A Máquina do Crime

I don't know much about bert kreisher as a stand up comedian and this seems to be the first film he has stared in. This film is fun and funny at times but its not by burt that makes it funny. Its the scary russian characters that are including mark hamil who can only sound like the joker in my head. In this movie burt and his father are kidnapped by an attractive woman named irina. She wants a watch returned to her that was a family hairloom and she believes burt took it. Back in college he was known as the machine and became involed in the russian mob. Its hard to believe this film is actually based on a true story. But anyway acting was good and this film is decent enough as a crime action movie cut out the sort of comedy and its a pefectly fine film still.

I think 6/10 is very fair here. It's not a great movie, and that's ok. If you like Brent Chrysler, you'll be entertained by this movie. I can see why he was so happy with how the movie turned out, it's just all him being something he's not for two hours (which again, is fine!). I can tell this was really just something that everyone involved with had a lot of fun with, from the actors to the editors with those kitschy transitions and strange Russian subtitles. It's quirky, and I think it works here.

Mark Hamill was a crazy get for this movie and I can't believe he agreed to do it. It definitely helped the movie's case. Jimmy Tatro was a good casting for young Bert as well.

One observation to make- Bert's character in this is literally Po from Kung Fu Panda. It's just a fat guy who dumb lucks his way through everything until the very end when his actions seem a bit more intentional and he accepts who he really is inside.

Full disclosure, I am russian. Bert is very funny guy and he should stick to comedy. His machine routine was funny enough but it didn't translate well to movie. His story actual story is quite dark, and it goes through very bad time in Russia, but he makes a good humor story of this mess in his standup. Where he makes a funny standup, the movie falls well short of his act. Romanian setting with western actors speaking horrible, bearly understandible Russian, with even worse translation; was the funniest part of the movie for me. Over the top caricature characters can only take movie so far, it needs a good script.

The movie itself was pretty funny for the most part. I would also agree that it was a little slow at times too. Burt performing on-stage is truly authentic and amazingly funny. For a 1st time actor, I thought he did really well. Some have rated this movie with low scores forgetting that this is a stand-up comedian acting in a major motion picture about his life and never experiencing the acting role before. If you hated this movie and decided to post negative remarks and ratings, I cannot relate. I have read some of these negative reviews and it is clear that some people believe that they themselves are Siskle & Ebert themselves. The movie is funny, was it the best comedy I have ever seen NO. But to bash a movie just because it wasn't your cup of tea is an insult to reviews as a whole. When I dislike something, I simply choose to remember the morales my mother and father taught me as a young child. I keep my opinions and negative thoughts to myself. Go see the movie, it's pretty funny.

It's a comedy set in Serbia and it's trying to be about Moscow and Russian gangsters and it's incredibly unrealistic and cliché but it does have some originality and a nice message at the end.

However apart from Oleg Taktarov's great cameo (one of the few genuine standouts) there is few other actors playing Russians. This doesn't work for the accents. It's far-fetched and completely unrealistic.

There are very fast edit scenes where Bert is one place then another in an easier location to knock-out a bad guy.

Plot-wise it is very thin. A lady loses her father's watch so kidnaps Bert's daughter and takes him on a joy-ride to get the watch.

Soon the twists and turns of an unpredictable and stupid plotline come forth. It's another low-budget action flick on Netflix when I could have watched something better instead. Dull.

It's also highly-ignorant of the war and Russia's aggression right now and something could have been included in the screenplay. Or better yet it could have been Serbian gangsters then it would have been more honest!