RAPWORLD (Danny Scharar, Conner O’Malley, 2024)
Albert Camus, in L'Étranger, he captures so uniquely, within his protagonist Meursault, a feeling that was termed as Anomie. A feeling of listless instability and social breakdown, that stems from a lack of purpose or ideals. Conner O’Malley continues Camus’s legacy, but transposes it to white lower middle-class America.
Eminem CDs you shouldn’t have been allowed to buy. Bags of chilli heatwave Doritos. Bottles of Mountain Dew and cans of Monster. Family Guy funniest moments on YouTube. DC shoes. Snapbacks. Taking paintball too seriously. Your friend’s older brother that you think is cool but upon reflection, was a loser. I’m describing the very essence of the 2000’s, the very real feelings of sitting on a beat up sofa in your friends house and asking when is it my turn on Call of Duty?
This essence of the 2000s has been expertly bottled by Conner O’Malley in Rapworld, his HILARIOUS feature directorial debut. The film set in 2009, follows three friends, listless losers who decide, despite their lower middle-class suburban backgrounds to, in one night, record a rap album. After two of the friends take us around their job in a cinema, and some adventures around McDonalds, they eventually meet with their 3rd friend, who’s cooking up their fire beats for their raps. There is a great recurring bit hereafter within the structure of the film that every time they go to record a part of their album they get distracted by some wacky adventure that ends usually in embarrassment and denigration. These are truly pathetic characters. They are all socially, sexually and artistically challenged and it’s brilliantly painfully funny.
The characters are both comedic and realistic, over-exaggerated and completely true. They feel so fleshed out, probably because O’Malley has been playing these sorts of white American males for so long. They are unlikable because they feel so real every action they take makes your skin crawl, however, because of this there is also a level of endearment, perhaps only for a certain type of viewer, that can find a familiar sting. They feel like genuine coworkers you would’ve had in your first job. Or your cousin who had played so many video games he knew about every type of gun and wanted to join the military so badly despite living off own-brand cheese puffs alone. O’Malley here and in all his other work taps into this almost uniquely male psyche so well. The film is set in 2009 but if it was fast-forwarded to 2016 I’m sure these are the types that would be sharing Pepe the Frog-Trump memes, and shouting, ‘Lock her up’.
The lo-fi camera aesthetic used in the film and adds another layer of authenticity. It’s all one home video-style camera, following our protagonists around and capturing their ‘cringe’ moments, in which we see deeply into the psyche of the lonely American male. This combined with the realness of these characters, means you could show this to someone and half convince them this was in fact a real documentary.
This film becomes instantly, for fans of alternative comedy, a true classic. It’s funny, it feels fresh and new, and it feels like looking at “‘post ironic’’’ memes on Twitter, but as a film. This is a TRULY SPECIAL ONE. Rapworld and all of O’Malleys CLASSIC videos are available on YouTube, in full. Do yerself A FAVOUR M8!!!!!! Go watch this film… <3
CHECK OUT ONE OF HIS VIDEOS BELOW…
