Last Night I Watched: Frank

Last summer, one of the first movies I watched was The Spectacular Now, which left me a wreck halfway through to the degree I couldn't finish it in one night. If Frank's 2nd half had been its first, the same thing probably would've happened, albeit for different reasons. But Frank's 1st half was one of the top funniest things in a movie I've ever seen.

 This is way less creepy when you watch (screenshot from the film)

The reason I like the original 3 Muppet Movies and the Jason Segel one are because they have heart and they're funny. They're mostly funny through hilarious sight gags like bears and frogs being brothers and frogs on bikes. Frank ups the ante on sight gags and makes the entire first half of the movie a giant sight gag.

A guy walking around in a giant paper mache head doing everything a normal person would do, whether it be showering or throwing a ball against a wall or dancing in a meadow with a European woman, is roughly 10000000x funnier just because he does all of it with the head on and it's barely acknowledged. Combine that with him describing his facial expressions and it's fantastic.

Just look at this stuff:

It's basically a dad being disappointed in his son. Except he has a giant head on. He even wrestled the French guy in it:

I really can't describe how absolutely insane the first half of this movie is. Just random shots of him and the protagonist Jon in the car made me laugh out loud. When he's cuddling with Jon, it looks ridiculous. Half the humor in this movie is something you didn't even have to write. It's just Michael Fassbender is a physical actor extraordinaire and we just have to let him be weird with this.

Then the second half hits once they're done recording their album, and the movie becomes a depressingly beautiful character study of Frank. Frank seems happy just making his music for whoever is listening. It seems to help him get by after we find out that he and his manager met in a mental ward. It's his happy place. It makes him comfortable and Jon wants to bring him to the masses without realizing this. He thinks Frank is brilliant because of his mental problems but it's really in spite of them.

His musical gifts turn out to be what helps Frank live and be happy and survive in a world that his brain won't let him take in in the way people without mental illness can. Jon basically tries to make him into a cookie cutter singer who happens to have a giant fake head.

Really, all Frank wants is to be loved and that's why he agrees to go to Austin to SXSW even when everyone else in the band is against it. He finds out that the people probably won't love him for his music and he breaks down and leaves. The ending really is touching with a beautiful song and helps you realize why Frank does what he does and what he'll do in the future.

Not everyone wants to be famous. That's not why most of us make art. It's something that we enjoy doing and gets us through to survive in a world we're scared of. Frank wanted love, not fame. And I can relate to that.

***

So if you couldn't tell I loved this movie. It was funny and I got something personal out of it. So it naturally goes to the top of my power rankings for summer movies since it's the first one I've watched. But barring a Spectacular Now level surprise, it's going to stay there for awhile.

Summer Movie Rankings:

1. Frank