PLOT: To honour her comatose dad, a fortysomething ex-con, ex-junkie (Amy Sedaris in a fat suit) tries to straighten out by going back to high school and starting with a clean slate.

I didn't see the adult-oriented Comedy Central series Strangers With Candy, and you probably didn't either, since it didn't air in Canada. But I know people here who've followed it online and via satellite, it's that cultish a phenomenon.

This utterly odd and crude tale of a fortysomething ex-con, ex-junkie (Amy Sedaris in a lumpen bodysuit) who goes back to high school to redeem herself to her comatose dad, is a true "love it or hate it" phenomenon. Now that it's a predictably stretched-thin movie, the half of the audience that "gets" it will probably be divided in half again.

So I guess what I'm saying is there's about a one-in-four chance you'll like this movie. Diminishing returns are like that.

Still, there are enough out-there moments and shocked laughs in the "crack-whore goes to high school" premise, and some whipsmart lines to suggest how nastily funny the show could be in its undiluted half-hour form.

Sedaris plays Jerri Blank -- a stunningly unattractive vision of hard-living and smeared lipstick -- who returns home after decades on the streets and in prison, to find her dad non compos mentis (Dan Hedaya, who, yes, is virtually immobile throughout), and her house being run by his snobbish and mean-spirited new wife (Deborah Rush). After a round of comic histrionics, Jerri decides to redeem herself by returning to where it all first went bad.

As she tells her classmates: "I'm an alcoholic. I'm also addicted to amphetamines as well as mainline narcotics. Some people say I have a sex addiction, but I think all those years of prostitution were just a means to feed my ravenous hunger for heroin. It's kinda like the chicken or the nugget."

Not that redemption is on her mind for long. Soon Jerri is offering to make other girls her "bitches," slamming bullies' heads in lockers, awkwardly social climbing with the cool kids, breezing and cheating her way through class, etc.

Stephen Colbert, who co-created the series and who starred as closeted teacher Chuck Noblet, is here, as are a number of celebrity fans of the show in cameo roles (Phillip Seymour Hoffman as a school board trustee in love with colleague Allison Janney. Matthew Broderick as an insufferable superstar science teacher, Sarah Jessica Parker as an uncaring guidance counsellor). Surprisingly, the VIPs don't add much.

I do have to admit, the writers (Colbert and Paul Dinello) have a way with collegiate-clever names -- like principal Onyx Blackman (Greg Holliman), Jerri's nerd friends Megawati (Carlo Alban) and Tammi Littlenut (Maria Thayer) and school staffer Iris Puffybush (Dolores Duffy).

It's comedy you may feel slightly embarrassed to like. In any case, I'm down for screening the series if it ever shows up.

BOTTOM LINE: Based on a lewd and crude half-hour Comedy Central sitcom (which didn't air in Canada), and which viewers apparently either loved or hated. Stretched to feature length, it's not consistently funny, but there are inspired moments and whipsmart lines that suggest how good the show was.

(This film is rated PG)
More Movie Reviews