 | MOVIE DETAILS • Name: An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn • Year: 2018 • Country: USA, UK • Director: Jim Hosking • Main cast: Aubrey Plaza, Jemaine Clement, Emile Hirsch • Runtime: 89 minutes • Production company: Park Pictures, Wigwam Films, Rook Films • TRAILER |
After the big shock, in the most positive way as possible, his debut feature film The Greasy Strangler (2016) [read our review here] supposed to the fortunate people who had the infinite joy of watching it, the expectation for what would Jim Hosking’s new work were high, very high. Today was that day, and the experience was satisfying enough although the movie wasn’t able to cope with the director’s predecessor.
The title of the movie is An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn (2018) and it’s the story of Lulu Danger, a young woman whose unsatisfying marriage takes a turn for the worse when a mysterious man from her past comes to town to perform an event called “An Evening With Beverly Luff Linn; For One Magical Night Only“. Many hilarious situations, ridiculous characters in ridiculous situations. And it all filmed by that little weirdo called Jim Hosking, a man who has proven an undoubtful talent for filming very beautiful images mixed up with the most hysterical comedy feeling. This time he got together a group of “normal” comedy actors like Aubrey Plaza, Jemaine Clement, Emile Hirsch, Craig Robinson and British Matt Berry of The IT Crowd (2007-2013) fame together with some of the freaks who starred in his previous film. If people like Sky Elobar, Sam Dissanayake, Gil Gex and Carl Solomon are going to be habitual in Hosking’s movies, a good set of uncontrollable laughs is secured.
The script is senseless, bordering surrealism, but still hosts some bizarre quotidianity that could make some of the characters and situations almost possible. The acting is good, almost every actor has one or two sequences where the laugh is insured (especially Sam Dissanayake, my favorite of the whole movie. Every single one of his appearances is priceless). And as a difference to many of the brainless comedies nowadays when filming tends to be quite hollow and unsubstantial, Jim Hosking still manages to get very good results in the cinematographical sense. The takes and framings are very well constructed, with an images setting more caregiving than the average movies. Special mention deserves the music, again composed by Andrew Hung, which although doesn’t reach the level of iconic as The Greasy Strangler (2016) still remains as a very personal factor in this title.
Altogether makes An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn (2018) a good movie in its weird own kind. Inferior to The Greasy Strangler (2016) but still a mandatory watch for everyone who enjoyed Jim Hosking’s opera prima. Both movies are different between each other, but they still have the same unique perspective. And although I could understand why The Greasy Strangler (2016) was part of the line-up of the Sitges Film Festival a couple of years ago, due to its strange monster and serial killer background, I don’t understand what An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn (2018) was doing here. But hey, I don’t complain, never change that, bring in anything Jim Hosking does! The whole auditorium was laughing out loud the whole movie, so it was a very good feeling to know I wasn’t the only one I was craving for this movie and knew what I was going to face. This is the kind of movie that turns a film festival into a party.
RATE: 6/10
IMDB URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt6518270
