Taglines: A comedy about family affairs.
Walter, a middle-aged, has been TV actor, who is still beloved by the fans of the cult high fantasy show he starred in, is invited to his estrange millennial daughter Nic’s woodland wedding. Glad to be able to see her again, he accepts the invite and travels to her house in the woods with her cute friend, Kim, with whom he has sex in the heat of the moment after a drunk karaoke night in a bar.
However, when he later realizes in shock that she is actually the girl his daughter is suppose to marry, he becomes deeply conflicted about whether or not they should come clean and admit their one night stand to Nic, which Kim is decisively against. Meanwhile, he also has to get used to his daughter’s unorthodox female friends, who are also there for the wedding.
Funny Story is a 2018 tragicomedy film, directed by Michael J. Gallagher and co-written by Gallagher and Steve Greene. It stars Matthew Glave, Emily Bett Rickards and Jana Winternitz. The film premiered as an official selection at the 2018 Slamdance Film Festival on January 21, 2018.
The part of Nic was specifically written with Winternitz in mind. On casting Glave, Gallagher noted that it took some time to find the right actor for the part of Walter and that he was looking for “someone who could be charming, oblivious, deeply narcissistic– but deep down have a good heart”. With regard to casting Rickards as Kim, he stated “I knew that by casting Emily, when Kim made tough choices, the audience could see that deep down she is a good person who is just lost at this moment in time.”
Filming took place in Los Angeles, California, in June 2017 and on location at Topanga Canyon and Big Sur. The film was shot in its entirety over 15 days. Director Gallagher took the decision to shoot the whole film with a wide-angle lens, something he believed benefited the comedic nature of the film and showcased the actors’ interactions, as it was “fun to let them breathe and experience the awkwardness of being stuck in this shot together.”
Film Review for Funny Story
Directed by Michael J. Gallagher, Funny Story is the story of a conceited actor on a road trip with his semi-estranged daughter’s special friend up to Big Sur. I’m keeping it vague here because there are some twists and turns I don’t want to give away that authentically had me surprised.
The movie takes some really unexpected turns and keeps things interesting. Funny Story has an incredibly dry sense of humor that the actors execute perfectly. I was really sucked in by everything that was happening on screen between the characters, they all play off each other quite nicely. Unfortunately, the film falls apart at a certain point and delivers an incredibly dissatisfying climax that sours the experience overall.
Matthew Glave is wonderful as Walter. Walter is a bit of a selfish tool and that is established during the very first scene. We see his desire to be a better person, and the script really plays with the question of whether or not he’s making decisions based on actually trying to help his daughter or bring everyone down to his level of misery and personal failure. I like to think it’s the former, but thankfully it’s all very ambiguous and it works. Emily Bett Rickards as Kim is introduced as a cold and distant asshole with a massive chip on her shoulder.
As the movie advances, we learn more about who she is, and she becomes a more nuanced and layered character. The movie really centers on these two characters, their similarities, and their conflict. The rest of the cast is fine, but these two make the film. Jana Winternitz plays Walter’s daughter, Nic. She has some of the most dramatic moments of the film and she handles them well enough.
I felt her character came off a little pompous and unlikable, and I think the story should have explored her relationship with Walter a little more. I feel like they hardly interacted, and I was very interested in what kind of a relationship they had. Lilly Holleman as Moon is definitely the funniest character in the movie, and somehow she’s at her best when she’s in the background not speaking any lines.
Funny Story is a comedy with a terribly tragic edge. I’m not speaking of the plot exclusively. There’s plenty of tragedy involved for the characters, I’m more so speaking in terms of how sad it is that the film kind of falls apart during its climax. Funny Story is one of those movies I found myself really getting into, the characters and the plot was really engaging and I was enjoying the way everything was unfolding and then it ends in an incredibly unsatisfying way complete with an out of nowhere cameo from Carl Winslow himself, actor Reginald VelJohnson. The ending set itself up for so much potential drama, so much potential comedy of errors, or maybe a mixture of the two and instead it all just sort of peters out. Finale aside, the movie is definitely worth checking out for its strong performances and surprising story.
Funny Story (2019)
Directed by: Michael J. Gallagher
Starring: Matthew Glave, Emily Bett Rickards, Nikki Limo, Daiyse Tutor, Jana Winternitz, Lilly Holleman, Jessica Diggins, Jacob Wysocki, Susan Gallagher, Elizabeth Greer, Ceciley Jenkins
Screenplay by: Michael J. Gallagher, Steve Greene
Production Design by: Karleigh Engelbrecht
Cinematography by: Greg Cotten
Film Editing by: Brian Ufberg
Costume Design by: Jax Sirotiak
Set Decoration by: Lauren Kim, Hank Kulesa
Art Direction by: Sage Griffin
Music by: Brandon Campbell
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Blue Fox Entertainment
Release Date: May 24, 2019
Visits: 50
