Klown is a Comedy about growing up… and making the absolute worst decisions at every possible moment. And then doing it again.
First off I want to say I have not done any major outdoor sports in long time.. I mean in a long time, so this was so much of a workout that I was sore and I ached for two days after this trip. I really forgot how beat up you get enjoying a canoe trip.
But I digress. So, last month on June 30th at the famous Texas Guadalupe Canoe Livery, stars Frank Hvam, Casper Christensen stars of the danish comedy Klown, producer Louise Vesth, Tim, Karrie League and about 100 plus Alamo Drafthouse / Klown fans all got into canoes and started to float the 4 four miles to be rewarded at the end of the canoe trip with endless cascades of free beer, scrumptious hotdogs and strawberry crepes all while seated in front of Alamo’s Rolling Roadshow’s giant inflatable movie screen playing every uncomfortable moment of the R rated Klown.
Did I mention the beer was FREE? They even drove in a Beerliner.
OK let me break this down into segments only because there is going to be a lot of jumping around.
About the Canoe trip down the Guadalupe river: As we waited for the Canoe guides to load us into old school buses to take us the 4 miles up river we sat in front of a peacock enclosure and wondered, “why are there peacocks here?” It didn’t really matter because it was soon go time. I grabbed my cooler and gardener hat, with my new peacock feather sticking out of it, and loaded my butt in the now recommissioned Maple Wood School districts transport. Pack me in with twenty five eager boaters, a large stash of life jackets and oars, beer and the stars of the movie and I’m golden.
We arrived in the first few waves of canoe warriors. Everyone grabbed a life vest, a paddle, a partner and made our way to the banks of the great Guadalupe river. We are about an hour and a half away from downtown Austin Texas and I honestly didn’t think we had such a beautiful river so close and I live near lake Austin. This is a ridiculously stunning river. Super clear water cascading down smooth river rocks, right out of the Travel Channel .
This all soon faded within the first two minutes of us getting into the water. In the distance ahead I saw a couple of canoes that seemed to have stopped. How do you stop a canoe in the moving river? Easy, take away the river. Yes it was that shallow at certain points and with the combined weight of two people we stopped dead in our tracks except of course the slow turn that almost capsized us. But I got out of the canoe just in time to grab it and steer it in the right direction and push it along the rocks to a deeper part of the water. Whew disaster averted. or at least until the smiling couple who figure they can just ride it out and barrel through the shallow, and they do until they hit us.. Guuuh!!! this is getting more and more fun by the nautical minute.
I actually started to laugh as I flipped over and thought oh man my head is going to hit the biggest rock in the riverbed. It didn’t but I was laughing and swallowed about 2 gallons of river water instead. As I rose out of the river I noticed everyone else walking their boats by us and I just thought to myself why couldn’t you people have taken a lesson from everyone else and got out and walked your boat instead of barn storming into us? Turns out they where very helpful in getting our boat upright and in turn I was able to help them about a mile down the river when something very similar happened to them.
This was tougher then I thought, canoeing and all. I guess sitting in front of my computer day in and day out doesn’t do much for stamina. But at the end was more then just a prize it was downright a gift. I sat in my camp chair with lots of ice cold beer, new friends, the cast of Klown, Tim and Kari League in front of a 25 foot inflatable screen. I was in my own personal Nirvana.
The movie Klown opens in theaters today across the country and also available on VOD NOW here. Watch the funniest movie of the year, KLOWN Now! Click Here
About the Movie KLOVN (Klown the V is silent): What does canoeing have to do with a Danish Comedy? Well let me tell you a little about the movie and you will know why.
Klown is a dirty raunchy movie about two really likeable guys Frank and Casper, who just do stupid stuff over and over again. Its mind numbing at times, but that is why its called comedy. Frank learns from a friend that his girlfriend is pregnant, and that she hasn’t told him because, as she says, “I worry you don’t have enough potential as a father.”
Frank gives his girlfriend good reason to doubt his fatherhood-um. So he kidnaps the kid they’re babysitting, His girlfriends newphew, young Bo, in hopes that showing Bo a good time in the great outdoors will restore his girlfriend’s faith in him. Unfortunately the two friends had planned a whore filled Canoe trip down the river called offensively “Tour de Pu**y”( hence the canoe trip we took).
This is a comedy people, so while I understand folks being offended by some of the humor, still humor is supposed to be cutting edge funny, stuff that makes you laugh hard and make you think “Oh man did they just do that?”
As they start their trip things start to go south, from a bus load of high schoolers on a field trip to a kind woman who takes them in after they flip their canoe and feeds them pancakes, sounds innocent enough but the debauchery ensues and engulfs all three with very uncomfortable moments at a camp ground, soon visited by the High school students and their counselor.
As things progress they forget about Bo, who cannot swim, is ignored, bullied and left behind to fend for himself, and then falls into the water to be rescued by the same lady who helped them previously but this time she feels a bit truthy with the wife and girlfriend of our two main hedonists. From the male flirting, to the drinking of bottles of Underberg liquor to collect the caps for a chance at winning a toy Underberg liquor truck, to climbing on the stage half naked at an outdoor rock concert looking for the now lost boy, it just seems like things cant get any worse.
But they do. And with expected results of pure humiliation and squirms of uncomfortable images on screen that make you think “Oh wow did they REALLY just do that?”
I will say this, it was not about a canoe trip that goes horribly wrong, its about trying to make people think you are something you are not, ready to grow up.
The Hangover’s Todd Phillips will be overseeing the American remake.
Klown comes to theaters July 27th, 2012 and stars Frank Hvam, Casper Christensen, Marcuz Jess Petersen, Mia Lyhne, Iben Hjejle, Lars Hjortshøj, Tina Bilsbo, Mads Lisby. The film is directed by Mikkel Nørgaard.
And now available right here for direct release rental from Drafthouse films and Distrify. Nerdlocker will be experimenting with more of these Direct release rentals in the near future, until then please grab a Direct VOD download and watch .
Photos courtesy of Drafthouse films, Debbie Gomez and Aaron Rainbolt
