Funny Pages

Funny Pages is a movie about repulsive losers by first time writer director Owen Kline. A tourist in the world of comics collectors and trash ephemera enthusiasts, Kline noticeably cribs the template for his cast of characters from Terry Zwigoff's films Crumb (1994) and Art School Confidential (2006). This wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for the fact that Kline possesses none of Zwigoff's affinity for societal misfits. Zwigoff knows his subjects intimately and empathizes with their struggles and their sadness, where Kline can only identify what is weird and disgusting about them.

Owen Kline is the son of actors Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates, two of the most beautiful people alive, and with his background of extraordinary privilege and wealth it seems a strange choice to make a film about poor struggling outcasts, the likes of which he would be unlikely to cross paths with in his world. Funny Pages' inhabitants are never allowed to be anything other than nauseating caricatures of their specific class, which is unfortunate because there isn't a bad performance in the movie, this being especially true in the case of Matthew Maher who is fantastic in his role.