Washington Square News (NYU) Delivery Boy Chronicles Review

Posted by Leigh on July 1, 2010 at 7:14 PM

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Elivia Shaw

University Wire

(Washington Square News) (U-WIRE) NEW YORK -- Consider where you want to be in four or five years. Do you picture yourself graduating from NYU and interviewing for your dream job? Maybe traveling the world or on your way to graduate school? When thinking about the future almost all of us have some sort of plan or goal in mind.

Or not, according to Michael Childers, who wrote film "Delivery Boy Chronicles." Best described as a conspicuously low-budget mix between "Half Baked" and "Office Space," "Chronicles" reminds you not to waste your time drinking beer and sitting on your ass.

Like all of the other stoner/early-life-crisis movies that have preceded it, "Chronicles" presents you with your usual band of anti-establishment waste products. To start, there is Mike, the well-meaning anchor of the group played by the unknown Ralph Price, who tries to change even though his friends manage to thwart any of his attempts at success. In one scene, they drag him on a shroom hunt that ends in an attack by a herd of emus and a drug trip during a job interview at "Adam Smith Securities -- the invisible hand that cares."

The rest of the crew of Restaurant on Wheels, a food delivery service, includes Magoo, a failed artist whose current goal includes fixing the mousetrap from the board game "Mouse Trap;" Molly, a naive small-town girl who wants to fix the world; and last but certainly not least, Tig, the chain-smoking mess, fittingly played by Atlanta singer-songwriter Shawn Mullins.

"Delivery Boy Chronicles" marks Mullins' movie debut and probably the first time anyone has heard about him since his Grammy nomination in 1998 for his hit song "Lullaby." Whether or not you're a fan of "Lullaby's" breathy verses, Mullins proves that he can at least play a washout who neurotically avoids success.

The film's best comedic moments astutely reveal the various antics associated with a dead-end job. As the "Restaurant on Wheels" team proves, just when you think you've seen it all, people have a habit of surprising you. Molly, for one, takes it upon herself to cure the agoraphobic to whom she makes deliveries by tricking her into locking herself out. Molly then pops up and offers the woman her food. This plan fails, as the woman throws herself through her own window rather than face another human being.

When pressed to find change for a customer's $100 bill, Magoo resorts to a strip club where he trades the bill for the ones tucked into a stripper's thong. Similarly, Price's character gets a beating from a midget when he fails to deliver the man's chicken wings because he confuses him with the singing corporate "oompa loompas" that appeared to Mike during his trippy job interview.

Though disjointed in plot and underdeveloped in character, this film is entertaining, but certainly not on the scale with cult classics such as "Dazed and Confused" or "Clerks," both of which it clearly borrows from। That said, "Delivery Boy Chronicles" does manage a few laugh-out-loud moments. Burning of social security cards and Tibetan monks aside, the film's message is clear: Grow up, but don't settle.

Official Website: www.deliveryboychronicles.com