Funny Man (1994)

Totally British and perfect for a night in with a load of beer.I don't understand all the negative reviews but whatever-I enjoyed it and everyone i know who watched it thought it was great too!If you want serious horror then there is plenty of choice out there.Nothing wrong with having a laugh whilst the characters get bumped off in very original ways-Where else do you see a Jester dancing around whilst electrocuting,stabbing eyes with stilettos and as for what he does in the van-Hilarious stuff!In some ways it reminds me of Revenge Of Billy The Kid-another British horror comedy.Perhaps the humour doesn't translate that well overseas .Just wish the proposed follow up had been made but sadly we just get Friday the 13th part 54 etc........Now lets have a long overdue DVD release-my VHS copy is getting worn out!Sorted!

As long as you get the original UK uncut VHS version this film it is a treat for those who appreciate a very typically British sense of humour.The film presents us with at least 8 loathsome stereotypes who are humorously dispatched by our anti-hero Funnyman.In the full version of the film (not available in the US as I found to my cost when I ordered the DVD from some place in Chicago) the violent scenes are a campy gore fest accompanied by suitably humorous music, in the cutting down of those scenes for the US market much of the humour is lost to the cutting room floor.Unfortunately it seems that the authorities responsible for censoring movies in the US find the humour a little TOO violent for American Sensibilities (Something that I am sure many Americans would disagree with had they been given the opportunity to see this film in its entirety).This is a cult movie of the first order, not everybody's taste in comedy (which is what gives it its cult movie status) but certainly a movie that is unworthy of deletion and unworthy of the philistine cutting room in the US censors office.Like the comment on the VHS and DVD cover of Funnyman says "He's cheeky and he's cruel" and sometimes cruelty is involved in humour to deny that is to deny humour of which this film is Jammed packed full from the very simple humour of slapstick to the more cerebral humour of irony, farce and parody.If you are going to venture a rental or a buy, make sure that you go for the uncut / uncensored version it is infinitely more funny.This is a film that works well if you are familiar with Britain and British culture, if you don't know who Jimmy Saville is or are so out of touch with Britain that you think any of the accents employed by the characters were "Cockney" (Which none of them were) then clearly you will not understand the gags or parodies and can be forgiven for your lack of appreciation for them.Additional Background Information of Interest:Whether or not Simon Sprackling based the Funny Man character on an old English legend is not known but people who view this film should be aware that there was a real life funny man counterpart in history, his name was "Thomas Skelton" (Tom Fool) and he was the Jester and Sheriff to the Pennington family.Legend has it that Thomas would often be seen sitting at a tree on the roadway waiting for travellers to go by, he would then engage them in conversation and decide whether or not he liked them, the unfortunate travellers that Tom decided he didn't like he directed towards the local marshes and quicksands where they would meet their grizzly fates.Thomas Skelton (Tom Fool) died around 1600 and gave the phrase "Tomfoolery" to the English language even being cited as the inspiration behind the Jester in Shakespeares King Lear.Today Mucaster Castle in Cumbria claims to be the home of Thomas's Ghost who is apparently every bit as mischievous today as he always was.I would rather like to think that the inspiration for Funny Man came from this ancient legend than from some Hollywood garbage, something others unfamiliar with the legend might find hard to believe, but life did exist before Hollywood and Hollywood is NOT the ONLY source of inspiration to those with access to other cultural sources.Thomas Skelton was the original Psychotic Jester predating "Freddie Krugger" by a mere 400+ years and predating the USA by a mere 200.

An awful, nearly impossible to watch and deservedly obscure piece of excrement. There us nothing more tedious and hard to sit through than bad comedy and this film is a perfect example of that. The whole victims die by some ironic means of death somehow appropriate to whatever personality traits they have displayed (Usually just the one, as with most movies of this ilk the characters are completely one dimensional) shtick was old a long time before this film was made. Still, it trots out that routine without any real originality, skill, wit or aplomb as the various annoying characters are killed one by one. The funny man the films half arsed British attempt at a Freddy Kruger type character is pretty lame and none of his jokes are remotely funny.With type of movie the individual scenes can sometimes be amusing even if there is only enough plot to provide a pretext for a series of killings (This film doesn't even go that far, stuff just happens) but they are all so badly staged, nonsensical and at times incoherent that they are hard to sit through. Most the scenes are needlessly protracted and are like a long, rambling joke with a bad punch line that would have been disappointing if the joke had been a quarter the length. Some of the stuff in the movie, like the bits with the Jamaican voodoo woman, or whatever the hell she was supposed to be, going underneath he house were almost entertaining in a WTF kind of way but again it was all so tediously protracted and badly staged that I was just waiting for it to end.I like to watch bad horror movies and whimsical over the top humour, which I gather this movie was trying for but this movie was a train wreck. Just because something isn't meant to be taken seriously doesn't mean it can't be crap.

Do you like jesters? Do you like demons? If the answer is 'yes' to both, then this is the film for you. The 'Funnyman' is basically a jester-demon with a Lancastrian accent, which turns into Welsh at various points in the film, who likes to kill people via hilarious (?) pranks in his big scary house. Surreal? Yes indeed. I won't go into too much detail about the wild-afro'd weirdy voodoo lady who's hand changed into a gun. The film, in general, is rubbish... but it has loads of comedy value and lots of gore that everyone should see. By the time you've finished watching this film, you can't help but say the word "Sorted", accompanied by a thumb-up.