← Back to Reviews
in
Lousy Carter
A terrific performance by a Hollywood veteran playing a very likeable character is the most appealing part of 2024's Lousy Carter, a weird and quirky black comedy/character study that works a little bit too hard at being quirky and is rich with really unlikable supporting characters.
The title character is a 40 year old college professor who is teaching a graduate course about The Great Gatsby, trying to complete some kind of animated tribute to Vladimir Nabokov, caring for his ailing mother, aggravated by a student in his class who he's having trouble reading, is having an affair with his best friend's wife, and has just learned that he has about five months to live.
This film is the brainchild of a somewhat experienced director and screenwriter named Bob Byington, who is really trying to find a voice as a filmmaker but apparently has decided someone else's voice until he discovers his own and that voice seems to be Woody Allen. This story has the bizarre and loopy sensibility as some of Woody's more out there work like Alice and Irrational Man. Byington has provided us with a central character who is actually likable and easy to relate to, but everything in Lousy Carter's orbit is just ridiculous and hard to believe.
This character is afforded no respect through out its mercifully brief running time. Right after he is told he is dying, the receptionist reminds him as he's going out the door that he has a balance over $6000 that he needs to take care of immediately. His alleged best friend, Kaminsky, never gives him a straight answer to a question and doesn't crack a smile throughout the entire film. Byington also actually gives Lousy's therapist a German accent so he sounds like Sigmund Freud, which just wreaked of cliche. His wife is just using Lousy to wake up her husband. One of his students, Gail, accuses him of being a pediphile and when she learns of his mother's death, insists on going to the funeral because she loves going to funerals, People loving to go to funerals is about as stupid as people being afraid of clowns. And having the funeral in a bowling alley wasn't as funny as it was meant to be either.
I was drawn to this film because of the casting of David Krumholz in the title role. Krumholtz has been in the business since he was a child, making his film debut in the 1993 Michael J Fox comedy Life with Mikey, and though he has worked steadily since, most people don't know him by name, but he is a talented actor and he does make this film worth a look. So does Martin Starr as the stone-faced Kaminsky, but the best thing about this film is that it clocks in under ninety minutes.
A terrific performance by a Hollywood veteran playing a very likeable character is the most appealing part of 2024's Lousy Carter, a weird and quirky black comedy/character study that works a little bit too hard at being quirky and is rich with really unlikable supporting characters.
The title character is a 40 year old college professor who is teaching a graduate course about The Great Gatsby, trying to complete some kind of animated tribute to Vladimir Nabokov, caring for his ailing mother, aggravated by a student in his class who he's having trouble reading, is having an affair with his best friend's wife, and has just learned that he has about five months to live.
This film is the brainchild of a somewhat experienced director and screenwriter named Bob Byington, who is really trying to find a voice as a filmmaker but apparently has decided someone else's voice until he discovers his own and that voice seems to be Woody Allen. This story has the bizarre and loopy sensibility as some of Woody's more out there work like Alice and Irrational Man. Byington has provided us with a central character who is actually likable and easy to relate to, but everything in Lousy Carter's orbit is just ridiculous and hard to believe.
This character is afforded no respect through out its mercifully brief running time. Right after he is told he is dying, the receptionist reminds him as he's going out the door that he has a balance over $6000 that he needs to take care of immediately. His alleged best friend, Kaminsky, never gives him a straight answer to a question and doesn't crack a smile throughout the entire film. Byington also actually gives Lousy's therapist a German accent so he sounds like Sigmund Freud, which just wreaked of cliche. His wife is just using Lousy to wake up her husband. One of his students, Gail, accuses him of being a pediphile and when she learns of his mother's death, insists on going to the funeral because she loves going to funerals, People loving to go to funerals is about as stupid as people being afraid of clowns. And having the funeral in a bowling alley wasn't as funny as it was meant to be either.
I was drawn to this film because of the casting of David Krumholz in the title role. Krumholtz has been in the business since he was a child, making his film debut in the 1993 Michael J Fox comedy Life with Mikey, and though he has worked steadily since, most people don't know him by name, but he is a talented actor and he does make this film worth a look. So does Martin Starr as the stone-faced Kaminsky, but the best thing about this film is that it clocks in under ninety minutes.