GENTELMEN BRONCOS (USA 2009) *
Directed by Jared Hess

From the director of NACHO LIBRE and NAPOLEON DYNAMITE Jared Hess comes another comedy about losers.  Unfortunately, GENTLEMEN BRONCOS is not funny and turns out to be a complete loser.

The story concerns Benjamin (Michael Angarano), home-schooled by his eccentric mother (Jennifer Coolidge).  Loser Mother believes in love and her loser son’s talent in writing – but also in her dress designs.  But from the look of the outfits, one is surprised less shocked that she succeeds in the end.  So true too, for Benji’s writing.  From the readings of Benji’s novels, the stories make no sense.  So, when the legendary fantasy novelist, Ronald Chevalier (Jemaine Clement) plagiarises his book, the audience can only snigger in disbelief. 

But director Hess is insistent on showing clips of how the book (called Yeast Lords) is made into a movie by a local homespun filmmaker.  This really bad movie only parallels Hess’ turkey of a movie.  Some films are so bad it is funny but GENTELMEN BRONCOS is so bad it is ‘not’ funny.  All the actors are specially chosen – as they all have a deranged look.

The only one good thing about GENTLEMEN BRONCOS is that it illustrates how disinfecting and dangerous home-schooling can be.  It also proves independent films can go entirely out of hand with reality.