User reviews

'Quasi', the imaginative retelling of the Hunchback of Notre Dame, features Steve Lemme as the title character, Quasi Modo - a torturer who grew up in the clock tower. Through a series of events, Quasi and his friend Duchamp (Kevin Heffernan) attempt to create an equal France by way of getting oysters for the peasants, and in doing so, is face the ire of King Guy (Jay Chandrasekhar) and Pope Cornelius (Paul Soter).

The film is made with the crew from Broken Lizard and has most of the elements that make their films funny, but falls short. The script is a bit lackluster, but the flow is decent. It's worth a few laughs and is amusing, but not their greatest work.

Worth a once over.

Broken Lizard strikes again with a movie that could have been perfect comedy wise, but I feel it fell a little short for me.

The plot is Quasi and his hut mate work at the torture house in their village. When Quasi wins the lotto things start to get interesting.

The characters and acting in the film were good, but I feel like they tried a little to hard to be Monty Python in this one. I understand that was the influence, but I wish it was a little more of their own style. The jokes were kind of tired at times, and it didn't really have the feel of a Broken Lizard film in my opinion.

The movie itself is decent, and I would watch anything these guys make. I'd recommend it for anyone who likes comedy to watch it at least once.

These guys used to be comedy geniuses but this is truly a stinker of a film in all aspects. You can tell they are trying to homage and Americanize Monty Python in many ways with this and it absolutely fails. You can't take something that was already perfect and try to remold it to fit your own comedy groups image. Aside from that Steve Lemme who plays the main character Quasimodo seems to have modeled his entire character after Adam Sandler's in Little Nicky right down to the affected accent and mannerisms. This was such a disappointing film and there were no laugh out loud moments in it only a few dry chuckles. I was so let down by this and it's a sad day when one of the comedy greats put out a DOA flop.

I've always been a pretty big fan of Broken Lizard, going all the way back to Super Troopers, and since then have seen all of their films. My personal favorite is Club Dread, but I find them all to be fun, care-free movies. Quasi is no different. It's fun and care-free. There are a few really good gags and ad-libbed lines, with the expected great chemistry of its core group, each of whom take on multiple roles. Steve Lemme steals this one as the titular Quasimodo as well as the small role of a terrible jester who keeps getting punished in ridiculous ways. It's not a masterpiece, nor is it even a top 3-4 of BL, it's just nice to have fun with a movie that, at no point, takes itself seriously. I would put this one in line with Slammin Salmon in terms of actual laugh out loud moments, but there are so many small moments that, while not making me laugh, brought a smile to my face. If you like Broken Lizards previous films, you'll probably like this too, but if you didn't, you'll, honestly, hate it.

I'm not really sure what kind of movie the Broken Lizard gang were trying to make or even why they felt the need to make this movie.

It's not a particularly funny movie as the jokes are very by the book and are the sort of jokes that would have been out of date 100 years ago, let alone nowadays.

At best the jokes are nothing more than expected insults throw at one another by the cast.

And the storyline itself is your standard zero to hero storyline without you really caring what happens to any of the characters.

Sadly the group haven't written a decent movie since Beerfest. You can't just keep making the same jokes and not making any real storyline and expect the movie to be good.

It's a silly comedy from the makers of Super Troopers. I laughed out loud a few times and was entertained enough to get through it. It's a retelling of the life of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, without Notre Dame.

These guys from Broken Lizard usually make decent comedies, and they hit par on this. Don't be uptight, just enjoy it for what it is. There are some good references and some childish French bashing, as well as, some playful sexual humor.

Production values are passable and direction executed soundly. Could it be funnier? Sure, but I was never bored watching it. It's streaming on Hulu.

Boring movie, jokes weren't funny, I half-heartedly laughed once the entire movie, although I did turn it off early. The plot was alright, but they just tried too hard to be funny and it just didn't work. There was a lot of childish humour that you'd have to be a child to find funny, mixed with swearing... Lazy attempt at comedy.

Even being baked couldn't save this movie lol Costumes were decent, a lot of the movie was dark and hard to see.

I'm not really sure what else to say about this movie other than it was boring and lame. I wouldn't recommend it, not even to your immature friends/family lol.

I should preface this by saying I'm a diehard Broken Lizard fan. As always, I was eagerly anticipating this movie. I recently heard Jay Chandrasekhar say on a podcast that they wrote this film maybe 20+ years ago, but hadn't felt like there was a market for it, until the opportunity presented itself through the pandemic. They were able to utilize an existing crew from a little TV show called Tacoma FD (a side project of Kevin Heffernan and Steve Lemme's), and I appreciate it even more for the integrity that went into making it. The fact that they found a way to help their colleagues continue working and make a living in an insecure time is just really awesome. Having said that, the movie itself goes down a different path than what we're used to from the group, but it's absolutely true to form. I find it fascinating how versatile they are, and it is one of the reasons why I love all of the guys together, and apart.

If you're not a Broken Lizard super fan, not to worry. There is plenty of fun to be had as a part timer or even a first timer, so long as you're not opposed to period pieces with silly accents, randomly placed bathroom jokes, and cheesy, absurd and sometimes painful, humor. The influence of Monty Python is definitely a major player here, and if you dig those fine chaps' work, well, you'll certainly dig Quasi.

I guess I disappointed myself for having high hopes for this movie. It was not funny. At all.

These guys had my interest with Super Troopers and even Club Dread, but only because I love all things slasher related.

I was a bit wary of it just reading the premise of the movie, but I really thought we would have gotten something remotely enjoyable out of it.

I must admit, I DID watch the entire thing. I had to see if I would laugh ever. I did chuckle when the one guy fainted at the end. And it wasn't even a main character!

Waste of time to watch. You think it may get funny as it goes. It doesn't.

Simple story, nice movie, looks like they had fun making it. What else can you expect?

Of course people saw better movies, and Broken Lizard made different stuff in the past but hey, the important thing is that they can still work together after so many years.

I don't think it is the type of movie that makes you burst out laughing like Slamin' Salmon or Super Troopers, but it is still a concise story line that kept me on, entertaining enough with funny moments, and something quite important to think about: without a multimillion dollar budget and an tiresome amount of CGI.

I hope they keep putting things together and having fun creating things. God knows we need it!

When Broken Lizard released 'Super Troopers' in 2001 it became a big hit in no time, and it put the comedy troupe on the map. Whether or not they fell off the map thereafter is up for debate. None of their subsequent pictures met with the same success; if I'm being honest, after 'Club Dread' came out to unexpected silence (I still haven't seen it myself), I kind of forgot Broken Lizard existed. So for the group to serve up a new film in 2023 begs the question of whether their brand of comedy still holds up, or if they've grown and changed in the subsequent years. For that matter, would 'Super Troopers' still come off as well now as it did 20 years ago? It's safe to say I sat to watch 'Quasi' with mixed expectations, not least of all given very reasonable concerns of how the titular character himself would be approached. It doesn't take long to begin forming an opinion, for it turns out that comedy, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. I can honestly say I do enjoy this, and it's quite good and well done, proving itself more as the length draws on. At the same time, surely there are other folks who will get more out of it than I do.

The simple fact of the matter is that I don't think I'm the target audience. I was 16 years old when 'Super Troopers' had its wide release in the U. S.; it turns out that Broken Lizard is still probably best suited to teens, or at least those who have the same sense of humor as teens. Gags and jokes based on sex, anatomy, or bodily functions are just boorish and unfunny (even at the climax); outrageousness, silliness, or offensiveness for their own sake - including the exaggerated accents that much of the cast adopts - are tiresome. This is hardly to say that there's no entertainment value herein, because that's distinctly untrue. There's some definite wit and intelligence on hand, and the fun stems directly from those bits that are specifically tied to the plot, the setting, or the particular characterizations. The best jokes or gags come from, for example, Quasi's employment, or the fraught dynamics between the power players in this heavily fictionalized medieval France; the anachronisms of modern language, cultural concepts, and sensibilities infused into the medieval setting; those ways in which power structures, ableism, classism, sexism, and other sorry truths of our world, and the world of several hundred years ago, are twisted and upended for the storytelling and the humor. More common material such as dynamics between friends, coworkers, and love interests are also inserted sagely into the tale. I mean it when I say there's a lot to like here; there would be more if the writing passed on the cheap and easy crassness that undercuts the earnest ingenuity.

In so many other regards 'Quasi' is very well done. At its best the screenplay is splendid as it plays fast and loose with a historical setting, its politics, and its society, for the sake of both narrative and comedy. (The reveal to come heading into the third act, advancing the story and introducing a romantic element, is a superb example.) The plot is delightfully smart (and, again, the humor that flows from it); the dialogue and scene writing are as sharp as they are cheeky when ideally employed. The sets, costume design, hair, and makeup are truly fantastic, striking and rich with detail. The direction, cinematography, editing, and overall production values are as strong as we'd expect from modern cinema; stunts and effects look great. The cast unreservedly embrace the nonsense, and it's a blast to see most actors take on multiple roles; I'm personally of the mind that Adrianne Palicki, given notable prominence as Queen Catherine and herself detached from Broken Lizard, gives the best performance in and of itself. Jason Akana's music is solid.

I'm happy to say this is actually notably better than I anticipated. Its strength builds over time as the plot progresses, and as the comedy attached to that plot gradually becomes more prominent than the lower forms. Would that there were less of that base humor in the first place, or even none - and that 'Quasi' didn't itself employ a tidbit of ableism and play it for laughs. For as capably as this is made and written at large I want to like it more than I do; given those facets that are much weaker, I wonder if I'm not being too kind, and that includes not just the cruder jokes, but in a broader sense, even the resolution of the plot as it just sort of tapers off in the last ten to fifteen minutes. One way or another, however, more than not this is a pretty good time, and worth checking out. It's hardly an absolute must-see, and it's recommended above all for fans of Broken Lizard and the high school students in the audience. But if you're looking for something casually enjoyable, and don't mind if it's less than perfect, 'Quasi' is a decent way to spend 100 minutes.

The gang at Broken Lizard is back at it, but this time set in medieval times in France. Their typical slapstick humor is abundant in this one, and for the most part it's fairly entertaining and will make you laugh. It was a little long for what it was though.

I wouldn't say it was their best work, as I think Super Troopers, Beerfest, and Tacoma FD are better, but it was still enjoyable to watch. I think maybe the accents got a little tiresome, but it helped that they worked in some jokes involving their accents.

I was happy to see the cast from Tacoma FD in this as I find them all a great fit with the original Broken Lizard guys.

I think the re-watchability of this one is probably not great, but I do suspect it might be the type of cult-classic movie that will get better with time. We'll have to see how it ages.

I wanted to like this but it wasn't raunchy or funny enough to live up to Broken Lizard's other films. Probably because they are too scared to do anything funny and god forbid insulting anyone's delicate feelings for fear of getting cancelled. It's not totally horrible, it's mildly entertaining I guess but I didn't laugh out loud once. If you're expecting a raunchy hilarious thrill ride like Club Dread or Super Troopers then you'll be disappointed. There should've been a lot of nudity and a disgusting sex scenes with Quasi and racial jokes and it would've been funny. There is one scene where they nail a guys SCROAT to a stump but it wasn't funny. Also there is not enough toilet humor for me in this. Some of us love that stuff.

It's apparently a low budget production and the set design is poor. It looks like they filmed it on a Ren-Faire site or at a medieval tourist village. If they had taken raunch level really high if wouldn't have mattered. But they didn't.

It's not the worst film I've ever seen but I feel like it was tame, almost like a family comedy in certain parts which is not what most of us want to see from Broken Lizard. I hope they bring back the drugs, inappropriate sex jokes and wild hilarious adventures for their next film. I recommend watching this only if you are desperate to watch something.

The film has a lot of the classic Broken Lizard style to it but is lacking just enough high-quality humor to cause scenes to drag slightly from one to the other.

Most of the story has been done before in one way or another (it's the classic "destined hero from peasant" story), but the production design, costumes, and style are surprisingly good. That said, this story could have been told entirely without the hunchback angle because all that did for the movie was let people make mediocre jokes about how ugly he is. I would've preferred more clever uses for his condition than just him being ugly.

Kevin Heffernan does a great job directing, and all of the Broken Lizard cast is here in at least one role. The real winners here are the King (Jay Chandrasekhar) and the Pope (Paul Soter), but especially the Pope! Everything these two said had me cracking up and I wish there was even more. There were also some pretty good gags that ran through the whole movie (like the guy who always chants "oysters!" one too many times).

It's lacking something, maybe a final polish or a more relateable main character? I would definitely say it needs some cutting, just tighten up the pacing a little, there's room to cut down from 100 minutes to 90 minutes.

Overall I'd say the movie has some redeeming qualities and I'm not upset that I watched it but, unlike Beerfest or Super Troopers, I probably won't be watching it again.

There is absolutely nothing in this movie that is funny. And believe me, they tried. What's worse, is they truly believe that they succeeded. I like raunchy, stupid comedy, I really do and I also enjoyed Super Troopers...but this was just obnoxiously bad. Also, why did they need to have so many actors to play two characters each? It's not like there's a shortage of actors available, hell there's extras galore in this movie. Anyway. This is just a complete bore from start to finish. Bad script. Jokes that all fell flat. Acting was eh. I only continued to watch it to see where they were going with it and I was tired of scrolling.

I have never come across this writer or this director so I have very low expectations for this film. The first half I was on the verge of falling into disarray because of its tendency to become too corny and mediocre, but I was surprised upon finishing the film that it was just what it was: a genuinely good-old comedy flick. This time, it was made more interesting and innovative by its medieval setting which was made even funnier by its seemingly modernized scripts. The antics were just right without feeling too cliche or ordinary. The characters were well-played as well. Even the oyster chant was an added treat to watch.

As much as I love these guys, they really need to start outsourcing their writing and directing talent. Quasi just doesn't live up to today's quality of story and many of the things they think are funny just fall flat. This movie feels like they really just ran out of ideas. This type of comedy doesn't work in the current era of film and it's kinda sad to see them waste effort in this way. The movie has its moments, but overall it isn't great, which is why it was direct to streaming.

I think they should team up with the Reno 911 cast and do a department vs department series. I'd love to see this group work with some other people where their talents can really combine and shine.

I remember watching The Hunchback Of Notre Dame (1939) with my mother when I was little. She liked that movie, I can't say I did. Maybe I was too young to appreciate it. That said when my wife chose Quasi for the evening movie I wasn't thrilled as I thought it was going to be another romance/feeling pity movie but it was quite the opposite. It's for sure a comedy, okay maybe a silly comedy, so it won't please everybody but we had good fun watching this remake (if you can call it that as it's just about the character and a total different story). Decent acting, plenty of parodying and absurd humour, right up my street.

I generally like Broken Lizard creations - club Dread, Super Troopers.. etc... But this film was simply far, far too predictable in storyline.

There's absolutely no anticipation in the storyline. It's all so predictable it's merely one expected scene after another expected scene. If one knows the entire outcome of the film, actually sitting through it is an effort and unenjoyable. This is the first Broken Lizard film I can think of which was so terribly predictable. In fact, I think jokes land better if you can't anticipate how the ultimate story ends. This film was merely "going through the motions."

Sure some of the jokes were good. However, actually sitting through the story, which contains absolutely no mystery, made it more drudgery to get to the jokes than anything else.

I also don't think Lemme merely mussing up his hair, bending over, and moving his mouth to the left was a good choice to make Quasi unattractive. I mean, did they have zero money for makeup??? It seemed like a VERY weak choice. Surely, they could have done more.

This film "feels" like it was written on auto-pilot. No surprises whatsoever. I'd rather rewatch ANY other Broken Lizard film - which I should have done rather than wasting time on this film.

It's good to see the Broken Lizard guys back for another movie as I've always enjoyed their humor. I thought the concept was funny and the comedy on point. I also really liked that each guy played different characters. Duchamp with purple teeth and lips after drinking all that wine is beyond funny to me and watching the king and pope go at it was great. Their movies always have great banter between the characters which is enjoyable to watch and this film is no exception. This movie may not be for everyone but I'm happy its out and will watch it again for sure. Its currently on Hulu if you'd like to check it out.

Far and away Broken Lizard's classics are 'Super Troopers' and 'Beerfest'. Nothing else even comes close. They made the sequel of Super Troopers 2 already but at the end of Beerfest promised the film 'Weedfest', which personally I think would skyrocket in popularity. I don't understand why they keep avoiding that goldmine of an idea. Especially since weed is on the national forefront of people's minds all over Canada and the USA.

Quasi itself is an ok idea I guess but isn't in their wheelhouse of comedy in my opinion. And the subject matter is so obscure that nobody is going to watch it. I will reiterate one last time. DO WEEDFEST AND THANK ME LATER.

I made it about 25 minutes before I gave up. There isn't a single funny joke in the first 25 minutes. The acting is over the top and poor.

It's a parody of the hunchback of notre dame, which I never saw, so maybe that's part of why the jokes never land for me. Maybe I'm missing reference context that would make it funny.

The tag of the movie makes a big deal that it's 'from the guys that brought you Super Troopers', but Super Troopers was at best a middling comedy...and that was so long ago. Have those guys not done anything successful since then? I'm guessing not.

I don't have much more to say, but need one more paragraph to meet my minimum characters. I mean, it's an over the top comedy that isn't funny. It's not a dramedy. It's not comedy mixed with action. It's JUST a parody that lacks good jokes. It's a shopping bag with no groceries. A car without an engine. It's empty.

I'm a fan of the rest of the Broken Lizard series but Quasi was so bad it was "unfunny" , so not funny that it actually takes laughs away from you. I've laughed more at funerals. This was a mail in effort by these guys. It was boring, not funny, badly written, and the multiple characters played by the same guys was almost confusing. The comedy was off. I didn't like it at all. Honestly just don't do it. I like the premise and love the actors in it but it's just not played out right. This is the first broken lizard movie I did NOT like. It didn't connect with the audience like it usually does. !