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Robert
Sarkies adapts
his brother Duncan’s novel in his latest film, a black comedy about two
mullet-sporting
bogans who find their friendship put to the ultimate test after one of
them
kills a Norwegian backpacker named Juergen (Filip Berg) in a freak road
accident. Nige (Bret McKenzie) and Deano (Hamish Blake) have been best
friends
since childhood. Their epic bromance began on Nige’s first day at his
new
school, when Deano let him sit next to him in class. Their bond
extended long
into adulthood, with Deano assuming the role of older brother to Nige.
The two
did everything together, including living together as flatmates, but in
the
process became unsettlingly overfamiliar. One day, Nige woke up to the
sobering
question of whether this is all there is to life. His concomitant
crisis precipitated
the breakdown of their friendship. Nige asserted independence by
leaving Deano
and moving in with a good-natured, obese Maori named Gav (Maaka
Pohatu). After Juergen’s
death, however, Nige is forced to seek Deano’s help in disposing of the
corpse
without Gav’s knowledge. Nige, Deano and Gav embark on a wincingly
awkward road
trip through the Catlins, where
Deano’s possessiveness towards Nige reignites their former conflict.
The trip becomes
a painful but necessary journey for both of them.
Two
Little Boys has all
the makings of a classic New
Zealand comedy but lacks the savage funniness. Fans of the nation’s
particular brand
of black humour, epitomised by films like Braindead
(1992), Black Sheep (2006) and
Eagle
vs Shark (2007), will be sorely
disappointed. Like many Kiwi comedies, the film sets ludicrously grisly
scenarios against beautiful vistas, but it distinguishes itself by
taking crudity
to another level. It goes too far and becomes insufferable to watch.
The film’s
humour resembles a madly esoteric, jet-black and bogan-specific version
of Stepbrothers’ (2008) man-child humour. Gags
riff on random topics like corpse disposal, human dismemberment,
Norwegian
football, flatmate infidelity and
murder conspiracy. The Sarkies
brothers don’t channel their energy into one specific type of humour,
but write
individual jokes that hardly ever provoke laughter, only the audience’s
exasperation. McKenzie and Blake both fail to amuse, though much of
this could
be attributed to the lines they were given. The film’s greatest problem
is that
it meanders wildly, drifting in and out of so many moods and ideas that
the
viewer is left perplexed as to how to respond. It is by turns an
inaccessible
black comedy, an absurd road movie
and a disturbing drama about two oblivious bogans. It is a restless and
shapeless
mess.
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