Your patience for Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie will depend on your appetite for the comedy of Matt Johnson, who in his films usually plays an overcaffeinated buffoon whose ideas run the gamut from nonsensical to borderline dangerous. It’s a bit Johnson used as a side character to amp up the comedic energy of his last film, the criminally underseen Blackberry (2023).
Since Johnson plays the louder one of Nirvanna’s two main characters, accepting his shtick is crucial to enjoying this unpredictably ramshackle film. Which has nothing whatsoever to do with Nirvana the band.
For those who enjoy or get past Johnson’s clowning, Nirvanna is a deftly intricate mockumentary about friendship, celebrity, and the trap of nostalgia shot like a sci-fi nerd’s YouTube paean to Back to the Future, all wrapped inside a love letter to Toronto. Johnson and co-writer Jay McCarroll play slightly tweaked versions of themselves, much like Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan self-spoofed themselves in The Trip series.
Rather than trading dry witticisms and competing Michael Caine impressions, though, Johnson and McCarrol bumble through a manic buddy comedy that starts with a sly “how did they do that?” stunt. They create a convincingly shot scene in which the two appear to skydive from the CN Tower to the SkyDome. Nirvanna concludes with a knotty time travel scheme whose lack of believability is brazenly audacious.
The characters Matt and Jay start Nirvanna in the middle of a years-long caper. The two have been scheming elaborate publicity events to get a show at Toronto’s Rivoli nightclub. Though this is a running gag from Johnson and McCarrol’s 2017 web series Nirvanna the Band the Show, explanatory background is largely unnecessary.
Nirvanna sparks right away with chaotic energy, playing Matt’s incessant wishcasting of new avenues to extremely modest fame against Jay’s quieter and uncertain “I don’t know…” hangdog style. Addicted to his whiteboard, Matt scrawls out ideas while an increasingly exasperated Jay plinks along on the piano and plots a solo path to stardom.
Nirvanna has an improvisatory spirit elevated by Matt and Jay’s easy rapport, and also Johnson shooting on the street with bemused bystanders as unwitting characters in the pair’s schemes. The guerrilla approach was loose enough that when the 2024 shooting occurred at Drake’s Toronto mansion, Johnson and McCarrol went to the scene in character and worked the footage into Nirvanna.
These schemes become more outlandish after Jay jury-rigs a time machine based on the dubious presumption that Doc Brown’s flux capacitor in Back to the Future was the pinnacle of scientific realism. Johnson’s combination of Jackass-style filmmaking (sans humiliations) and meta self-referentiality (using their own names, the camera crew being directly addressed or treated as if not there depending on the moment) helps ensure that the central sci-fi conceit is never treated too seriously.
Even after the film moves into more emotionally textured territory once the pair’s friendship is tested, as in any good buddy comedy, Johnson keeps the banter ironic. Explaining why to avoid doing anything that could change the future once they travel back to 2008, Matt says the butterfly effect was all explained by “an Ashton Kutcher movie.” He also speaks directly to the audience, thanking them for being lucky enough to catch the film in a theater since all the Back to the Future references made Nirvanna “a copyright nightmare” and probably unreleasable.
There are moments when Nirvanna seems about to fall into the “remember when” trap. Once the two jump to 2008, cultural references are sprayed everywhere. Matt marvels at all the goths (and how being one was a great way for guys to date women more attractive than themselves), the camera picks out magazine covers and billboards showing since-canceled stars (Bill Cosby to CBC radio host Jian Ghomeshi), the two go to see The Hangover, and a long-discontinued fizzy Canadian drink called Orbitz turns out to be a crucial cog in their time travel machine.
Through the flurry of callouts, the film becomes closer to a cautionary tale in which the supposed glories of the past or dreams of the road untaken can overwhelm the present. However, it would be unwise to label Nirvanna as having a message. Still, once the story incorporates a reverse It’s a Wonderful Life plot twist, it hits some notes of meaningful sincerity without losing the spirit of antic make-believe that gives the film its sheen of freshness and fun.