GENTLEMEN BRONCOS Grade: B
With his new film “Gentlemen Broncos,” Jared Hess (of “Napoleon Dynamite” acclaim), feeds his camp-hungry audience the same formula of true weirdness as his last two efforts. Only this time, he does it with a certain dose of crassness that could only be warranted in the world of science fiction. According to Hess, between the two films, he’s been able to showcase different sides of his own childhood.
“‘Napoleon’ is kind of a representation of my social life at that age,” Hess said in an interview with The Eagle. “This is more of a representation of my creative life.”
Be warned if you somehow end up at this film with your grandmother: this definitely isn’t a wholesome family film by your favorite indie filmmaker from Utah. Go see this movie with a group of fun friends — preferably the unemployed ones with criminal records — and be prepared to have both your funny bone and your gag reflex induced.
The film follows the story of Benjamin Purvis (Michael Angarano), who is excitedly accepted to Cletus Fest, the best camp for young writers in Utah. Remember the kids in high school who got way, way too excited about each new “Lord of the Rings” movie? Take about five hundred of them, put them in cringe-worthy, ‘70s haircuts and clothing and ask them to write about their fantasies. That’s Cletus Fest.
Fellow campers Tabatha (Halley Feiffer) and her guy friend Lonnie (Hector Jimenez) joyfully cling to Benjamin after he succumbs to her request to borrow 20 dollars in order to buy tampons. Heading the camp is renowned science fiction author Ronald Chevalier, played with utter hilarity by “Flight of the Conchords” star Jemaine Clement. Chevalier, Purvis’ idol, is a complete tool who perpetually dons a Bluetooth on which he never receives any calls. One of the most hilarious scenes involves him coaching the campers on coining better names for the characters in their fantasy stories.
“You can add -onious, -ainous or -anous to just about anything and it becomes magical,” explains Chevalier with utter sincerity. Chevalier, believably, is at a low point in his career where no one is buying his work. When he announces a contest for the best science fiction story, Purvis eagerly submits his latest opus, “Yeast Lords: The Bronco Years,” a bizarre tale replete with sexual innuendo.
Benjamin leaves camp early to help his eccentric, coddling mother Judith (Jennifer Coolidge) with her nightgown-making business. In addition to nightgowns, Judith also makes and sells popcorn balls that she joyfully deems “Country Balls.”
Life after camp for Benjamin is miserable. Not only did he lose the Cletus Fest contest, but Tabatha and Lonnie, who own an A/V studio, have decided to translate Yeast Lords into a movie that would make something by Michael Bay look like an Oscar-winning film. On top of this, Chevalier has predictably enough decided to plagiarize “Yeast Lords” by “onious and ainous-ing” all the character names and incorporating cyclops, which leads to a chaotic struggle by Benjamin to reclaim the work.
Audience members may gasp or cover their eyes during many of the grosser moments of the film. However, Hess seems rather nonplussed about things getting too weird or getting pushed too far.
“I mean, this film is as weird as we get,” he said. “We always try and make the film that we’ve always wanted to see with the characters and situations that we haven’t seen before and that’s what’s fun to do as a filmmaker.”
Hess co-writes all of his films with his wife, Jerusha. Despite her sensitivity to gross-out humor, Hess said that she played a significant part in “Broncos.” One of the opening sequences of “Broncos” involves a character’s gonads being cut off.
“It’s funny because she actually blames the disturbing stuff on me, but she actually had the idea for the gonads thing — that was her,” Hess said. But the film’s weirdness goes beyond the situations; in fact, much of it comes from the characters.
Upon Purvis’ return from camp, his mother realizes her son has no friends. She takes it upon herself to find him a church-appointed mentor named Dusty (Mike White), an albino choir-singer with a boa constrictor that contributes to one of the most outrageous moments in the film. Despite its ridiculousness, it is actually loosely based on a true event.
“I had a friend ... in Boy Scout Camp when I was like 14,” Hess said. “He caught a big old black rat snake in the woods, and was like, ‘Check out this sweet snake, man!’ and it just crapped all over his shirt. I didn’t even know snakes had a butt hole — I just thought they kind of regurgitated their food when they were done.”
Many of the film’s characters were inspired from Hess’ life in Utah.
“My mom kind of inspired the Judith character,” said Hess. “She worked for a modest nightgown-making company, had popcorn balls that she sold ... A lot of things that happened to the characters in the film, I can relate to quite a bit. The Lonnie character is based on someone I knew in high school that made a lot of soap opera movies that were thrillers. Tabatha is kind of a composite of a lot of crazy girls I knew growing up.”
On par with his own indie-esque movies, Hess encourages aspiring filmmakers to start with whatever they can.
“The first piece of advice is probably very practical, and that is, write something within your means,” Hess said. “Write something you can shoot tomorrow on DV. I knew a lot of kids in film school who would write these epic stories and be like, ‘It’ll be at least 100 mil to pull this off, and we’ll have to have Bruce Willis.’ And it’s like, dude, you don’t have the funds to pull this off. Write something you can do immediately. It’s a great way to find your voice as a director and a writer. Write about the things you know first hand, which may or may not be entertaining to people. But start there.”
“Gentlemen Broncos” hits theaters this Friday, Nov. 6.
You can reach this writer at thescene@theeagleonline.com.
