In 2005, actor Vince Vaughn decided to spend a month on the road with four up-and-coming comedians and a small collection of famous friends, determined to bring a smashing night of comedy and improv to sections of the U.S. typically deprived of such luxuries. Hitting 30 towns in 30 days, Vince Vaughn’s Wild West Comedy Show presented the actor’s handpicked comedians—Ahmed Ahmed, John Caparulo, Bret Ernst, and Sebastian Manisalco—along with “improv” bits from the movie star himself.

Now there’s Vince Vaughn’s Wild West Comedy Show, the documentary of the tour, which brings Vaughn’s hike through the heartland to the silver screen. When focused on stand-up, the film’s exactly as successful as the comedian on stage (each of the comics has his moments, but freaky little John Caparulo leaves the others in the dust). But when the film ventures behind the scenes, things get dicey. For every revelation—the group’s visit to a post-Katrina refugee camp, Ahmed Ahmed’s return to the Nevada jail where he was detained after 9/11—there are a half-dozen happenings that go nowhere. Unlike Jerry Seinfeld’s Comedian, Vince Vaughn’s Wild West Comedy Show lacks a critical perspective—the cameraman’s just another chum along for the ride, and in place of unguarded insights, we get self-satisfied comics making soulful pronouncements like “I’m a comedian, man. It’s what I do.”

Most confusing is the film’s fixation on Vince Vaughn, American Superstar™. From trotting out old co-stars to read favorite scenes from Dodgeball and Wedding Crashers to extensively and emotionally praising Notre Dame as “the place where it all started for me, with Rudy,” Vaughn surfs through the proceedings on a wave of self-regard that’s baffling. When did mid-career movie stars become entitled to victory-lap documentaries like those of ex-presidents?

VINCE VAUGHN’S WILD WEST COMEDY SHOW DIR. ARI SANDEL | RATED R | OPENS FRI AT THEATERS EVERYWHERE

Tags: documentaries, Film, vince vaughn's wild west comedy show