Starring: Jack Plotnick, Eric Judor, Alexis Dziena, William Fichtner, Steve Little
Absurdist tale of a man's search for his missing dog.
Things aren’t going too well for Dolph Springer (Plotnick). His dog has been kidnapped, his palm tree has turned into a pine tree, and his gardener (Judor) is posing as him to have sex with the pizzeria receptionist (Dziena) who’s fallen for his voice over the phone. On top of all this, he still turns up to his office, where it constantly rains indoors inexplicably, despite being sacked three months ago. Welcome to the world of Quentin Dupieux, the mad Gaul who first came to public attention with a late nineties Levi’s commercial featuring a head-banging puppet named Flat Eric (who makes a small cameo here). If you thought Dupieux’s previous feature ‘Rubber’, the story of a tire with the power to make heads explode telepathically, was absurd, his latest will really have you scratching your cranium. Unlike that film, which was essentially a pun stretched to feature length, ‘Wrong’ actually has something approaching a narrative, and, crucially, a lot of laughs. He may hail from France, a nation often mocked for its lack of humor, but Dupieux has probably made the best American comedy you’ll see all year. It’s certainly a welcome respite from the “mumblecore” dramedies so beloved by the American indie set.
Absurdist humor can be painfully unfunny in the wrong hands. The Coens, Terry Gilliam, and Charlie Kaufman have all failed for one specific reason: they try too hard. David Lynch can pull it off because he is genuinely insane and, as a result, his surreal humor flows naturally. Dupieux, who not only directed but wrote, shot, cut and scored his film, may well have a screw loose as the gags in ‘Wrong’ are completely off the wall but never feel forced. Here, the situations are absurd but the characters are deadpan, unlike say, a Coen Brothers film which would employ exactly the reverse approach. Comedy is far more effective when the audience understands the joke better than the participating characters.
Ninety percent of viewers will no doubt find all this infuriating but if you’re a fan of comedy that manages to be incredibly clever about being incredibly stupid, ‘Wrong’ will provide an entertaining ninety minutes.
If you thought Dupieux’s previous feature ‘Rubber’, the story of a tire with the power to make heads explode telepathically, was absurd, his latest will really have you scratching your cranium. Unlike that film, which was essentially a pun stretched to feature length, ‘Wrong’ actually has something approaching a narrative, and, crucially, a lot of laughs. He may hail from France, a nation often mocked for its lack of humor, but Dupieux has probably made the best American comedy you’ll see all year. It’s certainly a welcome respite from the “mumblecore” dramedies so beloved by the American indie set.
