'My Name Is Bruce' is full of laughs

By Chris Kaltenbach

November 14, 2008

An exercise in self-indulgent filmmaking at its most endearing, My Name Is Bruce casts beloved grade-B horror star Bruce Campbell as obnoxious grade-B horror star Bruce Campbell, and wonders what would happen if the cinema worlds created for his films became real.

At least, that's kind of what it does, in a we've-got-to-come-up-with-a-coherent-plotline-for-this-film sort of way. But mostly, what My Name Is Bruce does is give its director-star endless opportunities to make fun of himself. Fans - and they're a dedicated lot - will eat it up, of course. But what's surprising is that the film has genuine laughs and smart-aleck asides that will keep even nonfans happy (although it helps if you at least like the genre).

The film has the on-screen Campbell, an obnoxious twit who abuses fans as much as he abuses the craft of acting, recruited by the residents of Gold Lick, Ore., to save them from a vengeful Chinese demon, the dreaded Guan-di, whose specialty is decapitating his victims. Campbell at first thinks the whole thing is a joke engineered by his agent and, when he finds out it's all too real, does what any God-fearing actor would do in a similar situation. He runs.

Of course he comes back, and there's a climactic showdown of sorts. It's all played for good-natured laughs (at one point, a disgusted townie asks Campbell, "Don't you have a bad movie to make?") and the supporting cast, especially Grace Thorsen as the potential love interest, has great fun being in on the jokes. Evil Dead this isn't - but then, what is?