Hurries too hard at times
Men with Brooms laughs good-naturedly at Canada
Review
Men with Brooms
Starring Paul Gross, Molly Parker and Leslie Nielsen
Directed by Paul Gross
Opens Friday, March 8
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Men with Brooms falls into the same trap many Canadian comedies fall into: telegraphing jokes, soliloquies for plot development and sub-plots dedicated to pointless jokes. But for the most part it is an uneven comedy that could fall into the category of those quaint little European comedies that exemplify the local oddities.
Now, in the sporting world, few sports are riper for humour than curling. The fact that until very recently there were ashtrays lining the sheets makes this a sport that is often seen in quotations marks. But aside from some mild mannered ribbing, Men with Brooms takes curling to the glorious heights of bowling.
The set-up leaves the hack with an age-old movie dilemma after a bizarre request is made in a man’s last will and testament. This sets off the quest for four long-lost buddies to come together and win the Golden Broom. Paul Gross is the skip who left town mysteriously on his wedding day and isn’t seen again until he returns for his old curling coach’s funeral. It was his coach’s daughter that he ditched at the altar – she is now... wait for it... an astronaut. No, I don't know how or why. That’s all we find out about her. Her sister (Parker) is a dried out drunk, also in love with the skip who skipped town.
Meanwhile, in the background, we learn a little bit about the rest of the team and the new coach, an old codger with a propensity for magic mushrooms, played without too much ham by Leslie Nielsen. The lead rock is a hen-pecked funeral director, the second is a gambler and no-account dandy, and the third is a man with a low sperm count who is desperate to impregnate his wife.
Men with Brooms is filled with half-finished characters and jokes that come out of nowhere and go back to nowhere. Luckily, the acting is pretty solid and it is full of quite funny Canuck moments, all of which add up to make most of the film’s faults forgivable. |
