Comedic sketches meant for a short period of screen time (i.e., The Ladies Man, A Night At The Roxbury) rarely ever translate into a feature length success. The jokes are usually built on the character's unique "personality" and they run a little dry after 15 to 20 minutes.
Jiminy Glick, Martin Short's parody of celebrity interviewers, may not come from the typical Saturday Night Live school of sketch comedy films, but it works in the same way when translated to the big screen for Jiminy Glick in Lalawood. Short's Glick, an obese, ignorant man with a short attention span, can be very funny in small doses, but certainly not over the length of an hour-and-a-half.
By "Lalawood," they apparently mean Toronto, where the film is almost entirely set. Glick and his wife, Dixie (Jan Hooks) set off to the Toronto International Film Festival in search of interviewing the likes of Kiefer Sutherland and Steve Martin (who, among many others, make cameos that are some of the few bright spots the film offers). For Torontonians, the scenery would be a welcome distraction from the lack of comedy, except the film seems to be shot entirely in Vancouver, and this is not hidden well.
Either way, the film progresses as Glick gets involved in a bizarre murder/mystery plot that is supposed to be parodying David Lynch (who is a character in the film, played with sloppiness by Short) and Stanley Kubrick, except it is unclear what is going on half the time. The film turns into a vanity project of the messiest kind, with little coherence in the plot, and numerous occasions of extremely offensive (think racist, homophobic, sexist) scenarios.
It would have been wonderful if Short had pulled this off. A comedic talent who has been misused in Hollywood for a long time, he certainly garners kudos for creating a very Canadian-centric project and attempting to parody a culture that has burdened him with a resume that includes Clifford and Jungle 2 Jungle. Nonetheless, sympathy for a former local is not enough to sustain a film as horrendous as Jiminy Glick in Lalawood. (Equinoxe/Gold Circle)
Jiminy Glick, Martin Short's parody of celebrity interviewers, may not come from the typical Saturday Night Live school of sketch comedy films, but it works in the same way when translated to the big screen for Jiminy Glick in Lalawood. Short's Glick, an obese, ignorant man with a short attention span, can be very funny in small doses, but certainly not over the length of an hour-and-a-half.
By "Lalawood," they apparently mean Toronto, where the film is almost entirely set. Glick and his wife, Dixie (Jan Hooks) set off to the Toronto International Film Festival in search of interviewing the likes of Kiefer Sutherland and Steve Martin (who, among many others, make cameos that are some of the few bright spots the film offers). For Torontonians, the scenery would be a welcome distraction from the lack of comedy, except the film seems to be shot entirely in Vancouver, and this is not hidden well.
Either way, the film progresses as Glick gets involved in a bizarre murder/mystery plot that is supposed to be parodying David Lynch (who is a character in the film, played with sloppiness by Short) and Stanley Kubrick, except it is unclear what is going on half the time. The film turns into a vanity project of the messiest kind, with little coherence in the plot, and numerous occasions of extremely offensive (think racist, homophobic, sexist) scenarios.
It would have been wonderful if Short had pulled this off. A comedic talent who has been misused in Hollywood for a long time, he certainly garners kudos for creating a very Canadian-centric project and attempting to parody a culture that has burdened him with a resume that includes Clifford and Jungle 2 Jungle. Nonetheless, sympathy for a former local is not enough to sustain a film as horrendous as Jiminy Glick in Lalawood. (Equinoxe/Gold Circle)
