When you are scrolling through your channel guide at nearly any point during the day, there is a fairly good chance that you will stumble across a marathon of Impractical Jokers on truTV. America has been enamored with hidden camera shows since they first debuted, and combining it with elements of a game show proved to be the perfect recipe for a ratings smash. The show centers on four friends, Brian Quinn, James Murray, Joe Gatto and Sal Vulcano, collectively known as The Tenderloins, who challenge each other to the ultimate game of dare each episode. The series has been running for eight seasons at this point, and the fellas thought it was time to take their exploits to the big screen. Impractical Jokers: The Movie takes more of a Borat leap with the story as opposed to Jackass by providing a loose narrative to justify their challenges.
In full disclosure, this is my first real interaction with Impractical Jokers outside of occasionally catching the final minutes of an episode when tuning into some scripted fare on truTV. I had a cultural awareness of their popularity, but it has never been enough to get me to seek it out in the era of The Golden Age of Television. As this is my introduction to the group, it is hard for me to say whether there is enough added value to the film to set it apart from just watching a string of their episodes of television. The loose narrative thread of the film is that the four guys had a disastrous interaction with Paula Abdul when they were teenagers, but, in the current day as the successful comedy group, they have stumbled into an opportunity to redeem themselves and travel to Miami to party with Paula. The trouble is, there are only three tickets available for the four gentlemen. In order to see who will get to attend the party, the guys must compete in their normal hijinks to see who will earn the tickets.
The scripted portions of the film are really rough and typically bring the film to a screeching halt. Those who have a greater affection for the group may feel differently, but it was not a good starting point for a newcomer. Thankfully, the unscripted challenges are where the group truly shines. Since the guys are on a road trip, they hit up some national landmarks and other atypical spots to set up their challenges. The group starts out with something simple like having each of them recite a ridiculous eulogy to unsuspecting people, but they subsequently build and build in scope and humor. There were moments during a fake job interview where I had tears streaming down my face from laughing so hard. Another scenario with the guys flagging down people to help fix their broken down car also had me rolling. The scripted portions may have been challenging, but the unscripted bits made me understand why the show has such a following.
In the end, there is not a real reason for this film to exist outside of The Tenderloins and studio executives thinking it might be a wise financial move. There does not appear to be anything shown here that could not have been included on cable TV, but the scenarios do provide copious amounts of laughter. If you love the show, you are probably going to want to check this out to get more of what you love. Newcomers can probably get the same amount of laughter from tuning into truTV at any given point in the day and catching a rerun. Either way, this has enough laughs to justify its existence, but do not go into the movie expecting anything truly groundbreaking. This is the perfect movie to shut off your brain and enjoy, and probably text a little during the scripted portions.
Video Quality
The Blu-Ray release of Impractical Jokers: The Movie comes with a very pleasing 1080p transfer. The presentation itself can be a bit inconsistent itself due to the varying nature of the source material, but the disc provides the best quality it can for each shot. Hidden cameras do not always lend themselves to the absolute best video quality. There is a good amount of detail from shot to shot including textures on clothes and stubble on faces. Skin tones look natural and there are some nice bursts of colors throughout the journey across America. The transfer mostly avoids any egregious digital anomalies. Without knowing for sure how the film was shot, there appears to be some digital grain added to some of the scripted segments to make the picture more film-like. Black levels are fairly deep and do not fall victim to much in the way of black crush.
Audio Quality
The Blu-Ray release comes with a great DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix that does not get a huge workout, but brings some power when it is engaged. Due to the nature of the movie, this is extremely dialogue driven from beginning to end. The vocals always come through crystal clear without being overwhelmed by music drops or sound effects. The activity mostly stays in the front center of the mix, but there is some ambient activity, such as cars driving by, that engage the rear speakers. Musical cues provide a large portion of the activity on this track, with some extreme engagement of the low end on at least a couple of songs. This is not meant to be demo-worthy material for your surround system, but it does a solid job for what it is supposed to accomplish.
Special Features
There are no special features included on this disc.
Final Thoughts
Impractical Jokers: The Movie offers many instances of genuine belly laughs due to the outrageous situations they put themselves into. Unfortunately, the scripted elements mostly fall flat and leave you waiting until you can get back to the jokes. Hardcore fans of the group will want to seek this out where they can know they are not missing out on anything, but casual fans will probably be just as well of watching reruns of the TV show. Warner Bros. Home Entertainment has provided a great A/V presentation, but nothing in the way of special features to make the package more enticing. As a newcomer to the group, it was an enjoyable enough way to spend an hour and a half. While less consistent overall, it provided bigger laughs than a lot of studio comedies.
Impractical Jokers: The Movie is currently available to purchase on Blu-Ray, DVD and Digital.
Note: Images presented in this review are not reflective of the image quality of the Blu-Ray.
Disclaimer: Warner Bros. Home Entertainment has supplied a copy of this disc free of charge for review purposes. All opinions in this review are the honest reactions of the author.
Dillon is most comfortable sitting around in a theatre all day watching both big budget and independent movies.
