One thing I've always
liked about Larry Longstreth is his ability to pull off comedy that
would be lost on someone less talented. The man knows how to stage
certain scenes and when relying on his own abilities to pick up the
slack, he pulls off some pretty interesting gags. Dolly Oxem is a
character that I was irritated by right from the beginning, but as the
short went on, I eventually grew to enjoy the zany clown for all he
brought to the front. Longstreth completely pours himself in to this
cartoon character and almost makes the fake nose and glasses prop funny
again. As for the other sketches in this variety short,
Longstreth
again displays his ability to change faces as he plays a sex
predator who happens to be going around his neighborhood
announcing he's a sex predator, and there's also his mock
commercial about his company Leonard's packaged meats where
he struggles to get through his monologue showing how health
and environmentally conscious his business is. It's hard to
take the man seriously when we see his crew member in the
shadows with what looks like an outdated camcorder on a
tripod.
And
Larry's comeback to the host of the "America's Funniest Home Videos"
parody also provided quite a few laughs. Much of what occurs in
"Dolly Oxem" reminded me so much of "Tim and Eric's Awesome Show
Great Job" as Larry takes chances with his characters and jumps from
one gag to another with ease. And as a horror fan I also have to
give him credit for staging a funny but creepy parody of "Night of
the Living Dead."
I was very mixed
with "Dolly Oxem" as you can imagine by the rating above. While
Larry Longstreth does indeed pump some genuine off beat humor
sometimes, other times there are jokes and skits that could have
been pulled off with much more thought behind them. The fake
commercials didn't really ever make me laugh at all, and there were
times where I was wondering what exactly Longstreth was trying to do
with them, while Dolly Oxem doesn't exactly get center stage
considering he takes the title of the whole short film. Longstreth
is not concerned with pulling off traditional humor, but there are
instances where the skits go on too long like a bad Saturday Night
Live sketch and I sat waiting for him to move on to something
funnier. And I could also never really get why we had to go in to
the minds of some of the crew members, nor could I understand why
Larry takes center stage in the middle with a crew member interview
that cut to brief comedic scenes that also never hit home as they
seem to want to do. All in all, Dolly Oxem is an experiment that
could do with much more mixing up and re-edits and less bizarre
humor for the sake of being bizarre.
Admittedly, "Dolly Oxem" is a mixed bag of comedy that hits with
pinpoint precision and comedy that misses by a mile. Director Larry
Longstreth leaves a lot of room for improvement so in spite of our
reservations, we're anxious to see what he does with this formula next.
It has potential to be a hit series if approached with the right
creative direction.
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