Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie Review
Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie (2025) Film Review, a movie directed by Matt Johnson, written by Jared Raab, Matt Johnson and Jay McCarrol and starring Matt Johnson, Jay McCarrol, Ben Petrie, Michael Scott, Reid Janisse, Maddy Wilde and Ethan Keyes.
When one thinks of silly movies, one typically tries to avoid them because one knows how bad they can be if they go sour in their comic aspirations. Luckly, filmmaker Matt Johnson’s incredibly silly, but wonderfully energetic, Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie, never lets up and offers audiences a flat-out great time watching two funnymen, Matt Johnson (who directed the film) and Jay McCarrol, go about their comic paces in truly humorous and fascinating situations. This film incorporates so much into it, even including a reference to the Will Smith/Chris Rock Oscars slap, that it has something for everyone even if some of the material is a little too broad at times to push the movie into anything other than enjoyable, fun territory.
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Matt (Johnson) is the star of the picture. He dons a hat and has a bizarre personality that keeps going and going as he cracks one-liners and never stops. Johnson is like the Energizer bunny of comedy. Johnson steers his film into near-classic territory at times when he references the movie Back to the Future which is clearly a huge inspiration for this new picture. McCarrol plays Jay, the straight man to Matt’s outlandish attempts at a humorous character. The rapport between these two men often hits a comical bullseye. Forget about the plot of Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie because the movie’s story line is merely one silly excuse to have our heroes act goofy, but they do that goofy act so well that the film works without much of a plot to drive the action forward.
OK, there’s something of a basic plot here. For example, Jay pulls a gun off the wall when he finds himself in a parallel future where he is one of the most popular music stars imaginable. Jay accidentally shoots a guy in his entourage in the head and is soon wanted by the authorities. Matt must find a way to get his best friend, Jay, safely out of this alternate reality and to do this, Matt must connect a very long wire to a tower then throw it off the tower and roll it along the street and plug it in. Don’t ask. Why does he need to do this? Because lightning is coming and lightning is the key ingredient to powering up a time machine that shoots our heroes to whatever date they want to go to. This film uses 2008 as a major reference point and a place to set some of the action of the movie.
Matt and Jay are friends who wanted to go big with a band and play at the Rivoli, but things didn’t work out as expected. With this time machine, they may be able to make small changes in the past that could make the possibilities of their success come into fruition in the future. This movie is more concerned with being funny and letting the cameras roll and capture hilarity than anything else, though.
Johnson is obviously improvising much of the time in a mockumentary-style fashion here in this Canadian comedy. He talks about his “ass” repeatedly in one scene to the point where hearing his “character” complain just becomes astonishingly funny. In one scenario, Matt is in a future when Jay doesn’t remember him too much because they parted ways in order for Jay to become famous. Jay is holding a secret from Matt though and their friendship will be tested through the situations that occur throughout.
This film works best when it pays homage to 1985’s Back to the Future. This new picture seems to have a low budget, but it never grows tiresome as it lays out its hysterical scenes in such a way that it feels like Johnson is making everything up as he goes along. That is the best type of comedy. When something is unpredictable, it becomes more fun to watch and that is certainly the case with Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie.
This picture is full of funny cameos by everyday people such as a handy guy on the street willing to make sure a plug remains connected to its outlet for our heroes for thirty minutes. A girl sits down as one of our heroes makes small talk with her and she smiles, adding to the positive energy the film creates on-screen. In a later scenario she re-appears, but that’s a different reality/multiverse so the past has never really happened. Get it?
Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie is a lot of fun. Not every joke hits the mark efficiently, but the efforts put into the proceedings by Matt and Jay are noble and heartfelt with nothing but the best of intentions of the stars for the audience to enjoy their shenanigans as they go down in a fast and furious manner. When we see Matt may make a major sacrifice for Jay at the end as a hat goes floating through the streets, the movie is also rather touching in a weird, peculiar sort of way.
Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie is a boon in a time where films often like to pay homage to things that are part of classical pop culture and cinematic history. Back to the Future was a pretty big-budgeted science-fiction classic. This new picture has a shoestring budget, but just enough of a budget to make the film smart, clever and highly contagious in terms of its energy levels. If one starts out with low-energy at the beginning of the film, Matt and Jay will change all that with their high-levels of enthusiasm which are likely to make audiences have a great time watching this mockumentary-style film which never comes up for air as it flings jokes at the audience one after another in a relentlessly entertaining fashion.
Rating: 8/10
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