After a long tour around the festival circuit, The Aristocrats is now on general release in the UK. It’s essential viewing if you’re interested in films about comedy, as much as films that simply are comedy. Don’t be put off, though – it’s still very, very funny. This is a roll call of some of the greatest contemporary comedians including, especially outside of the US, many that you might not already know. The delight they take in explaining their craft makes for infectious raw material, and the editing is superb. There’s storytelling, exposition of technique, ludicrous overanalysis and a few wonderful moments of genuinely dangerous humour. I haven’t seen people walk out of a film for a long while, but seeing eight people leave from a reasonably sparse audience made it feel just that little bit more special. Maybe they didn’t get the joke.
In paper-size news, The Guardian rolled out their new format (it’s interesting to see who else noticed). The Guardian’s current policy of putting pretty much all their content up on the web, and giving it permanent URLs, has really increased the scope of their material. It’s not uncommon to see their articles riding up on Daypop, and on more than one occasion I’ve read something on the web before reaching it in the print copy I’ve already bought. Given that, it’s good to see them working on the role of the news in printed form. (Even if, unfortunately, it also brings the end of Smallweed.)
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