Comedy Film

And Not a Housos Movie in Sight

What’s that you say? We’re experiencing a golden age of Australian cinematic comedy? This we had to see for ourselves – and so we spent our Saturday watching not one but two Australian feature-length comedy films currently screening in cinemas. Shouldn’t the non-awaited third film in Paul Fenech’s Housos trilogy be out by now as... Read More »

AACTA-ing up

The nominees for the 2016 AACTA Awards were announced yesterday, and the comedy and light entertainment nominees aren’t bad at all… AACTA AWARD FOR BEST CHILDREN’S TELEVISION SERIES LITTLE LUNCH – Robyn Butler, Wayne Hope – ABC3 THE NEW ADVENTURES OF FIGARO PHO – Daniel Fill, Frank Verheggen, Luke Jurevicius – ABC3 NOWHERE BOYS SERIES... Read More »

Manny Lewis and the News

Of course we went to the first session of Manny Lewis we could get to. It’s an Australian comedy! Starring an Australian stand-up comedian! Who plays a stand-up comedian in the movie! This was going to be bigger than Roy Hollsdotter Live. Well, at least it has a longer running time. As far as the... Read More »

Fat Pizza vs Housos: Whoever Wins We Lose part 42

From just about every perspective that doesn’t involve writer / director / star Paul Fenech cashing in, bringing the worlds of Housos and Fat Pizza together makes no sense. And not just in the traditional “ugh, Aliens versus Predator really messed up both franchises” way that bringing different worlds together in the one movie is... Read More »

Smuggling in (a) hero-win

The new Australian film The Mule is an interesting piece of cinema in a lot of ways, one of which is that it’s just been released but you can’t actually see it in... Read More »

Not This Old Shit Again

We go on and on about this so often even we’re sick of it. No, not Josh Thomas: the twin evils of Australian criticism – critics siding with their mates instead of the viewing public, and critics who think the best way to support the local industry is… oh wait, since when was “supporting the... Read More »

Le Petite Mort à L’arrivée

So Australian comedy actor Josh Lawson has turned writer-director and made a film called The Little Death. But how to get your small quirky comedy noticed in a cinema marketplace where half a dozen films from overseas debut every week? Maybe like this: Why is Josh Lawson bashing Australian cinema? You’d think that a guy... Read More »

The Joke is Over, Smell the Smoke From All Around

This time last year Australian comedy on the big screen was looking pretty good. That’s “good”, not “funny”. But in contrast to previous years where you’d be lucky to get a single locally produced film that could even be loosely defined as “comedy”, in 2012 a slow but steady trickle of local comedies made it... Read More »

The Scumbus Has Something For Everyone

There’s a theory that says the perfect length for a comedy film is somewhere just south of 80 minutes. Any longer than that and you need to start adding non-comedic story and character elements to keep people watching, as there seems to be an inbuilt intolerance for silly antics once they drag on much longer... Read More »

You’d Have To Be Mental

“I tried to make MENTAL as politically incorrect as I could because I think I’m not a fan of political correctness, especially in comedy and especially not when it comes to this subject matter, mental illness, because political correctness, for me, is another way of saying, “We don’t want to talk about it.” Use the... Read More »