jonathan-577 Review of Best Worst Movie

Best Worst Movie (2009)

loving and revealing, but disappointingly episodic

[6/10 · 18 May 2009]

In which the wholesome child actor at the fulcrum of the awesomely cruddy "Troll 2" constructs a documentary around the timeless question of how the hell the movie happened in the first place, and what cultural aftermath lay strewn in its wake. Repeated theatrical revivals of this direct-to-video nonpareil leave its jes-folks stars grinning in utter incomprehension at its rabid cult, and its asocial creep director wondering why everyone is laughing at the serious parts. There's a lot of fun to be had in watching the actors - who are basically normal everyday crazy people, two decades out of the limelight - engage with the phenomenon that this film has become, and starstruck dentist George Hardy is a nice focal point for the project. Unfortunately the film struggles to interweave his story with the other, equally endearing characters . Grandpa Robert Ormsby and the profoundly weird Don Packard could carry whole subplots by themselves, but their interjections are disappointingly episodic and incidental to Hardy's through line; surely the film could have provided a better balance. And whenever things list toward 'montage' the movie dies a little. But the subject matter carries it, and without giving away too much of the source material either; not that the magic of 'Troll 2' could ever be dissipated by a mere documentary.