Review of Waking Ned (1998) by Russell B — 16 Jan 2009

Just saw this last night after doing my Plyo X workout (ugh..), and I'm not quite sure what the best ranking to give it is. All in all it's a rather touching and sometimes amusing story of friendship...and one that is made all the more charming due to the fact that the main 2 characters, who are trying to cash in on a recently deceased friend's lotto ticket, are both quite old! But for me, it wasn't as funny as I had hoped or expected given that it's billed as a comedy. It also suffers a bit from fairly slow pacing, especially during the first half, as well as some superfluous subplots that seem to have no connection, thematic or otherwise, to the main story.

Even so, here are a few other positive notes about the movie: 1) one of the main characters, Michael, played an incompetent Irish construction contractor in an episode of John Cleese's old British TV show, "Fawlty Towers"; 2) the general "Irishness" of the movie makes it hard not to feel happy by the movie's end...kinda made me wanna go down to Celtic Crossing for a pint; 3) there are a few downright gorgeous shots of the landscape.