profanity, and don't mind hearing Bob Saget use words he NEVER used on "Full House," then this is the film for you.

---------------- 4.7 Whammies out of 6. 1 whole Whammy was deducted for having WAY too many Eric Idle and Billy Connolly scenes, and not nearly enough Bob Saget and Emo Phillips. A second Whammy was deducted for having the completely unfunny Paul Reiser dominate part of the film. However, a .7 of a Whammy was added because I've met seven of the performers in the film, and each one of those bastards is worth a tenth of a Whammy. ----------------------

No comments: