new movie review: Misery Loves Comedy

If you go to the IMDb page for Misery Loves Comedy (you can click on the link here) you'll see that Kevin Pollak's documentary about the psychology behind comedy is, quite simply and inarguably, the best and most impressive collection of funny people in a single film since 1963's It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. But is it funny?

No. It isn't. And for the most part, host/ director/ editor/ writer Pollak isn't interested in his film being funny. The problem is, while the "comedy is serious business" attitude may indeed be valid -- Pollak and his interviewees certainly make a strong case for that point in this movie -- it doesn't make for a very good film.

Take another look at that cast. It's truly astounding. Now let me add another bit of info: Not a single one of the interviews in this film is disappointing. Every person interviewed is eloquent and insightful, and even when segments require multiple people to reach the same conclusions, they all do so from a different, equally interesting perspective. Any one of these interviews, taken on its own, would be golden.

Put 'em all together, at least the way Pollak does here, and what you have is a surprisingly boring movie. The thing is only about an hour and a half, and I lost track of how many times I checked my watch. I mean, this thing reeeeally dragged.

How can this be? I mean, these are all interesting people, talking about an interesting topic. But it's a "talking heads" picture, and that's it. The hour and a half includes maybe a minute of still photos, and the rest is one person talking, then another, then another, then another, and the result is that even with this much insight and talent on the screen, the whole thing quickly becomes tiresome. Pollak may be a gifted actor, impressionist, and stand-up comedian, but he don't know a thing about filmmaking.

Here's a tip for any potential documentarians out there: You need more than just people talking at the camera. I don't care how great the interviewees are, or what they have to say, it bears repeating, to make a documentary, you need more than just people talking at the camera. Even History Channel documentaries, with nearly every one of their subjects long dead, know to throw in reenactments or, in the case of Ken Burns, at least vintage photos to look at.

And the weird thing is, this is a documentary about showbiz. The wealth of material Pollak could have chosen to add as illustration of his movie's key points is limitless.Was he too cheap or too lazy to include a clip or two of the key moments some of these comedians are talking about? Take Richard Pryor, for example. A few of the comics talk about how particular various moments in Pryor's televised or filmed stand-up performances perfectly illustrate the point they're trying to make, or played a key role in them wanting to be a comedian. Would it have killed Pollak to show us what these people are talking about, by showing at least a brief clip of the Pryor performance everyone keeps mentioning?

Or consider how much of the cast of Misery Loves Comedy is made up of stand-up comedians. Some of these comics discuss their career in only abstract or generalized terms, but others refer to specific performance moments. Doesn't it therefore seem appropriate to maybe show at least a brief clip or two of these performances, so we know what these people are talking about?

Look, there's a lot of valuable material in here. My suggestion is to watch this movie in brief chunks. As I said, each of these interviews are both eloquent and insightful. Watch maybe five minutes here, ten minutes there. It may take you a long time to finish the movie that way, sure. But watching the full  hour and thirty-five minutes nonstop will feel a hell of a lot longer.