National Lampoon’s The Legend of Awesomest Maximus

Beyond Home Entertainment

R4 DVD

I am not a great fan of American film comedy. Compared with the subtlety of British humour, American comedy is crass and immature and based too much on one-liners and slapstick. Awesomest Maximus is one of these but somehow it works.

Lately we have seen a revival of the old sword-and-sandal genre starting with Gladiator and Spartacus. Perhaps the genre should have stayed dead and buried. It was parodied in the 2008 film Meet The Spartans without success as the producers tried to include as many current icons (like the judges of American Idol) as they could write into the script. There are the compulsory gay jokes, but not too many – we wouldn’t want to upset a minority, would we? With this self-indulgent approach and spot-the-irrelevant-star the film lost its way and the producers forgot they were doing a parody.

Awesomest Maximus doesn’t have these problems and stays firmly on course. The unashamed gay jokes come thick and fast (when will the Americans get over this obsession that gay people are to be laughed at?) and the script is full of other risqué jokes and sexual innuendo. They still have a mental block at the thought of depicting sex so they talk and joke about it instead. Some sort of “family values” thing perhaps?. The characters’ names are the usual parodies (like Testiclees). At least with comparatively unknown actors you don’t have to play spot-the-star. There is a passing touch at subtle humour in the opening sequence where the titles roll over a background of figures painted on a vase, Greek-style. If you are watching the titles you may miss the fact that the men look suspiciously like bodybuilders and the women are actually pole-dancing strippers. Top marks to whoever came up with that one. It sets the tone (very low) for the rest of the film.

The plot isn’t great and you soon realise you are watching a spoof of Gladiator and 300 rolled into one. At least the film has a plot and writer Jason Burliescu follows it rather than try to be cute and add irrelevant bits and stars. This tight construction makes the film better viewing and a serious parody rather than a mishmash of one-liners. Because of this I enjoyed it.

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