‘Nerdland’ at Tribeca Film Festival
What lengths would you go to for fame?
Paul Rudd, Patton Oswalt, and Reid Scott explore this question through the raunchy, adult animated feature Nerdland.
Set in the dark, seedy streets of Hollywood, that rarely grace the cinematic screen, best friends John (Rudd) and Elliott (Oswalt) are just trying to make it. John is an aspiring actor and Elliott is an aspiring screenwriter, but like many people that move to Los Angeles to pursue their dreams, they haven’t quite made the cut. As their 30th birthdays swiftly approach, reality sets in that the fame they seek becomes more and more difficult to reach.
Their growing desperation to achieve their dreams comprises the bulk of the film and leads to the most exciting part. From a blow-up sex doll, to Hannibal Buress’ The Nerd King, the crazy antics that John and Elliot go through are strangely magical in this take on the less glamorous side of Hollywood, to which so many aspiring actors fall victim.
There is a police brutality scene that lasted just a bit too long, but if the purpose was to make viewers uncomfortable, then that kind of high-level shock value was definitely achieved. Other than that, screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker proves that some people will do almost anything to achieve fame in modern society.