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Movies & TV

Land of the lost

One of the more talked-about films at Hot Docs earlier this month was Ben Steinbauer’s Winnebago Man, a documentary that purported to explore the cult stardom of cranky commercial pitchman Jack Rebney, whose profane blooper reel has been delighting hipsters for more than a decade.

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One of the venues that helped turn Rebney into an underground sensation is the Found Footage Festival, which actually appears in Steinbauer’s documentary. The FFF is a touring show of industrial films, training videos, promotional spots and music clips that all share one common trait: they’re atrociously bad. But when Joe Pickett and Nick Prueher get their hands on them and screen them for a crowd, they become something glorious. They’re still awful, mind you, but now they’re funny.

Pickett and Prueher bring the third volume of the Found Footage Festival to the Bloor Cinema this Sunday (May 17) at 7 pm, and if you’re fixing to break up the long weekend with a massive hit of creepy, kitschy goodness, well, look no further.

This iteration boasts cringe-inducing montages of corporate cautions against workplace injuries and sexual harassment, excessively patriotic songs about America, self-produced advertisements for sexy, sexy men, and some public-access material that’s just too weird to put into words.

One caveat, if I may: Once you’ve seen a clip of babies singing Yankee Doodle Dandy, you can never un-see it. My eyes, they still burn …

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