‘Anchors Aweigh’ Review: A Cynical Comedian Reflects on His Youth in an Abridged Mockumentary — SkimNews
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- Matt Barats wrote, directed, and stars in Anchors Aweigh, a 71-minute mockumentary about a late-thirties comedian whose sudden proposal to Megan — a 25-year-old heiress and Broadway hopeful played by Serena Profaci — is rejected, sending him spiraling creatively and existentially.
- The protagonist shoots both old MiniDV footage from his teen years and new half-formed solo sketches on what appears to be the same outdated camera, a choice the review frames as visual shorthand for a millennial 'who hasn't moved forward beyond his snark-filled response to the Bush years.'
- When the lead rents a boat at a marina near a New York airport, the film gestures toward John Wilson- or Ross McElwee-style mockumentary, but the review says secondary marina residents 'seldom stick around long enough to make a lasting impact.'
- Simon Hanes composed the film's 'dreamlike score,' which the reviewer credits with occasionally pushing the film into surreal territory — though the film never 'tumbles headfirst' into it.
- The review argues the picture feels 'stuck halfway between an idea for a short sketch, and something much longer and more emotionally detailed,' remaining 'ironically unmoored until the end' — amusing but never raucous.
- Despite that verdict, the reviewer calls Barats' construction of a 'self-reflexive, semi-autobiographical character this flawed and callow' a 'remarkable starting point' for the filmmaker.
Why it matters: For indie comedy audiences tracking Barats' leap from alt-comedy stages to feature filmmaking, Variety's review positions *Anchors Aweigh* as a textured but unresolved debut: its 71-minute runtime, MiniDV aesthetic, and John Wilson / Ross McElwee aspirations register as ambition, but the critic's central complaint — that the film never commits to either sketch comedy or emotionally grounded romance — means viewers leave with texture rather than a destination.
Ask SkimNews
