Breakfast of Champions

So here I am watching 'Breakfast of Champions' – not for the first time and again having a hard time following it. It is a total mess of a film. None of the characters work as characters – they're all just people up there saying their lines and not falling over the furniture (unless the script requires them to) and various things are happening. For some reason I'm being reminded of the 60s surrealist comedy film 'the Bed Sitting Room' by Spike Milligan and Richard Lester. Which was a gazillion times better. In fact I'm thinking this whole sorry mess would work better as a 60s British film of that ilk – it would serve the madcap off-beat comedy they're painfully striving for a whole lot better. I'm seeing Michael Holdern as Kilgore Trout, John Cleese (or any one of the Monty Python actors) would do better as the cross-dressing Harry Le Sabre. Not sure who I'd replace Bruce Willis with though – I'll have to think about that one. John Cleese? Michael Palin? It's a hard job depicting someone who's going insane and who you still feel sympathy for. Although I can't work out if Dwayne is supposed to be sleazy or not. (Aren't used car salesmen supposed to be really sleazy as a stereotype?) Brucie isn't up to the job here that's for sure. It's a pity because you can tell he's trying so very, very hard. He wore his glasses and everything. Poor Brucie.

Talking of Pythoners – Terry Gilliam would have made a better job at directing it, Richard Lester certainly would have.


Now the thing is... if they're showing this as a tribute to Kurt Vonnegut - then where's 'Slaughterhouse 5'? I haven't seen that in decades and it is a much better film.