Day 026 || Puddle Cruiser

Puddle Cruiser, 1996

Dir. Jay Chandrasekhar

"What's the difference? It's just a bunch of old white men legislating my uterus anyways."

Some of you readers may be familiar with the comedy troupe/film team, Broken Lizard, and even more of you will be familiar with their breakout hit Super Troopers, a film that made all of the characters huge. Well, some more than others. Super Troopers, although still rough around the edges and filled with several flaws, earned it's place among great genre and cult comedies, and have lead to the team getting picture deals working on several follow-ups, Club Dread, Beerfest, and the soon to be released The Slammin' Salmon and follow-up, Super Troopers 2.

But what many people might not know is that Super Troopers wasn't their first film, but actually their second. And there's good reason.

Puddle Cruiser is the first film by Broken Lizard and features all the main players. The guys are all here, be it much, much, much younger and more immature. Maybe because I'm about fifteen years removed from this film, or because I've grown used to their more evolved approach to comedy, but Puddle Cruiser is never really becomes a comedy. Sure there are some comedic bits, and a few times you might chuckle, but it resembles more of an immature (a word I'm pretty sure will be used quite a bit in relation to this film), awkwardly paced indie film.

The production values are low and it looks like it was shot on the weekends for super cheap on a campus somewhere. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing. Look at Kevin Smith's Clerks for example. The soundtrack cost more than it did to shoot the film, yet it managed to be not only funny, meaningful, but it still holds relevance to this day. If anything, Puddle Cruiser resembles a bad parody of Mallrats, Smith's most flawed and loosely reined in film.

Puddle Cruiser, again much like Mallrats, shows signs of brilliance here and there, and it's definitely evocative and showing of the true talent behind the film...but ultimately Puddle Cruiser is weighted down in mediocrity, and subpar film-making, acting, and comedy. It's definitely a disappointed, and for fans of Broken Lizard, I'd say this might be worth a rental purely to see the roots of the team. For those uninitiated with the group, stay away from this film, because it's just not worth the time.

1 out of 5