Hey, Happy! (Reviews).

2001 75m prod Big Daddy Beer Guts, p Laura Michalchysyn, Noam Gonick, d/sc Noam Gonick, ph Paul Suderman, ed Bruce Little, sr Evan Kroeker, Jonah Corne, s ed Etoile Stewart, pd Simon Hughes, ad Rick Gilbert, Jim Lambie, c Billy Martin, mus Chris Robinson; with Jeremie Yuen, Craig Aftanis Clayton Godson, John Simone, Dita Vendetta, Chelsey Perefanick, Syliba Dueck, Lola Wong.

Hey, Happy! takes place on the eve of the Apocalypse in the barren wastelands surrounding Winnipeg. Sabu (Jeremie Yuen) is a rave DJ who spends his time spinning vinyl out in the fields. His goal is to sleep with 2,000 boys before the world ends. He wants Happy (Craig Aftanis), an introverted UFOlogist to be his final conquest, and Spanky ONiel (Clayton Godson), the local mega-bitch wants nothing less than to ruin everybody's fun. Drugs, debauchery, raves, rants and all else run rampant just outside Manitoba's capital city (played here for laughs as some kind of hip, prairie Sodom).

Noam Gonick, who wrote and directed the film, his first feature, had previously made the documentary Waiting for Twilight, about fellow Winnipeg filmmaker Guy Maddin, and published and edited a book on Bruce LaBruce. The latter is significant, as LaBruce's influence on the film is impossible to miss (as is the early work of John Waters). Unfortunately, the difference is that though the characters in Hey, Happy! may be bizarre, flamboyant and spout portentous nonsense for prolonged periods, they just aren't funny. The film takes itself far to seriously, visually distancing us from the characters' idiosyncrasies so much so that it's hard to pay attention to what they're talking - or in Spanky's case, screaming at the top of his lungs - about.

Hey, Happy! was filmed in a lush and stylized Cinemascope that would be admirable if it wasn't so sloppy. Each shot seems to be painstakingly executed and graduated filters abound. However, the framing is always just off from a well-composed image; something that becomes even more awkward when you notice the minor repositioning that occurs far to frequently. Furthermore, its attempt at creating the requisite post-teen sex fest/apocalyptic atmosphere of hallucinatory fatalism falls so short that its 75-minute running time seems positively glacial as opposed to the intended meditative.

The film has too much of an "I don't give a shit what you think about me" air to it. The problem is that there isn't much to think about in the first place. It deals with "shocking" imagery and situations without ever being too shocking. Hey, Happy! just isn't that interesting.