The Aristocrats is fucking amazing. If you can stand strong language and dirty (scatological!) jokes, see it. It isn't just about a dirty joke. It's about how comedians work, how funny works, how much a persona defines work for better or for worse, what comedy does... it's a meta-movie.

Bob Saget, for instance, is trapped in the sweet-boy persona caused by Full House and the Funniest Home Video shows. In fact, he is the filthiest-mouthed comedian you will ever hear (promise!), brilliant at tale-telling, and tears-to-your-eyes funny. But nobody knows that now, because that wasn't the "Bob Saget" that sold. It's as if Jon Stewart had had a successful movie career -- think of all the dirty political humor we'd have missed out on.

The Aristocrats is fucking amazing. If you can stand strong language and dirty (scatological!) jokes, see it.

Misreading this as the AristoCATS causes all sorts of confusion...

They joke about that in the movie, too.

I thought it was a fascinating concept, but not a great film. (It was incredibly annoying, for example, to spend most of the movie being told about the joke without letting us just hear the damn thing.) And while I understand that the godawful camerawork was partly a side effect of the way it was made, tripods are neither expensive nor difficult to use.

Still, it did give rise to one of my all-time favorite taglines. ("Reporter: And what do you call this government? Bush: The Aristocrats!")

Jessica, is your taglaine some sort of portmanteau of Felicity Huffman and William H Macy?

Yep -- it's from the Colbert Report, Sophia, during the Valentine's Day segment "Stephen's Laws of Love." Law 1 was to have names that mix together well, and his examples were Brangelina, Bennifer, and Filliam H Muffman. I had to pause the Tivo because I couldn't stop laughing. (And then I had to pause it again when he cracked up -- it was just too much.)

that is hysterical. I wish I still had cable!

You can watch it on comedycentral.com here.

Nobody I've referenced "Filliam H. Muffman" to, in the context of Brangelina and Bennifer2, has not lost their shit. It's the kryptonite of portmanteau celebrity couple names.

I loved the discussion about the joke in The Aristocrats, but I'm all about the analysis of humour.

Humour and killing people. That's what I like to dissect. Still, gives me less of a body count than my mother.