Sweaty Larry review

By Simon Thompson

Writer/director Vanessa Ionta Wright’s Sweaty Larry is a campy and enjoyable horror comedy short, with convincing performances by its cast of child actors, competent direction, clever sound design, and smooth editing. In terms of humour and tone I would describe Sweaty Larry as being in the same sort of ballpark as SpongeBob SquarePants, South Park, Ren and Stimpy, and Eric Powell’s The Goon– in that many of the movie’s jokes are based around both parody and surreal and absurdist comedy underpinned by a somewhat gross edge.

The plot of Sweaty Larry revolves around three bored teenage girls at a sleepover looking for a way to stay up for as long as possible. One of them decides to introduce the other two to an urban legend known as Sweaty Larry, a humanoid, almost cryptid-like- creature, afflicted with sweat, that only appears when you flush a toilet nine times. In a nutshell, it’s a knowing, tongue-in-cheek piss-take of movies like Candyman and urban legends such as Bloody Mary. 

In their cinematography, Nick Lauinger and Tony Reames manage to strike a seamless balance between a naturalistic style of shooting at the start of the short, then switch to using green filters in a possible parody of found footage films in the second half of the movie, without ever creating a sense of tonal dissonance. Overall the cinematography is extremely professional across the board, made all the more impressive by the fact that this short wasn’t made for an especially large budget (roughly $5000 USD). 

The acting by the three leads is proficient and realistic and, given that child acting is notoriously hit and miss, this movie manages to land on the decent side of scale. This is thanks to Ionta Wright’s strong direction and scripting, that manages to pull the movie closer to The Once Upon A Time In America, Sleepers, and Stand By Me side of the child acting spectrum than a less competent filmmaker would. 

To conclude, Sweaty Larry is a breezy and enjoyable short, made with genuine passion and effort. While its humour may not be everybody’s cup of tea you can’t deny the skill of Vanessa Ionta Wright’s direction and the sense of fun that the cast and crew clearly had making it.