Any time Jemaine Clement, as Dr. Ronald Chevalier, esteemed science fiction author, opened his mouth to speak in Gentlemen Broncos (2009), I started laughing; his deep, conceited tone, his nonsensical cosmic ramblings, and his penchant for all things sci-fi (“May the glistening chrome of the Borg Queen shine upon us all” he quotes from Star Trek). Hell, any time he appeared on screen, dressed in his faux 80s, shamanistic, turtle-necked, Stetson garb, with a thick salad atop his head, a blue tooth in his ear (which he never once uses), and the type of manicured beard you only see on dudes in old cigarette ads, I laughed. Mainly because it’s Jemaine Clement, but also because Chevalier is the cream of the Jared Hess character crop. Hess, who’s also responsible for Napoleon Dynamite and Nacho Libre, has created yet another quirky universe inhabited by odd, awkward, out-of-touch loners, including Chevalier and Benjamin Purvis (Michael Angarano), a young science fiction writer, whose latest creation, The Yeast Lords: The Bronco Years, has been pilfered by Chevalier and turned into a best-selling book.

Purvis first meets his sci-fi author hero, Chevalier, at Cletus Fest, a fantasy writers convention, where the good doctor tells the attendees that one of them will be lucky enough to earn a publishing deal if their manuscript is chosen by a panel of judges, including Chevalier himself. So Purvis submits The Yeast Lords to Chevalier who, mired in a creative downward spiral (his publisher has just rejected his latest book), reads it, likes it, changes a few things, and submits it to his publisher. The publisher goes crazy for it and Chevalier’s new book (now titled Brutus & Balzaak) becomes a hit.

In the meantime, Purvis makes some new friends, Tabatha and Lonnie, who run an amateur film company (basically Lonnie turns all of Tabatha’s French romance stories into trailers), and they give Purvis $500 to turn The Yeast Lords into a film. The film is screened right when Purvis discovers Chevalier ripped him off but Purvis and Lonnie are the ones who get accused of ripping Chevalier off. But don’t worry, it all gets sorted out in the end.

Like all of Hess’ films, this one has its share of weirdo characters, including the ones I’ve already mentioned, all of which are way out there (especially Lonnie and his mouth, who is to Gentleman Broncos as Pedro is to Napoleon Dynamite). There’s also Purvis’ mom, Judith, the over-bearing, quack fashion designer, and Dusty, Purvis’ snake-loving, blow dart spitting, half-wit with a mustache, guardian angel from church.

Gentlemen Broncos is mostly about the story within the story though. Actually, to get it right, there’s three stories within the story. The film we’re watching is always switching from its own story-line to the story-lines created in Purvis’ book, The Yeast Lords, Chevalier’s book, Brutus & Balzaak, and the movie Lonnie is making based on Purvis’ book. All of them are really bad, low-budget, and quite ridiculous, and two of them feature the great Sam Rockwell (as Bronco/Brutus). Oh, and they also feature cyclopes, lasers, jars of gonads, flesh pockets, yeast turds, and flying stags that shoot rockets. Normal sci-fi-fare, naturally.

Gentlemen Broncos works for me. I dig the subtle, odd ball humour, and Jemaine Clement is especially amazing. Sigh. Now it’s time for me to lament the loss of Flight of the Conchords.

Check out the trailer for Gentlemen Broncos!