Trailer Park Boys: Seasons 1 & 2
Alliance Atlantis, $55.99
Officially unknown to the pages of this publication until the midnight premiere of their eponymous film at South by Southwest, the Trailer Park Boys have entranced Canadians – and whoever caught it on BBC America – with their weirdly low-key, documentary-style ensemble show since 2001. Alliance Atlantis released the show’s collected episodes season by season last year without frills or fanfare, but even without extras, they’re worth discovering, preferably from the beginning, as best friends Julian (John Paul Tremblay) and Ricky (Robb Wells) exit the Van Allen Correctional Centre after 18 months and return to Sunnyvale, the Nova Scotia trailer park of their shared miscreant youth. With them is a documentary crew chronicling Julian’s readjustment to society. “I’m going to lead a good, clean life,” he says. “I’ve matured now. Things are going to be totally different.” In fact they will not. Despite the wistful, tinkling piano music and sepia-toned crane shot that ironically prelude each episode, Julian and Ricky are right back where they were: breaking probation, sleeping in cars, growing pot, wrestling the neighbors, and getting shot accidentally; Julian is always – always – holding a rum and Coke, such as when he’s stripping a car. None of this behavior is glamorized, per se, and even the oddest characters in the ensemble are tenderly human: Consider Bubbles (Mike Smith), the hugely bespectacled cat freak living in a nearby shed, who could be the most sympathetic weirdo since Dave Goelz’s Gonzo the Great. This is not television that thinks gangster goofballs with guns in a trailer park are funny. This is television that lets gangster goofballs with guns in a trailer park be funny, deflating not only Ricky’s cool-guy posture but that of the ex-cop park supervisor (John Dunsworth) and his constantly but inexplicably shirtless yes-man, Randy (Patrick Roach). Despite their comic clashes, Sunnyvale’s community is sincere and the characters instantly accessible, even if the show’s curiously flat and … well … Canadian tone is more of a slow burn. It’s also terrifically addicting after two or three views, after you’ve engaged with the characters and warmed to the dry humor of the show’s often-contrapuntal editing. The price tag seems steep for such a bare-bones collection – at the very least, captioning would help out with those Atlantic accents – but here’s hoping that better editions (including the complete series collection, as of now import-only) will follow once the Boys catch fire in the States.ALSO OUT NOW
Flag Wars (Zeitgeist Films, $29.99): Hey, speaking of neighbors, this excruciatingly observant chronicle of a gentrification war in Columbus, Ohio, finally moves home to video after a SXSW win in 2003 and great applause in rotation on P.O.V.Maude: The Complete First Season (Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, $29.95): The inimitable Bea Arthur takes no guff as Edith Bunker’s sassier and more modern cousin, and the name of sitcom genius Norman Lear is alive.
This article appears in March 23 • 2007.