Review of Pretty Bird (2008) by Lorenzo V — 16 Jul 2011

"A rocket-propelled misadventure.".

A comic tale of three would-be entrepreneurs who set out to invent a rocket belt. The clash of their mismatched personalities soon dissolves the business into a morass of recriminations and retaliations, kidnapping, and murder in this parable of American dreams and delusions.

REVIEW.

This is another quirky independent film, this one about a pair of business-oriented dreamers who are all attitude and no substance. The great idea is a working rocket belt, something neither of them know anything about. What they have instead is an abundance of business models, motivational pep talks and winning slogans. For the actual rocket belt they succeed in hiring an actual unemployed rocket scientist who begins to develop a prototype.

Much of the humor is Gogolesque, treading a fine line between absurdity and apparent success. They are successful in raising money from dreamers like themselves. There is a broad satirical implication that "the money people" are a class apart requiring to be spoon fed a certain formula unrelated to business realities. But the project is satisfyingly rejected by the big-time investors, summarily dismissing it as needing "more science" (itself a business euphemism). The film is thus very amusing from the outset and I was prepared for more amusing developments. But the story takes some unfunny turns. The rocket belt becomes the focus of in-fighting which is carried almost to the point of bloodshed. This is probably because it is based on a true story, but that does nothing for poetic justice.

This film turns into one focusing on male bonding or the lack of it. The two original entrepreneurs are best friends with a bond that supersedes anything, including reason. The third partner, the rocket scientist, engages with the two to gain recognition, but in the long run the original promoter is implacable. At issue is the prototype rocket belt itself which he has hidden. You aren't supposed to ask the seemingly reasonable question why the scientist, who is the only one who knows how the thing works, doesn't just build a second prototype--maybe this time one capable of better than 30 seconds flight time. So much is this an all-male film that what might otherwise have been a romance developing between the original promoter and Kirsten Wiig's character is simply dropped, as if for lack of interest.

It all adds up to a flick which starts out very funny and is worth watching to the end, but with a little let-down so far as humor is concerned.