Review: CRIME SWEEPERS

” — ” (That’s a blank stare and an empty thought with my jaw hanging open.) I’m all about being supportive of indie filmmakers and the films they want to make. With that said, it doesn’t mean I have to like the film. I’m glad Lance Mora got to make CRIME SWEEPERS, his 30-minute comedy short and I’m glad it has garnered him some festival booty. However, and I simply have to be perfectly honest, I really found little to enjoy in this film.

To be fair, let me explain… It was the final day of the CineVegas Film Festival 2009 and while hanging out in the food court of the Palms Casino before heading back to my hotel, a man stops me and hands me a burned DVD in a paper slip. The DVD has “CRIME SWEEPERS” written on it and the man introduces himself to me as Lance Mora and told me this was his film from “the other festival,” meaning the Las Vegas International Film Festival. He asked if I would like to check out his movie and, as I always respond to these encounters, I said “sure.”

Fast forward to now. Yeah, it took me a while to finally sit down with CRIME SWEEPERS, but I did follow through with my promise. Before I go any further, let me briefly explain the film and then I’ll go into more detail. CRIME SWEEPERS is a crime caper comedy that features characters that are brooms and mops… Yep.

The trend of vulgar, profane, risque, coarse and controversial comedy is growing and the success of films like BORAT and WAITING have made this trend more popular. I’m not going to sit here and knock on this genre, simply because there is a lot of it that works and is actually funny. The trick however, is that it can be tough to pull off. There are low-budget indie filmmakers that focus on this style of humor and are relatively successful, but CRIME SWEEPERS still needs some work.

CRIME SWEEPERS relies almost solely on profanity combined with cliched genre references and crude bathroom humor, including a vomiting broom cop and a perverted OB/GYN delivering a woman’s baby, uh… I mean, little broom. Which actually brings me to another point. I would have liked to see Mora either stick with the whole mop and broom gag the entire film, or else toss it out completely and just use real people characters. The Hot Lab Girl, played by Tonya Mora, and the OB/GYN are real person characters whereas the others are all brooms or mops.

Adding to the projectile vomiting at a crime scene is projectile bleeding during the birthing scene, followed by projectile peeing on the doctor by the, uh, little broom. One of the detective characters is called Tony Danza, but for what reason eludes me. Perhaps the most creative part of CRIME SWEEPERS is the bad guy, a character named Christopher Mopin. This character is intended to be like Christopher Walken, making an attempt to mimic both his gestures and his voice. Later in the story, Christopher Mopin busts Dennis Mopper (get it?) out of prison.

Half way through the film, the depravity takes the express lane into unpleasant territory. Then again, CRIME SWEEPERS was made in and the story is set in Las Vegas, so that explains a lot. Unfortunately, this didn’t stay in vegas. Look, I really don’t want end this on a negative note. The film, despite it’s many flaws, had potential as a gimmick-driven short sort of like the now defunct thumb-themed bits like THUMB WARS. There’ll be some out there that enjoy the film, I am certain of that… it just didn’t do anything for me.

Best Nevada Film – Las Vegas International Film Festival 2009
Best Comedy Short – Action on Film International Film Festival 2008