A buddy just lately described this film to me as “Borat” meets “Again to the Future,” and truthfully, that’s the precise chaotic headspace you need to occupy earlier than urgent play on Matt Johnson’s “Nirvanna the Band the Present the Film.” Contemporary off a rapturous SXSW debut and a buzzy pickup by NEON, the movie builds on an nearly 20 yr working gag during which aspiring musicians Matt Johnson and Jay McCarrol are perpetually making an attempt to make it to a gig on the Rivoli. The one downside is that they’re not likely a band; the venue has no clue who they’re, and the universe appears personally invested in ensuring they by no means arrive.
For the uninitiated, me included, there are stretches the place you might really feel such as you’ve walked into the center of a protracted working inside joke. The movie clearly assumes a degree of affection and familiarity with the duo’s 2007 internet sequence origins. Nonetheless, the central premise is undeniably humorous: an countless sequence of more and more unhinged schemes to get on stage, every one derailing into a brand new catastrophe simply as success appears inside attain. To stretch that premise to characteristic size, the movie veers into absurdist sci-fi territory, because the pair by accident remodel their cellular residence right into a time machine, flux capacitor and all, sending them again to 2008. The temporal logic is gleefully nonsensical, together with a pit cease at a movie show screening “The Hangover,” (despite the fact that it didn’t come out till 2009) a gag that both lands as a sly wink or an eye fixed roll relying in your tolerance for chaos.
Johnson, coming off the scrappy and surprisingly polished “BlackBerry,” brings a extra assured filmmaking hand this time round. The film nonetheless thrives on low fi vitality, however the pacing is sharper and the comedian setups extra deliberate. A number of the hidden digicam pranks, like one inside a division retailer, are genuinely hilarious, balancing cringe with audacity, and a jaw dropping sequence involving the Rogers Centre delivers one of many movie’s largest and most spectacular surprises with out sacrificing its DIY spirit.
The duo’s best power stays their willingness to be the butt of their very own joke. They absolutely decide to residing inside their unusual little universe, blurring the road between efficiency and actuality to the purpose the place you’re by no means fairly positive who’s in on the bit. That ambiguity is a part of the enchantment but additionally a supply of frustration. The mockumentary type can really feel disorienting, particularly in the course of the time journey segments the place it turns into practically not possible to tell apart between actors and unsuspecting bystanders. When somebody instantly asks, “Are you Jay McCarrol?” It highlights simply how skinny the barrier between fiction and actuality has grow to be, typically to the movie’s detriment.
That tonal and structural messiness in the end makes for a viewing expertise that may really feel extra exhausting than exhilarating. Hardcore followers will possible embrace the chaos and have a good time the growth of the lore, however newcomers could wrestle to totally join with out a deeper emotional or narrative anchor. The film’s scrappy, something goes ethos is each its largest appeal and its most limiting flaw. It revels in pushing boundaries, together with a number of cheeky flirtations with copyright legislation that earn straightforward laughs, nevertheless it sometimes errors randomness for momentum.
Even so, there’s one thing undeniably endearing concerning the duo’s dedication to their bizarre little dream. I might not be able to dive headfirst into the fandom, however I got here away with a newfound appreciation for his or her creativity, and the weird world they’ve constructed collectively. “Nirvanna the Band the Present the Film” ought to delight longtime believers whereas leaving curious newcomers amused, confused, and possibly just a bit bit charmed.
NIRVANNA THE BAND THE SHOW THE MOVIE is now taking part in in theaters.