Crying With Laughter

On Wednesday after class a group of us decided to go to Cineworld since we were all having withdrawal symptoms from being back in Glasgow and not setting foot in the great building. So some people went to see some Rieper Man film but since we had planned this earlier, Sam and I went to see the Scottish film Crying With Laughter which was made in 2009. I was told it was only in the cinema for a couple of days so it was a good opportunity to go and see it now and blog about it if it was any good.

The film follows the story of a Scottish comedian, Joey Frisk who has had a fairly troublesome life, getting sent to borstal at a young age where he was forced to learn to be funny. The film begins with the news that a comedy scout is interested in seeing Joey's act and if successful, he could make a good career out of it. However, events take a turn for the worse when he is arrested for seriously injuring his landlord after one of his shows.

I really enjoyed the film. It gripped me throughout and I always think films like this are very cleverly written and must take a lot of work. Every eventuality needs to be worked out so that people don't watch it and ask "well why did he not just do X in that situation." I liked the way the plot continues and unravels at a relatively fast pace. There is not a great deal of lingering around unnecessarily in scenes as the story progresses seamlessly. The story is never boring and is also very "edge of your seat" type content which I really enjoy. The fact that Crying With Laughter is a Scottish film made me like it even more: there was a very noticeable difference in the style to this film in comparison with big Hollywood blockbusters which would undoubtedly have turned this script into a completely different and, in my opinion, much less enjoyable film. The fact that it's set in Scotland with Scottish actors also makes it a much more realistic watch for me. There were some very nice shots in the film from a technical point of view and the style and tone of the film to me was great.

So no matter what Sam says I think Crying With Laughter was excellent and it's probably one of the best films I think I've seen this year. That and A Prophet I think, which maybe says something about what I think of a lot of the American films coming out these days.