So, I recently watched this little cult-y piece of nerdom on Netflix the other day. Knights of Badassdom is an (very obviously) independent film from B-movie director Joe Lynch. This movie is good and bad and good, in a bad way. The cast contains some surprisingly big names, including Summer Glau and Peter Dinklage. The film centers around LARPing, or Live Action Role Play, if you’re not a nerd, or that game they played in the movie Role Models, if you’re really not a nerd and your life revolves around football. In which case, what are you doing here? Also, it’s a horror film. So it’s… interesting.
Frankly, if you’ve never been exposed to LARPing or you don’t know anyone who LARPs, then you probably won’t enjoy this movie. It’s for the nerds, by the nerds. If you’re a stoner nerd, you’ll probably like it even better. I’ve never LARPed, but I know people who do or have, and I found it entertaining and funny.
The horror element is a bit random. Like, the writers just needed some conflict to forward the story, so they threw in some demons (because angry nerds with foam swords isn’t enough, I guess), but it wasn’t so bad. I will tell you what is bad: the effects. The graphics in this movie are really, really bad and the special effects are pretty bad. Most of the FX are done practically (not digital) and you can really tell. It throws you out of the movie. Maybe Lynch is going for that cheap B-movie feel, but it is misplaced. Especially since rest of the film is pretty high quality, so it just doesn’t mesh.
Neptune Your Dial 