The Aristocrats
Directed by: Paul Provenza
Starring: Approximately 100 comedians including Penn Jillette, Robin Williams, Sarah Silverman, Gilbert Gottfried

The Aristocrats is a documentary about a dirty joke with the same beginning and the same end. A family of performers visit a talent agent, say: “We’ve got an amazing act for you”. They perform the most disgusting things you can imagine. The talent agent says: “That’s a hell of an act. What do you call it?” The answer: The Aristocrats.

It’s not a funny joke at all, but as Penn Jillette says, “It’s the singer, not the song”. The Aristocrats is 100 comedians’ take on this old joke that for years was just an insider thing amongst comedians. Some of them tell their own version, others just talk to the camera about why it’s funny or not funny to them. Before seeing this film I assumed it would be amusing, yet for various reasons, be a faulty film. I think my instincts turned out to be correct.

“The Aristocrats” will probably generate more laughs than 90% of the junk put out this year, but at the same time, very few of these comedians are ever funny in the film, especially when telling their version of the joke. They rely on the assumption that shit, piss and incest are inherently funny, and don’t add anything new to it to make their version stand out from the pack. At the same time, there are a few that can work that same base material and get by on performance alone, such as Gilbert Gottfried’s lauded performance of the joke at a Hugh Hefner roast shortly after 9/11. Only a handful were dementedly creative enough to get me laughing – Bill Maher, Bob Saget, Andy Dick and South Park’s Trey Parker and Matt Stone cross the line so far it was no wonder some people walked out of the movie.

The big problem though, is almost every time someone is making the joke work, they cut away to someone else who is doing a terrible job at the joke, or unnecessarily explaining for the millionth time what the joke is about as if we didn’t get it yet (such as Paul Reiser, who I wanted to kill by the end of this film.) This movie is just as much Penn Jillette’s baby as it is director Paul Provenza’s, and I guess he just couldn?t stand to cut all these friends/colleagues out, even if their pieces weren’t working. (By far, Eddie Izzard has the most useless scene.) Because of this ADD editing, “The Aristocrats” gets tedious very quickly, and it took something really bizarre or creative to get me interested again.

There were some of those moments. A few times comedians would tell stories about each other that were interesting, and several comedians were wise enough to turn the joke on its head, or do it through someone else’s voice. A highlight is Kevin Pollak’s impression of Christopher Walken doing the joke, another is Martin Mull and Robin Williams’ reversal of the joke. Mario Cantone, dreaded hack comedian who regularly inhabits TV’s “the View”, manages to shine brighter in the film than noted stars such as Drew Carey, Chris Rock or Emo Philips. Andy Richter and Doug Stanhope tell the joke to their infant children.

So basically, what we have is a 90 minute documentary that should have been maybe even half its length, with around half of its stars cut. The only justification for this as a feature length would be as a gift from Jillette to his buddies. There’s a mime version of “The Aristocrats” that itself makes this a worthy DVD rental, but nothing here is amazing enough to justify going out of your way to one of the few theaters showing it.

Unless of course, the word “fuck” alone sends you into waves of laughter. — Goon