REVIEW - THE HISTORY OF FUTURE FOLK

You can have your cake and you can eat it, but you can't reasonably expect everybody else to like your cake. The History of Future Folk has everything its way, flaunting its irreverence every time it needs to disregard formalities like plot and logic, which it employed when it had use, and now can't find a viable means of providing resolution. Why let them get in the way, eh? The emphasis is on music and offbeat comedy here, and the frivolous nature of this film effectively demands that it be kept brisk and breezy, so there's justification for all the inconsistencies and other similar nagging details. But too often, where there ought to be something of distraction, a reason that could assuage us that narrative is trivial anyway, there's a gaping hole of tedium. In fact, it mostly seems like the filmmakers are confident enough in their material that they don't even need to try to make it engaging. I concur that it's technically competent, and doesn't outstay its welcome, but the same could be said for some (select) snuff porn. There's definitely a lot of successful elements herein, though, especially in the charming sense of whimsy and a number of nicely-pitched jokes, but most of all in the soundtrack. Future Folk's musical performances are not all instant winners, but these scenes are uniformly lovely, and no doubt Spaceworm is one of the cutest, catchiest songs I've heard in a film for some time. But all the goodwill on Planet Hondo, no matter how well put to use it may be at times, can rescue The History of Future Folk from the monotony that plagues its dramatic sections, and renders it a trifle too slight and unmemorable.