Review: Sleepwalk with Me

       Mike Birbiglia is a successful stand-up comedian, though you might not know that from talking to him. He's comes across as somewhat shy and awkward, it's a wonder that he is able to get in front of an audience and spill his guts. Birbiglia's success is even more amazing once you start listening to his act. A large portion of his material comes from his sleep disorder in which he acts out his dreams while he's asleep. The most extreme manifestation of this sleep disorder happened when Mike jumped our a second story window, an event that nearly cost him his life. Since then, Mike now sleeps in a sleeping bag and wears mittens so that he cannot unzip it. Mike turned this story into a successful one man show, and then into a popular segment on Ira Glass' radio show, This American Life. Mike teamed up with Ira Glass to make a movie about his experience as a comedian with a sleep disorder and the result is Sleepwalk with Me.

Review: Wet Hot American Summer

     A falling satellite, a talent show, a cook with PTSD, and a heroin binge. What do these things have in common? They all can be found in Wet Hot American Summer, a disjointed, manic spoof of teenage camp sex comedies like Meatballs. Co-writers David Wain and Michael Showalter worked together on MTV's sketch comedy show “The State” and later as part of the comedy trio Stella, along with Michael Ian Black, who also worked with them both in this film as well as on MTV. Their screenplay takes every opportunity to make a joke, and many of them are delightfully absurd. Many critics don't appreciate this film because I think they are trying to take it seriously as a traditional comedy. But that's not what it is, it's a send-up of the tropes teen sex comedies so often find themselves perpetuating. But this film doesn't limit it's focus to just spoofing comedies. It also spoofs a wide variety of movies including disaster movies and romantic dramas. Because of this, the film has too many different facets to be compared to any comedy that has come before it. The closest it perhaps the Zucker Brother's Kentucky Fried Movie, but this is still different because it manages to piece together a plot that can be followed throughout the entirety of the film. In my opinion, Wet Hot American Summer is one of the funniest movies ever made.