In the very funny deadpan comedy Congratulations!, a squad of stolid cops search for missing ten-year old in his own house – and move into the home, too. Writer-director Mike Brune sends up the police procedural in the vein of Airplane! (and Brune makes no secret of his admiration for the Zucker brothers). The dough-faced John Curran is superb as the police detective who determinedly leads the search behind the couch and under the coffee table.
Filmmaker Brune cleverly finds new ways to sustain the joke throughout the movie, until an absurd climax and a very funny final shot. Fittingly for such a subversive film, Brune shot the film at his parent’s suburban Atlanta home while they were vacationing.
I saw Congratulations! at its world premiere at Cinequest. Congratulations! plays again at Cinequest on March 5.