VOD film review: Humor Me
Review Overview
Jemaine Clement
8Elliott Gould
8Jokes
8Matthew Turner | On 04, Oct 2019
Director: Sam Hoffman
Cast: Jemaine Clement, Elliott Gould, Ingrid Michaelson, Maria Dizzia, Annie Potts, Le Clanche du Rand, Rosemary Prinz, Priscilla Lopez
Certificate: 15
Watch Humor Me online in the UK: Sky Cinema / NOW / Apple TV (iTunes) / Prime Video (Buy/Rent) / Google Play / Sky Store
Written and directed by Sam Hoffman (the creator of web series-turned-book-slash-play Old Jews Telling Jokes, making his feature debut), this charming and funny comedy stars Jemaine Clement as Nate Kroll, a down-on-his-luck New York playwright who has the week from hell: he’s fired by his agent (Bebe Neuwirth), his wife (Maria Dizzia) leaves him, and the lease runs out on his apartment, forcing him to move into Cranberry Bog, the New Jersey retirement home of his father, Bob (Elliott Gould). Bob’s coping mechanism of telling elaborate jokes quickly irritates Nate, but he finds a new lease of life when he’s asked to help a senior citizen theatre troupe (including Annie Potts, Le Clanche du Rand, Rosemary Prinz) stage a production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Mikado.
Aside from sporting an accent that makes him sound like a New Yorker who has (ahem) spent some time in New Zealand, Clement sticks closely to his established comic persona (deadpan, downbeat, a little bit grumpy) and it serves him well, generating amusing odd-couple chemistry with Gould and several of his elderly co-stars. Gould, for his part, isn’t stretched too far, but he’s effortlessly convincing as a man who’s used to disguising his feelings with non-stop jokes.
There are strong comic turns from a fun supporting cast that includes Ghostbusters’ Annie Potts, Priscilla Lopez (as Bob’s new girlfriend, Connie), Willie C. Carpenter (as a former marine who’s a friend of Bob), Bebe Neuwirth (in what amounts to a very welcome extended cameo) and singer Ingrid Michaelson (making her screen debut) as the piano-playing daughter of one of the theatre troupe.
Plot-wise, the story beats are more or less entirely predictable, but that ends up giving the film a relaxing, laidback vibe that works perfectly. It helps that Hoffman establishes exactly the right tone: warm-hearted and gentle, with just a hint of melancholy, like a lengthy hug from someone you might not see for a while. He also adds a playful stylistic touch that riffs on his previous property, in that every time Bob tells one of his elaborate jokes, we cut to a black-and-white vignette starring “Zimmerman” (Joey Slotnick), the subject of all the jokes. As gimmicks go, it never quite leads to the expected pay-off, but it’s a nice touch.
Humor Me is available on Sky Cinema. Don’t have Sky? You can also stream it on NOW, as part of a £11.99 NOW Cinema Membership subscription.