Tag Archives: Kristen Schaal

Patty All the Time

The Bob’s Burgers Movie

by George Wolf

Some fifteen years ago (!), at a critics screening for the movie version of Strangers With Candy, I laughed early and often. I was a fan of the TV show and its particular brand of humor, and I thought the film was hilarious. And then I realized something.

I was the only one laughing.

At the recent critics screening for The Bob’s Burgers Movie, a similar thing happened. Only one person was laughing.

It wasn’t me.

Series creator Loren Bouchard brings his baby to the big screen as co-writer and co-director, and he promptly puts the Belcher burger joint in jeopardy.

The family has just seven days to make a loan payment to the bank, and business isn’t exactly booming. And that was before a big sinkhole formed directly outside the front entrance! Meanwhile, the Belcher kids stumble onto a mystery involving the obnoxiously rich Calvin and Felix Fischoeder (voiced by Kevin Kline and Zach Galifianakis) that could reveal a way out of the whole mess.

Bouchard and his regular cast of voice actors (including H. Jon Benjamin, Kristen Schaal, Dan Mintz, Eugene Mirman and John Roberts) have been at this for over a decade, and their move to the multiplex shows no signs of re-inventing a formula that has clearly worked for years.

It just doesn’t work for me.

The songs are spirited, the animation well-crafted, and the dialogue often rapid fire. But it leans on a style of humor that’s often obvious and repetitive, in a cartoon world where nearly every single business has to have a corny name like “It’s Your Funeral Home,” “Sprain Sprain Go Away” and “Weight Weight Don’t Tell Me.”

But to its credit, The Bob’s Burgers Movie is here to super serve the regulars. There may be too much fatty in the patty to attract many new converts, but if you’ve already memorized the specials, belly up for a deluxe portion.

Dr. Whoa

Bill & Ted Face the Music

by George Wolf

You know why Death (William Sadler) was really kicked out of Wyld Stallyns?

Well, I’d tell you, but that would take the number of laughs waiting for you in Bill & Ted latest romp down to two…maybe three.

It’s been almost 30 years since their Excellent Adventure gave way to the Bogus Journey, but Bill (Alex Winter) and Ted (Keanu Reeves) are still best buds. Now living in the suburbs, each has the wife that they brought back from Medieval England (Erinn Hayes, Jayma Mays), plus a daughter (Samara Weaving, Brigette Lundy-Paine) that is the younger version of their most excellent dad.

Though they still rock out, Ted is ready to hang up his guitar until the future comes calling.

It’s Kelly (Kristen Schaal), daughter of their old pal Rufus (George Carlin, thanks to a well-placed hologram), with news from the Great Ones. The boys have exactly 77 minutes to play their song that united the world, or reality will collapse.

Whoa.

While it’s nice to know Bill & Ted will finally achieve musical greatness, the world needs that song right now. So why not go into the future, steal it from themselves, then come back and get quantum physical?

Director Dean Parisot, who helped make Galaxy Quest an underrated cult classic, teams with original franchise writers Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon for a time-traveling ode to living in harmony. This time, the historical figures we meet are mainly musical (Mozart, Satchmo, Grohl), but while the journey is long on sweetness and good-natured stupidity, it just isn’t very funny.

After all these years, Reeves and Winter make an endearing pair of overgrown adolescents, and they do seem genuinely joyful about stepping back into that magical phone booth.

The joy that you get from Face the Music will likely match up perfectly with the amount of nostalgia you have for this franchise. The film’s present isn’t bad, either. Because theaters are opening again, and God knows we’re all longing for a simpler time right now.

For almost 90 minutes, Bill & Ted make sure we get one.