Get good and depressed with one of the darkest comedies ever made. It’s sad all over and ugly on top. Comedian Patton Oswalt is wince-inducing perfection as an obsessed New York Giants fan who’s brutally beaten to the point of concussion by his favorite player for being a nuisance and then refuses to press charges over it because he doesn’t want to hurt the team’s season. That’s a great set-up for a wacky comedy, but writer/director Robert D. Siegel would rather take a hard look at Oswalt’s warped mental state and how it’s ruined his life. Oswalt’s a 36 year old pile of shit who lives with his mother and works in a parking garage. His greatest accomplishment is being a star caller on a local sports talk radio show and he feels not the least bit bad about it. His mother is ashamed of him. His lawyer brother tries to help him, but he won’t accept it (partly out of resentment). He desperately needs a life, but he doesn’t want one.
Patton Oswalt is so great here because he gets the fanboy mentality. In his stand-up comedy, he often ridicules his own nerdiness for comic books, films and literature. He knows the pitfalls. He knows that somewhere there’s a very icy place to go where one has stopped participating in life and builds their entire world around (and hitches their ego to) being a fan of something. He also does an amazing job of looking terrible. Robert D. Siegel makes pointed use of Oswalt’s pudgy Mr. Potato Head body and is liberal with the most unflattering close-ups possible. If this was shot in 3-D, Patton Oswalt’s neck fat would flop out at you like The Blob every ten minutes. His face ends up being the dominant image of the film. It’s a face full of clueless inner conflict and searing anger at ridiculous issues. It ain’t pretty. Ain’t nothin’ pretty here.
For maximum hopelessness on a Saturday night, pair this with the other great mortifying comedy of 2009, Observe and Report (in which, incidentally, Patton Oswalt plays a small role), or any Todd Solondz film.