Funny Pages

In the early 2000's when I was the same age as the protagonist in the film, the world of underground comic books was a universe I loved dipping my toes into. The grot, the beauty and the ugliness of Weirdo magazine and Bagge, Clowes, Pekar and Crumb. It's an enchanting scene, full of strange curmudgeons, men who smell and collect jazz records. I used to love going to a now defunct "comic-mart" convention, marvelling at the stench of body odour, the lack of civility and obsessed desperation of the men that permeated these events, despite being the privileged youth who went back home afterwards to a clean, household of love and affection. To say this film resonated with me is an understatement.

At times hilarious and ridiculously niche, a really interesting little film that makes me excited to see what Owen will create next.

A coming of age story about a rebellious teenager who hates his parents for wanting him to go to college and be serious about his studies, when all he wants is draw cartoons and become an artist.

A lot of nerds. A lot of whining parents. And a lot of frustration suffered by teenagers. We have seen it all before. Is it any good?

The good; I must say that this is an honest movie with true to life characters. It'll do as a nice coming of age portrait, BUT...

The bad: this is not a new teenager classic, because it is lacking spark and punch and the actor's aint particularly great.

Not bad, not great either....

Funny Pages is a movie about repulsive losers by first time writer director Owen Kline. A tourist in the world of comics collectors and trash ephemera enthusiasts, Kline noticeably cribs the template for his cast of characters from Terry Zwigoff's films Crumb (1994) and Art School Confidential (2006). This wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for the fact that Kline possesses none of Zwigoff's affinity for societal misfits. Zwigoff knows his subjects intimately and empathizes with their struggles and their sadness, where Kline can only identify what is weird and disgusting about them.

Owen Kline is the son of actors Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates, two of the most beautiful people alive, and with his background of extraordinary privilege and wealth it seems a strange choice to make a film about poor struggling outcasts, the likes of which he would be unlikely to cross paths with in his world. Funny Pages' inhabitants are never allowed to be anything other than nauseating caricatures of their specific class, which is unfortunate because there isn't a bad performance in the movie, this being especially true in the case of Matthew Maher who is fantastic in his role.

The grungy "idiosyncratic indie movement" (as one critic called the movement of "new Harmony Korines" that explore the most pitiful lifeforms of America's underbelly), which includes the likes of Sean Baker and the Safdie brothers, now has a new member in the form of Owen Kline and his impressive debut Funny Pages.

It stars Daniel Zolghadri (Tales from the Loop) as Robert, a young man who aspires to be an artist -- specifically, a comic strip artist. It doesn't take place in some past golden age of Sunday funnies, yet it feels like it; much like Spencer and Compartment No. 6, the film is presented through a grainy image that makes it feel remarkably "90s".

I do relate to growing up on the funnies: while others flipped through Spider-Man comics, I read Dilbert, Get Fuzzy, Pearls Before Swine, Bloom County, The Far Side, and whatever else appeared in the Gary Larson magazines my father used to collect. (My grandmother also used to cut out the funnies of our local newspaper, which included the likes of Beetle Bailey and Zits, and staple them together into little books for me and my cousins to read.)

Of course, Robert is more into the R. Crumb stuff. His is a world of Tijuana Bibles and nauseating caricatures, and this includes the people he encounters in real life (who are among the most beautifully grotesque figures in the A24 pantheon).

Also, it contains one of the most blood-curdling screams I've ever heard in cinema and it's not even a horror film. Flanagan, eat your heart out.

I totally appreciate the bizarre vibe and humour.

I was chuckling every time a new character appeared (nothing worth a loud laugh though..).

Unfortunately, besides a couple good scenes, there's nothing else than a collection of really freaky looking and acting people, that don't have much to do throughout the movie.

The beginning makes the viewer think that the main character will be fighting hard to get what he wants, which is very clear, but he only goes around not doing much to achieve his goal, chasing an absolutely obnoxious character who never get what he deserves.

The ending is so bland and anticlimactic that I couldn't help but feeling that this was a complete waste of a chance as a movie.

The cinematography adds to the retro vibe, but it's nothing new and it doesn't help to redeem the lack of an actual story.

There are a few interesting scenes, but the weirdness of characters push too much to the side of boredom more than entertaining, funny awkwardness.

Wouldn't recommend it.