Perhaps you didn’t know you needed a twisted comedy about clowns, on the backroads of Ireland after “The Event,” struggling for fame, love and simple “acceptance” after the world ends.
But everybody gets the joke, that even after the power goes out and civilization takes a tumble, those wigged, rubber-nosed greasepainted mimes will still have trouble holding a crowd.
“Apocalypse Clown” is about an entertainer who never made it — Bobo (David Earl) — and one who did, the formerly Great Alfonso (Ivan Kaye), about an incompetent clown apprentice, Pepe (Fionn Foley) trying to pay tribute to the mentor who stroked-out at how bad his act was, and a wild-eyed, wild-haired “street clown” — Funzo (Natalie Palamides, who steals the movie) — who can’t understand why her psychotic come-ons don’t lure children into her tiny tent in public parks.
Stephen King? “Who’s that?”
Can failing reporter Jenny (Amy De Bhrún) get past her daughter-of-a-famous-journalist mommy issues, the bad decisions that had her drunkenly sleep with a clown once and her conspiracy mania to let the world know “solar flares” did it? Because, when everything electronic quits working, it’ll take some seriously analog thinking to set things right.
With well-worn acts, in costume and born to entertain, the clowns figure “This is our time.” Hell, they’ve even got a hand-cranked diesel Renault clown car to travel the country with. Because no car more more modern than that will start.
Only old issues, murderous grudges, petty rivalries and a grotesque lack of talent could hold them back.
Veteran TV director George Kane (“Flacks,” “Timewasters,””Crashing”) helms a comic winner that sprints out of the gate as we see Bobo lose his last job, “depressing” the children in a hospital, Pepe cause his French mentor’s (Barry McGovern) death and the vain Great Alfonso appear on TV promising a comeback when all they really want him to do is pay tribute to the dead clown DuCoque.
Jenny is sure she has a scoop about a coming calamity. But first, go cover this clown funeral, “big shoes to fill,” “Will they all show up in one car?” You know the drill.
A riot at the service gets them all tossed in the clink. It seems street psycho clown Funzo has drawn first blood from the human statues in her local park, and that feud with a Statue of Liberty and a two-fisted, body-painted Jamed Joyce intruded on the funeral.
But being in jail kept them in the dark when the lights went out and “The Event” happened. When they get out, Funzo figures their “clown troupe/fight club” should make its mark in this primitive new world. Maybe not.
Bobo crushes on Jenny. Alfonso schemes, brushes off remarks about his dark past and bullies, Pepe guards his mentor’s body and Funzo tries to ignore warnings that they’re still “fax modems” and “travel agents,” obsolete creatures in a world that stopped needing them decades ago.
Palamides is the stand-out in the cast — demented, dizzy, oddly-accented and capable of anything. But Earl’s hangdog act, Foley’s sadly self-aware mime, De Bhrún’s bellying up to the bitter bar and Kaye’s gift for grandiose and grotesque all contribute to the grim fun.
Throw-away one-liners land, daft enounters with a food truck hunk and a hippy “faire” whose inhabitants are set up to be survivalists, but would rather just consume all their drugs and stakes that rise as Jenny hopes against hope that she’ll have the means to announce her “scoop” to the world propel “Clown Apocalypse.”
It still bogs down terribly in the later acts, but manages to find a little suspense and a big laugh or two the finale.
Hey, as long as you leave them laughing, right?
Rating: unrated, violence, profanity
Cast: David Earl, Natalie Palamides, Amy De Bhrún, Fionn Foley, Tadhg Murphy and Ivan Kaye.
Credits: Directed by George Kane, scripted by Demian Fox, Shane O’Brien and George Kane. A Blue Fox release.
Running time: 1:42
