icebreaka

Standup comedy is such a popular form of entertainment its surprising sometimes how few documentaries tackle the subject. As an amateur comic myself I watched what I could find when I was starting out and gained some insight. I wish that No Joke had have been out at that time. The films premise (that 3 of Vancouver's least funny comics could be funny in a different market) is unique and original but in the end this is really a story about personalities.

The personalities in the film are all interesting guys on their own (Vibrato is a real character!) but their interplay makes the movie. Don't watch the film expecting to laugh your ass off (although there are funny parts). Instead see what its like to be on the road as a travelling comic. Some of the open mic nights the crew do on their road trip are good examples of where you'll end up performing if you were to try your hand at stand up.

I encourage you to give this movie a watch, part road trip movie, part character study, its entertaining and you can tell a lot of the director's heart and soul went into it.

There are lots of things you can pick on in this movie to be sure but there are also lots of moments that if you like the campy-ness of the thing are quite amusing. Its a pretty ambitious thing to try to make a sci-fi horror on what looks to be a zero budget and I commend them for that.

Thor is always fun to watch, if you've ever seen him in concert you know what I mean. Anyway its worth a rent for sure I think if you are in the right mood. Its not Oscar material obviously but I've seen less entertaining movies. I have heard that it was actually 2 separate movies that were turned into a single film and after you look at it that way you can kind of see that in it. Tricky work to pull it all into one story. I could see this thing have endless sequels within the characters that it creates.

I was disappointed in this film. Not that I expect an action movie to have a lot of substance, but John Woo sacrificed plot and believability for as many explosions, fight scenes and car chases as I have ever seen in one film. I felt insulted as an audience member that I was expected to believe that the two main characters were in love within 30 seconds (of film time) of meeting one another, that someone could escape a bomb within 2 seconds of it going off without a scratch, and that after colliding mid-air with someone at a combined speed of about 200 km/hr and falling 40 feet off a cliff, Tom Cruise could walk away unscathed. Should Mr. Woo have paid a bit more attention to these sorts of indiscrepancies, the movie would have been much more enjoyable. I'm just glad I didn't have to pay for it!