Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		4.5
Audio		3.5
Extras		4.0
Overall		4.5

Klown Blu-ray Movie Review

Curb Your Gag Reflex

Reviewed by Michael Reuben September 26, 2012

Klown is the feature film version of a popular Danish half-hour comedy that aired from 2005-2009 and was frequently compared to Larry David's HBO series Curb Your Enthusiasm—except that Klown did things that might make even Larry David hesitate. The infamous Danish frankness in matters of sex allowed the series a latitude that few American comics would risk for fear of pushing the boundary of discomfort past the point where people stop laughing. As an example, the Blu-ray extras include an episode entitled "It's a Jungle Down There", co-written by Lars Von Trier, whose penchant for making viewers cringe is well-established. A key plot point involves a porn magazine focusing on women who never shave in the region of . . . you get the idea.

The series starred former stand-up comic Frank Hvam as "Frank", a semi-retired stand-up comic, and his friend and writing partner Casper Christensen as Frank's friend, "Casper". Frank's live-in girlfriend, Mia, was played by actress Mia Lyhne, and Casper's life partner, Iben, was played by his then-actual life partner, actress Iben Hjejle, best known outside Denmark as the object of John Cusack's longing in High Fidelity. Wherever possible, Frank and Casper used real people and places to build their plots, but unlike Larry David, they scripted their episodes. Klown remained, however, a comedy of discomfort, and Frank and Casper were always the butt of their own jokes. "I've heard a lot of people say of the TV show that they can't watch it", Christensen told one interviewer. "They watch 15 minutes and they go, 'This is too much. I want to watch it, but I've got to take a break because this is so awkward now, the atmosphere is so weird.' So people stand in front of the TV, and it's almost like a horror movie [where] the more you get scared the more you want to come back for it."

When the series ended after six seasons, the duo sat down with their director and began to develop a movie. The Danish teaser trailer promised that the film would make up for all the terrible things that Frank and Casper had done on television. They would provide a beautiful and epic family movie: life-affirming, romantic, moving. Unfortunately, the teaser went on to admit, Frank and Casper failed to deliver. Then it cut to a scene of them trying to have a threesome. Klown was back.

At the wedding of Mia's brother, Mads (Mads Lisby), to his long-time girlfriend, Susan (Dya Josefine Hauch), Frank learns that Mia is pregnant but doubts he'll be a good father. Crushed, Frank returns home to discover that Mia has volunteered to babysit Susan's and Mads's 13-year old son, Bo (Marcuz Jess Petersen), while the happy couple goes on honeymoon. Sitting at breakfast the next morning across from a withdrawn Bo, Frank feels an utter failure as a man.

Casper, by contrast, is upbeat, because he is preparing for a "canoe trip", on which he knows Iben will refuse to accompany them, freeing Casper to run wild with other women. (He calls the trip a "Tour de Pussy".) The culmination will be an annual party in a remote bordello that resembles the orgy in Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut. Hosted by an elderly rich musician named Bent (Bent Fabricius- Bjerre), the gathering is invitation-only, which is why Casper and Frank are so keen to attend the weekly "book club" held by Bent and other distinguished Danish journalists, novelists and filmmakers (played by distinguished Danish journalists, novelists and filmmakers doing parodies of themselves). Unfortunately for Frank, the book club meeting proves to be just another in an endless string of humiliations.

Further horrors await Frank when Mia insists that he and Casper take young Bo on their "canoe trip". Unable to decline without revealing the trip's true purpose, Frank and Casper acquiesce, thereby ensuring one of the most excruciating road movies ever made. Casper wants to score, and he'll try anything female, whether she's a high school student or the friendly plus-size lady, Ronja (Marie Mondrup), who assists them after they capsize their canoe. Frank is the sadsack, who can't share Casper's enthusiasm, because he wants to be loyal to Mia (and he also lacks Casper's "strutting peacock" style, which one may rightly suspect to be some sort of overcompensation). Caught between these two goofballs is poor Bo, who, although he's only on the threshold of the whole teenage thing, already seems like he can't wait for it to end, even though what lies on the other side doesn't look like much of an improvement.

After various misadventures, the mismatched trio ends up at a music festival, where they encounter the Danish pop star Medina (playing herself). They visit Bent's "Castello Alleycat", the high-class brothel, where Frank is subjected to yet further humiliations, and meet up with their friend Lars, who gives them a "Bumkarl", a very powerful joint. Under the influence of alcohol and marijuana, Frank loses Bo in the crowd and goes frantically searching for him, ending up stripped to his underwear (don't ask) on the stage of a huge outdoor concert by Danish rock star Thomas Helmig. And there's still worse to come.

I can happily report that the film reaches its conclusion without any deaths or serious injuries. I'm not so sure, though, that such remains the case after the final cut to credits. The klowns may have left themselves in a tough spot for a sequel.

Klown Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Danish teaser trailer riffed on Klown's transition from TV to movie screen by opening with clips from the television show in 1.33:1, then widening the image to the 1.85:1 format of the film. Notwithstanding the wider canvas and bigger production values, the essential aesthetic remained the same. The film was shot like reality TV, with mostly handheld cameras and in what appears to be HD video. (Technical specifications were not available.) If I've followed the Danish credits correctly, the final edit was passed through a digital intermediate to color-correct and harmonize footage from multiple locations in Copenhagen, the great outdoors and the town of Skanderborg, where the music festival occurs and near which Castello Alleycat is located.

Image's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray is clean, clear and detailed, with its sharpness only occasionally compromised by the intense brightness of the daytime Danish light that streams in the windows of, e.g., Casper's and Iben's apartment. This appears to be a deliberate effect that reinforces the documentary feel of the production. Colors are varied, natural and well-saturated, and blacks are deep and solid, which is essential in all the scenes containing dark suits and tuxedos (including the wedding at the beginning and the Castello Alleycat sequence in the latter half). Shadow detail is quite good, although in the loathsome scene involving a threesome, the viewer may wish otherwise. During the many nighttime scenes at the music festival, it helps to be able to make out all the detailed activities happening in the frame, many of them for real, since the production shot during an actual music festival.

There was no video noise, no compression errors and no signs of inappropriate "filtering" or sharpening. It should also be noted that the Engish subtitles are "burnt in" and cannot be switched off.

Klown Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Like the TV show, Klown the movie relies primarily on its dialogue, but that doesn't mean its makers wasted the opportunity of a feature film soundtrack. The DTS-HD MA 5.1 is full of ambient noise that subtly (and not so subtly) opens out the scenes to help signal that this version of Klown is bigger, bolder and more shameless than anything to date. Starting with the sounds of the wedding reception crowd and the city noise of Copenhagen as Casper and Frank attend the book club meeting, we move to the various sounds of nature on the canoe trip (frequently a surprise to urbanites such as these) and then to the throbbing bass presence of the music festival. I can't vouch for the Danish dialogue, but the occasional word of English is clear enough. Klown's distinctive theme and incidental music by Kristian Eidnes Andersen will probably stick in your head—it's been compared to Curb Your Enthusiasm, but reminded me more of The Odd Couple—and the soundtrack uses some interesting standards, including "Alley Cat" (you've heard it, even if you don't know it) and a Danish version of the Roger Miller classic, "Chug-A-Lug", which plays over the credits. I don't know whether it was the film or the singer, but it sounded positively obscene in Danish.

Klown Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Commentary with Director Mikkel Nørgaard and Stars Frank Hvam and Casper Christensen: All three participants speak excellent English, but you have to wonder whether there would be fewer pauses if they were speaking in their native language. Hvam and Christensen, who are old friends, do most of the talking, and it's frequently hard to know when they're serious, especially Christensen, for whom clowning seems to be a natural state of existence. Despite the pauses, the commentary is full of interesting details, such as the fact that the actor playing Bent really did write the tune "Alley Cat", and intimate details about shooting the threesome scene, some of which may fall under the category of "too much information".



• "It's a Jungle Down There": Episode of KLOWN Television Series Written by Lars Von Trier (SD; 1.33:1; 25:01): The feature is captioned "written", but it should be "co-written", because Christensen is also credited. Mia and Iben disappear for some girl time for several evenings, and Frank and Casper become suspicious. In fact, the girlfriends are attending a workshop to explore their female sexuality. If American TV could manage to treat sexual embarrassment, frustration and incompatibility with equal frankness and humor, I'm not sure whether we'd be better or worse off.



• KLOWN from Behind: The Making of KLOWN (HD, 1080p; 1.78:1; 41:50): The double entendre title of this documentary refers to the fact that it's largely a retrospective using interview footage from the film's Copenhagen premiere. Frank and Casper are interviewed at length about the experience of making the film, along with director Nørgaard and many of the supporting actors. Intercut with the premiere footage is substantial material from various locations, especially the Skanderborg festival where Frank goes looking for Bo in the crowd and interrupts a rock concert.



• Inside "Castello Alleycat" (HD, 1080p; 1.78:1; 3:53): Scenes from the set of the fabulous brothel that is Casper's ultimate destination.



• Crafting "The Willie" (HD, 1080p; 1.78:1; 2:25): Makeup artists demonstrate the appliance specially crafted to spare young Marcuz Jess Petersen certain indignities inflicted on his character "Bo". As one of the makeup people is quick to point out: "I'd like to remind you that I didn't write this."



• Alternate Opening Sequence (SD; 1.85:1;1:38): This scene between Frank and Mia began developing the theme of Frank's lack of responsibility and also hinted at Mia's pregnancy, but it was apparently deemed unnecessary.



• Deleted Scenes (HD, 1080p; 1.78:1; 13:28): There are eight scenes. Some are extended versions of scenes that still exist in the film, including a half-hearted suicide attempt by Frank, while others are true deletions, including a classic exchange between Frank and Casper about what they call "the blowjob bank".



• Outtake Reel (HD, 1080p; 1.78:1; 6:52): It's difficult to keep a straight face while filming a threesome.



• Trailers (HD, 1080p)
• Danish Teaser Trailer (1.33:1 & 1.85:1; 1:28): By far the funniest.
• Danish Theatrical Trailer (1.85:1; 3:43): An entire scene from the film.
• US Theatrical Red Band Trailer (1.85:1; 2:06)
• US Theatrical Green Band Trailer (1.85:1; 1:58)
• Bullhead (2.35:1; 1:46)
• The FP (2.35:1; 2:16)



• Booklet: Cast, credits, stills and poster concepts, including a great parody of American Beauty and a nude poster of Casper that is discussed in the KLOWN from BEHIND documentary.

Klown Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

As cringeworthy and painful as Klown's humor becomes, there is something cathartic and even reassuring in the way that Frank and Casper make themselves the object of their own mockery. Others behave badly, but they are always the worst. In one of Lars Von Trier's early films, The Idiots (1998), a group of student rebels challenged what they saw as a complacent society by disrupting ordinary lives with the "idiot" behavior of simulating mental retardation. The notion was provocative, but it retained the intellectually detached, supercilious streak that often gives Von Trier's work a queasy aftertaste. Frank and Casper don't have to exploit the mentally challenged to disrupt ordinary lives. They manage it by being regular guys, with just a bit of exaggeration. They remind us that idiots are often ordinary people who happen to make really bad decisions. Highly recommended for those who can handle it.