"The Aristocrats" is an odd film. Perhaps one of the strangest i've seen actually. It's not a comedy, although it's often being treated as one in reviews and articles. It's a documentary about comedy and comedians, a story about a joke so foul and bizarre that it can never be told to the audience. It's only meant to be used as an inside thing between comedians to see who can ad-lib the most insanely offensive things for the longest time. Kind of like soccer players standing around playing with the ball, showing off to each other. Who can conjure the biggest and most elaborate tricks? So "The Aristocrats" is the joke never meant to reach the ears of the common audience. And yet here we have a movie devoted both to the story of the joke as well as the telling of the joke. We have dozens of different versions being told, as well as dozens of comedians telling you what the point of the joke is. Perhaps the most interesting, and most telling, point of the whole movie is that the joke is NOT supposed to be funny. It's so grossly over the top, so unbelievably offensive, that it's really extremely unfunny if you stop and think about what it contains. Like someone in the movie said "I think you would actually get the death penalty in many places for what goes on in the best versions of this joke". It's incest, feces, bestiality and perversions to last you a lifetime. The reviews have in most parts been good, at least where i live. And yet, most reviewers still look at this the wrong way.
The question should not be "do i find the movie funny?". Rather "do i understand comedians and comedy better after seeing this movie?". I did find the movie funny myself i grudgingly admit. Sure it was over the top, but to me it's something akin to laughing at the violence in a splatter-movie. It's so disgusting it becomes funny. And i understand some people can't cope with this kind of comedy, just as some people can't stand the blood in a splatter-movie. And of course the fact that i found this movie to be funny helps when i rate it. But it's not really necessary. The point for me rather was that this movie gave an inside view into what comedians share among themselves. Comedians like Bob Saget (who i've always found to be an extremely boring person) who breaks at least my views on his character by telling an amazingly disgusting version of this joke. "The Aristocrats" is an exercise in gross exaggeration, but it is also an exercise in ad-libbing. As such it's interesting in more ways than one.
If you're sensitive to foul language, sensitive to crude humor or sensitive in general you should stay away from this movie. It demands that you can distance yourself from the words being spoken. If you are the kind of person who watch "Dawn of the Dead" failing to see the comedy in shooting a movie-star look-alike in the head, you are probably the kind of person who could never get through this movie. For those who can stomach it, and distance themselves enough to see beneath the superficial layer of filthy words, this can be a rewarding experience. And for the right person also a lot of laughs.
7/10
The question should not be "do i find the movie funny?". Rather "do i understand comedians and comedy better after seeing this movie?". I did find the movie funny myself i grudgingly admit. Sure it was over the top, but to me it's something akin to laughing at the violence in a splatter-movie. It's so disgusting it becomes funny. And i understand some people can't cope with this kind of comedy, just as some people can't stand the blood in a splatter-movie. And of course the fact that i found this movie to be funny helps when i rate it. But it's not really necessary. The point for me rather was that this movie gave an inside view into what comedians share among themselves. Comedians like Bob Saget (who i've always found to be an extremely boring person) who breaks at least my views on his character by telling an amazingly disgusting version of this joke. "The Aristocrats" is an exercise in gross exaggeration, but it is also an exercise in ad-libbing. As such it's interesting in more ways than one.
If you're sensitive to foul language, sensitive to crude humor or sensitive in general you should stay away from this movie. It demands that you can distance yourself from the words being spoken. If you are the kind of person who watch "Dawn of the Dead" failing to see the comedy in shooting a movie-star look-alike in the head, you are probably the kind of person who could never get through this movie. For those who can stomach it, and distance themselves enough to see beneath the superficial layer of filthy words, this can be a rewarding experience. And for the right person also a lot of laughs.
7/10