Corndog Man, The
Thursday, July 23, 2009 at 9:23AM 
Mean spirited, one-note indie from 1999 that satisfies on the singular plane of watching a southern cracker asshole being psychologically tortured to the point of insanity.
Anyone who has spent any time in Dixie will recognize the form and nature of Ace Barker (a "thumb on it" turn by long time character actor Noble Willingham). He's a fat, sweaty, drawlin', racist fucktard replete with the good ol' boy glad-handing and faux friendliness typical of the dim male beasts of that horrible region.
It is not a stretch that he is a boat salesman in South Carolina at a place called Triple K Marine (KKK). These rubes live to hunt and fish. Actually, he's a lot like the state's Senator Lindsey Graham - only a bit brighter and not a closeted queen.
So it is quite a treat to see him harassed mercilessly and endlessly by a stranger on the phone who claims to be his long lost son.
Phone pranks have been a long standing comedic tradition ever since Alexander Graham Bell posed as a Sikh telemarketer from American Express on his second call to Thomas Watson. Artists like The Jerky Boys, Happy Telephone, The Phone Phuckers and the Comedy Central show Crank Yankers have all had varying degrees of success with the format. But the Bum Bar Bastards,who recorded tapes in the '70s harassing a foul-mouthed bartender (Louis "Red" Deutsch) at Jersey City's Tube Bar, were most certainly the inspiration for The Corndog Man and the running crank call gag between Bart and Moe on The Simpsons.
Corndog Man is essentially a two man stage play with a few peripheral characters. The majority of the screen time is Willingham's as the caller is never fully revealed. We only see the prankster's mouth, sunglasses, hands or legs during the entire picture. This allows Willingham to dive whole hog into the role. He starts out with simple annoyance toward the incessant caller who is posing as a potential customer. Then, brimming rage sets in. As the caller reveals a more personal relationship with Ace, the calls become more accusatory and pointed. Ace realizes he is being watched. His paranoia and anger bursts forth. He alternately screams threats and pleads with the caller to leave him alone. His massive ego, however, plays right into the hands of his harasser and he slowly, ever so slowly, goes out of his goddamn mind.
Suspend your disbelief and let the film work on you. The enjoyment stems from its repetitive nature. Like Ace's rage, the comedy needs to build for the payoff. Then you get to hear him spout some southern colloquialisms like, "You ain't got enough sense to pour piss out of a boot" and "... crazier than a boar hog in a peach orchard".
Willingham is a hoot. He channels an interesting combination of Dub Taylor, Charles Durning and Foghorn Leghorn. He hilariously improvises some great, spittle-flecked vulgarities. The voice performance from the film's co-writer, Jim Holmes, is also spot on.
Nasty fun. Particularly if you hate southern rednecks.
Reader Comments (3)
Sweet Bob Dixie, C. What the fuck happened to you in Birmingham? Tell it.
It all began on our second day in town. We were at Home Depot and passed by a booth for the Birmingham News where a woman was selling subscriptions to the paper. We signed up, gave her all our relevant information and shared with her that we had just moved to the area. She glanced down at the form, cheerfully looked up at us and asked, "So, have you decided on which church you'll be attending?"
It went downhill from there for the next eight years.
Once again, you’ve proven yourself to be the only cinematic Sherpa from which I’ll ever take navigation, you goddamned, mutherfuckin’, cock-sucking Ethiopian sonofabitch. Why don’t you go kiss a good man’s ass! This was a wonderful film, dude. Practically right up there with Sling Blade, if I may be so bold. I typically stream Netflix through my PS3 and have been fucking parched by the third rate ‘New Arrivals’ that are being offered (Hellraiser III? The Birdcage? Seriously?) so I‘ve found myself combing through the tomes of your older reviews looking for gems, and you rarely disappoint. Remembered this review and was delighted that NF actually had a streaming version (also watched ‘Very Young Girls’ ). After watching, I re-read your thoughts and the review was spot on, Percival. Would love to have seen this done as a play as well. Hell, I can now even envision how a rube like myself will expire – fat, sweaty, lying in a pool of my own Crown Royal scented sputum while a black tranny dances to the radio in the car’s headlights, parked at the end of dirt road. Oh, how he loved him some black whores.
Now, I have a selfish, off=subject request of which I hope you don’t mind me mentioning in this older post. While I realize that it’s not actually a new release, I would have loved to seen ‘Why We Fight’ reviewed instead of ‘Battle: Los Angeles’. It would have framed your point so much more profoundly and let’s face it, you wanna talk about this shit to someone – and so do I. So much so that I’m actually ‘clearing the room’ at work when I try to push this documentary on co-workers. I think that it’s a must-see for every American. And yes, you nailed it in that article when you said, “…I may be the only one left outside of the Pentagon to recognize (or care about) that fine line between shitty entertainment and propagandistic bellicosity. The rest of you seem morally fatigued…” Yes, these days, positive affirmations can seem like a miniscule ray of light in the midst of the helplessness I feel living in a corporately owned democracy.