Beerfest (2006)

Beerfest is not made for the likes of me - my guess is it's intended for the sort of loud, obnoxious 'young, dumb and full of cum' American that's depicted throughout this film.

Nevertheless it still comes as a surprise, and a huge disappointment, to see the likes of Donald Sutherland and Jurgen Prochnow reduced to having to perform cameos in such tosh. I hadn't realised these actors were so behind on paying their rent!

The film starts with the funeral, and a pre-recorded speech, from Donald Sutherland's character. He plays a German emigré whose ashes must be taken by his two surviving sons back to Germany during the big yearly beer drinking festival Oktoberfest.

While on their trip they stumble across a smaller Masonic Lodge -like, private 'Beerfest' festival, and, after being very publicly humiliated, are challenged to return a year later to save the family's honour and, perhaps, inherit the beer company that it will turn out is rightfully theirs anyway.

Much of the first act of the film is devoted to the two surviving sons and their search to find other team members who will help them defeat those nasty, stereotypical Germans. Not happy with turning a whole nation's population into over-the-top caricatures (a vile, lisping Herr Lipp from The League of Gentlemen - but without that character's jokes - is introduced here to up the comedy level) we get one politically incorrect set-up after another. Consistency of plot is thrown away endlessly, in the hope that if enough stereotypes and 'gross out' scenes are splattered across the screen somebody, somewhere might raise a chuckle. So one of the team is discovered as a male hooker, offering blow jobs to any male he spots, while his effeminate fellow-workers encourage him, only to suddenly turn full-blown heterosexual a few scenes later so that we can get endless 'accidentally making out with a very fat black woman when drunk' joke added into the mix as well. Calling the film puerile is an insult to the world puerile, and I don't know what's worse - the fact that the film got made and turned a profit, or the fact there are so many Americans over on imdb calling this 'one of the funniest films I've seen'. Has the mental age of the average film-goer in American really turned below five?!

Admittedly the cast do the best they can with the crap they've been given. But the fact that two of the biggest parts go to the two script-writers should alert you in advance as to how self-indulgent this whole exercise in bad taste is going to become.

If I had to sum the film up in one word I'd say 'lazy'. The characters are particularly lazily written, with the obligatory loud and obnoxious 'funny' fat guy, the geeky, sensitive intelligent guy, the... well you know the formula if you've been anywhere near a cinema in the last thirty years. Even with established character traits to draw on, all we get here from them are the obvious tit, knob and drunk sex gags.

There is an attempt at some sort of story, which I suppose is some kind of blessing for those forced to sit through this stuff. And it has some kind of resolution, albeit with a 'traditional' ending that's been clearly signposted from the start. But it is such a lazy story it's hard to feel any kind of investment in it. When the writers are reduced to having Jurgen Prochnow appearing for no apparent reason in a cardboard submarine just so they can make references to his most famous film appearance (as the U-Boat captain in Das Boot), or having the finalé consist of participants drinking beer out of a glass boot (Das Boot - see what they did there? Laugh? I nearly bought a round!), you know desperation has set in. And, alas, the desperation is set in for most of the film's ridiculously long two hour running time.

The only reason this HD-DVD release gets more than a big fat zero is the quality of the transfer, and the fact that it's not just a vanilla release. The picture quality is excellent and worthy of the title 'High Definition' - you're not going to get this quality on a standard DVD, or indeed in many of Britain's cinematic emporiums. Rich, deep colour and pin-sharp quality for the most part show that at least the cinematographers, if not the writers and director, knew what they were doing.

Sound is pretty good too, given that this is a comedy film rather than an action movie. Crowd scenes in the beer drinking halls make good use of surround and place one right in the middle of the whole ghastly debacle, although it could be argued this is the last thing one wants given what's happening on screen.

The extra's are generous, but show that in real life the actors seem to be as debauched and immature as the characters they play. There are deleted scenes, 'Making of' featurettes and TWO commentary tracks, which seems over the top given the 'Size 0' qualities of the main feature, but I guess one shouldn't complain about companies doing more than just put out a 'vanilla' release. If you're wondering if the commentary tracks are any good, I couldn't possibly say. Two hours was too much time to waste watching the main feature, without wasting even more time hearing morons talking about it.

Needless to say this is NOT a recommended title. Not even for rental. Not even if they pay you to rent it. At least not unless you're mentally retarded or think that horse-faced blonde women having their clothes 'accidentally' ripped off is the height of sophisticated humour. Avoid!