Storyline
Two actors, as their make up is applied, talk about the size of their parts. Then into the film: Laurence Sterne's unfilmable novel, Tristram Shandy, a fictive autobiography wherein the narrator, interrupted constantly, takes the entire story to be born. The film tracks between "Shandy" and behind the scenes. Size matters: parts, egos, shoes, noses. The lead's girlfriend, with their infant son, is up from London for the night, wanting sex; interruptions are constant. Scenes are shot, re-shot, and discarded. The purpose of the project is elusive. Fathers and sons; men and women; cocks and bulls. Life is amorphous, too full and too rich to be captured in one narrative. |
This film is just hilarious from beginning to end. Like most of the best comedy out there, it's thoroughly British in every way. It's more like The Office than Monty Python, though. Sure it's gimmicky and kind of silly, but that's precisely why it's so funny. When it was over I wanted it to just keep going. It could've been twice as long and I would've been on board for every minute. It's not for everyone, I'm sure, but it certainly is for me.