Nature Calls: The Script Poisoned the Movie

 Amidst a hubbub of big Hollywood pictures opening this weekend, the tiny independent comedy Nature Calls opened on a dismal little screen at an Indie theatre in downtown L.A. with myself and two dedicated “Oswaltites” in its audience. All three of us in attendance were hoping to see the birth of a brand new baby cult comedy, but instead were treated to an hour and fifteen minutes of poorly executed potty humor that we just couldn’t wait to conclude.

Randy (Patton Oswalt) is the local troop leader of a dwindling Boy Scout troop. When his final three scouts decide not to go on the big weekend camping trip, Randy dupes a group of potential scouts into an impromptu, unauthorized camping trip at a restricted National Forest. When Randy’s brother Kirk (Johnny Knoxville) discovers that Randy has “kidnapped” his adopted son Dwande (Thiecoura Cissoko)—and yes, the kid’s name is “Dwande,” that’s not a typo—but when Kirk finds out, he leads a group of wackadoo’s into the woods to track down the wayward scouts.

I’m often one to champion small movies. It’s incredibly difficult to produce any film of any substance, let alone a comedy. Unlike a drama, a comedy has immediate feedback from its audience. You can’t fake laughter, and sadly Nature Calls didn’t garner a single chuckle from myself or the other two ill-fated souls watching this evening. Right from the opening scene Nature Calls was a lost cause. The humor fell completely flat, and the jokes throughout the film were re-hashes of re-hashes of unfunny 80’s jokes. Ten year olds cursing can be funny, but only when the script is committed to it. To be fair I was “surprised” a handful of times, but the “surprise” moments didn’t fit in contextually with their scenes.

Nature Calls would have probably been marketable (sans R rated humor) as a Disney Channel movie. Or (if they added in a little extra crudeness) as a movie so raunchy that major studio’s couldn’t pass on the potential American Pie style franchise opportunity. Unfortunately, this film always felt like it was trying too hard for a joke, and it was painful to watch a veteran hilarity-inducing comic like Patton Oswalt struggle to get through the poorly timed jokes. Hopefully he received a decent paycheck. Sadly this film also marked the final film credit of Patrice O’Neal, whose last performance was smaller than his talent warranted. The cast attempted valiantly to bumble through the crudely mismatched screenplay, probably cheering to themselves when the final shooting day came to a close. I suspect a lot of booze was consumed after filming this stinker.

The comedy’s un-funniness is not to be blamed on direction, acting, editing, or any of the other common culprits. This is an issue in the screenplay itself, and it stems from poor choices in premise execution. The very idea of a small group of renegade scouts trying to man up and go electronic-gadget-free for one glorious weekend with an over-dedicated Scout Master is funny on paper. But, scene-to-scene, plot-point to plot-point, the movie was stretched way too thin. There was very little substance. Each scene seemed to be built around a single joke. When I know the punch line before the set-up has even commenced, that’s a script problem. The pacing of the film was so drudging that I found myself looking at the classic architecture of the old theatre mid-movie just to take my eyes off the screen.

I’m sure when screenwriter Todd Rohal came up with his premise it seemed great in concept: simple plot, somewhat original, and very affordable. Maybe he had to rush the script to production, or maybe its genius is just lost on me. In five years Nature Calls could be the next Anchorman, but it’s more likely that the movie will fade into Netflix one-star obscurity, to be fast-forwarded through by early teens hoping for a boob shot (It’s about thirty minutes in, and it ain’t worth your time kiddies). If Nature Calls, don’t answer.