FILMBRATS - REVIEWS

Jerri Blank just got out of prison and is making her way back home. Upon returning to her father’s house, she discovers that life has changed a lot since she’s been gone. Jerri now has a new mommy, who has her own meat man. But more importantly, her daddy is in a coma. The doctor treating him seems to think that maybe if Jerri somehow is able to better herself, maybe daddy will get better and come out of it. So, she decides to go back to High School and do something amazing. This works out pretty well for her, because there’s a science fair competition going on and the school desperately needs to do something equally amazing, so that they don’t lose their funding. The only problem is that Jerri is an old, former prostitute drug addicted thief. But maybe somehow she’ll still be able to save the day, if only she can be accepted by her new peers.

Based on the off-the-air Comedy Central television series of the same name, this movie shows you how Jerri got to the place she was there. A prequel, if you will. The problem, though, is that you can’t really use this as a good lead-in to the series. It’s not that you have to know anything about the show to appreciate the humor or to find the movie funny, although I’m sure it’s that much better for those that are already familiar. The issue, rather, is that the movie is so self-contained. It acts like an extended episode. And the end of the film, I’m sure, does not correlate to the beginning of the television show. Now this isn’t bad for the uninitiated, but fans may not like the inconsistencies in cast (we have a character named Megawatti instead of Orlando) and style.

Since this is a movie, the visual style has been amped up. It now looks like a major motion picture. That may sound like a good thing, but when part of the appeal of your source material is the hokey low production value of the after school specials, it kind of takes away from the charm and I can only imagine diverts from the original series’ vision. There also wasn’t enough narration for my taste. I wanted to see a movie that had the same feel as the TV show, and strictly visually speaking, I didn’t get that.

As a comedy goes, however, it exceeded my expectations. I really wasn’t a huge fan of the series. I would occasionally watch it, but rarely did it make me laugh out loud. I don’t know if maybe it was being in a crowd filled with fans, or (more likely) the spectacular script filled with off-the-wall absurdist humor mixed with a little bit of satire, physical humor, gross-out gags and virtually no telegraphed jokes, but it worked very, very well. The only real lulls come along with the celebrity cameos. There are quite a lot of them in here, and none of them really have the ability to deliver their lines on par with the regular cast made up of Second City improv veterans (such as stars and co-writers Stephen Colbert, director Paul Dinello, Amy Sidaris as Jerri). Even with the dry celebs, the movie is probably going to be the funniest film I see this year. Newcomers to the story should enjoy themselves, but it might be a good idea to watch an episode or two of the series first to get a feel for the type of humor to expect, before investing time on a full movie. Fans of the series will not be disappointed with the big screen adaptation.

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