Pretty Funny Nicole (2017) – 2/5

Emotional striptease gone wrong

„Pretty Funny Nicole“ is an American English-language live action short film from 2017, so this one is over 5 years old now and depending on when you come here to read this review of mine, it may even be a decade old already. Fittingly with the title, the two who made this were Nicole Bowers Wallace and Nicole Majdali and you maybe won’t see right away that the impact of the latter was much bigger here as this is basically an autobiographical film about here. She also plays the main character in these under 20 minutes and said main character is actually herself. The film started a bit like an episode of „Louie“ We find out the protagonist is a standup comedian and we follow her during a gig and briefly afterwards we know that this was her first gig even apparently. She was of course nervous when the crowd really likes the guy who was on stage before her. We see her approach the guy running the club and from the voiceover that the Nicole in the now gives us we understand that the two are having a good relationship and that he still means a lot to her because of how he supported her. However, this is kinda rushed in and we barely see or hear about him because the rest of the film was basically rambling about how men have ruined her life. This starts with a sexual abuse that happened when she was really young that we do not witness, but the main character mentions it on several occasions.

Afterwards, we watch a photoshoot during which the protagonist is played by a younger actress because this was a few years or rather decades in the past and she is told by the photographer to go topless. She agrees. We do not know if she knew before the shoot already or if she didn’t, but well it was still her decision to go there or at least to agree after she is told to strip naked. Naked on top that is. Afterwards we see her work during a strip club and well you must say again that she is not forced to do anything. Nobody shoved that cocaine down her nose and nobody forced her to work at that club and provide sexual favors to the male visitors. We only see one though. They did their best her clearly to make sure no breasts were seen and this includes the photoshoot and the strip club, so yeah age restriction was a big thing to avoid for Majdali. This strip club customer really had a thing for her it seems and it was not only because she was so young as he stayed with her for 15 years. To show us how broken she really is they also rushed in a quick DUI reference there. Felt a bit random. For me the only question here was in the end if it was a poor film or a bad one and I am being a bit generous now and say it is the former, even if it comes very close to failure territory too at times. Her standup starts not good after mocking a date’s physical appearance (imagine a guy said that) and Steve Buscemi, but towards the end it becomes a little better.

The film as a whole still felt oh so plastic and staged and scripted and not authentic, but rather the exact opposite of female empowerment. I have doubts if she really went on stage like that during her first performance and started with those words we hear relatively early on and nobody in the crowd is smiling, let alone laughing. I am also having a hard time to be honest with the words about her sexual abuse. Not with the fact that she expresses it, but really with how she expresses it. Talking all about how personal it is and how it always followed her and yet she felt the need to inform the public about it. I don’t like it as a consequence. Feels like a lot of rambling and pseudo emotional. I mean I totally get it if you talk about this with parents, close friends, siblings etc. But the way it was depicted here, I am struggling with her mentioning that in a short film. Especially in her first film, feels more like the intention to boost the work. It did not work out though. I mean the film is not totally obscure, but it also was not seen by many. Less than a year ago, Majdali herself uploaded it on Youtube to get more exposure I assume. Until then, this film was really difficult to find I remember. Not to say impossible. Perhaps it would have been better if it had stayed that way because I think that if you decide to skip the outcome here, you are taking the right route. I certainly do not recommend the watch and it does not make me one bit more curious about other career efforts from the two Nicoles who made this or to see Majdali live on stage. The imdb poster for the film (or a stage show from her) including definite sexual innuendo is also not helping the film’s message at all. Maybe she went for more here than her talent provides. I guess it is self-explanatory that this has stayed her only screenplay to this day in 2024. Unfortunately, the stunning Danielle Goike has also not appeared in anything else.