Panic Mechanic

6.1
1996 1 hr 40 min Comedy

When Hanky Pranky (alias Schucks), star of a candid camera TV show, loses his job to affirmative action, he applies for a job at a stress academy. It´s not long before Schucks discovers his new boss, Jack Paddaman, is as crooked as they come, but it´s too late: the employment contract is signed and sealed.A year passes, and Schucks is no better off. However, his candid camera videos, which poke fun at all sectors of post-1994 South Africa, prove a big hit with stressed-out government ministers. When the president asks Paddaman to make a movie to benefit street children, Schucks and his pals do all the hard work while Paddaman plans how he can get hold of the profits from the video sales. Add a scatterbrained secretary, a lovelorn traffic cop and a cunning street child and you have a roll-in-the aisles comedy with a distinctly South African flavour.

  • Cast:
    Leon Schuster , Desmond Dube

Similar titles

Road to the Stars
Road to the Stars
This film consists of three parts. The first dramatizes the life of the founder of Soviet astronautics, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky; the second describes the development of rocket technology; and the third visualizes the future with enactments of the first manned spaceflight, spacewalk, space station construction and humans on the moon.
Road to the Stars 1957
Home Alone 3
Home Alone 3
9-year-old Alex Pruitt is home alone with the chicken pox. Turns out, due to a mix-up among nefarious spies, Alex was given a toy car concealing a top-secret microchip. Now Alex must fend off the spies as they try to break into his house to get it back.
Home Alone 3 1997
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls
Summoned from an ashram in Tibet, Ace finds himself on a perilous journey into the jungles of Africa to find Shikaka, the missing sacred animal of the friendly Wachati tribe. He must accomplish this before the wedding of the Wachati's Princess to the prince of the warrior Wachootoos. If Ace fails, the result will be a vicious tribal war.
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls 1995
The Mask
The Mask
When timid bank clerk Stanley Ipkiss discovers a magical mask containing the spirit of the Norse god Loki, his entire life changes. While wearing the mask, Ipkiss becomes a supernatural playboy exuding charm and confidence which allows him to catch the eye of local nightclub singer Tina Carlyle. Unfortunately, under the mask's influence, Ipkiss also robs a bank, which angers junior crime lord Dorian Tyrell, whose goons get blamed for the heist.
The Mask 1994
The Count
The Count
A tailor's apprentice burns Count Broko's clothes while ironing them and the tailor fires him. Later, the tailor discovers a note explaining that the count cannot attend a dance party, so he dresses as such to take his place; but the apprentice has also gone to the mansion where the party is celebrated and bumps into the tailor in disguise…
The Count 1916
Sherlock Jr.
Sherlock Jr.
A film projectionist longs to be a detective, and puts his meagre skills to work when he is framed by a rival for stealing his girlfriend's father's pocketwatch.
Sherlock Jr. 1924
Zazie dans le Métro
Zazie dans le Métro
A brash and precocious ten-year-old comes to Paris for a whirlwind weekend with her rakish uncle. He and the viewer get more than they bargained for, however, in this anarchic comedy that rides roughshod over the City of Light. Based on a popular novel by Raymond Queneau that had been considered unadaptable, the audacious Zazie dans le Métro, made with flair on the cusp of the French New Wave, is a bit of stream-of-consciousness slapstick, wall-to-wall with visual gags, editing tricks, and effects.
Zazie dans le Métro 1960
Carry On Doctor
Carry On Doctor
Francis Bigger, a notorious charlatan who tours the country lecturing on the subject of mind over matter, slips off the platform in the middle of his performance and ends up in hospital under the care of Dr Tinkle. The hospital is about to enter a period of total chaos.
Carry On Doctor 1972
Space Jam
Space Jam
Jokes fly as the Tune Squad takes on the Nerdlucks in a hardcourt game to decide if the Looney Tunes remain here... or become attractions at a far-off galactic off-ramp called Moron Mountain. The Nerdlucks have a monstrous secret weapon: they've stolen the skills of top NBA stars like Charles Barkley and Patrick Ewing and become Monstars. But that's not all, folks. The Tune Squad’s secret weapon just happens to be the finest player in this or any other universe. He's outta this world. So's the fun.
Space Jam 1996
MouseHunt
MouseHunt
Down-on-their luck brothers, Lars and Ernie Smuntz, aren't happy with the crumbling old mansion they inherit... until they discover the estate is worth millions. Before they can cash in, they have to rid the house of its single, stubborn occupant—a tiny and tenacious mouse.
MouseHunt 1997

Reviews

CommentsXp
1997/01/01

Best movie ever!

... more
Tayloriona
1997/01/02

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

... more
Kien Navarro
1997/01/03

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

... more
Philippa
1997/01/04

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

... more
przgzr
1997/01/05

There are some quotes persons or whole families accept after watching certain movies or TV programs, and they can use them lifelong, while other people can't understand what are they talking about if they haven't seen the original. Someone who has never seen "'Allo 'Allo" can never get why someone laughs at "Listen carefully, I shall say this only once".'Hi Jack' has for years been one of such quotes in my family. I have seen a clip lately on http://www.spikedhumor.com/articles/2936/Hi_Jack.html - but it is too short; only listening to one or two minutes long introduction to the scene, when the narrator tells us the statistics about hijacks, and understanding the character's name is Jack can perform the effect on the audience. An opening scene like this makes people forgive weaker moments that movie might have later.But, on the other hand, it can raise the expectations, and whilst you wait for movie to develop you suddenly find you are not sure if it is a movie at all. Long and frequent candid camera scenes make it sometimes look like New Year eve TV show. Sometimes you can't be sure when the genuine candid camera starts, or is it an ordinary movie acted scene.I don't believe there are many nations that don't have their own candid camera programs. And usually these shows are very popular in the country they were made, but most frequently never cross the border. Most jokes, especially the best ones, can be understood if you are familiar with the circumstances they have been performed, often funny due to local dialect or some untranslatable word game. So at least you have to know something about the culture, people, history of the country that produced it, otherwise you will never understand how can anybody find it amusing.However, many networks bring us American candid camera shows, or maybe made abroad but inspired by their type of humor: short slapstick jokes, mostly without words, usually a soul-less Laurel&Hardy or Chaplin ripoffs. They don't try to make us use our brains, as well as most modern globalization TV or movie successes, and they end in 10 or 15 seconds having nothing more to offer.Schuster could have adapted his humor to international audience but he would have to reduce his ideas, clean jokes from everything local what he had built his career on. After Yankee Zulu, (which was a real movie and, despite of many weaknesses, had chances to be understandable and accepted, especially as it ends in rather bad Home Alone rip-off that is so popular worldwide) he returned to.his roots confirming his star position in RSA and ignoring the fact that people abroad won't even try to figure what it is all about. World doesn't know the complex South Africa situation, reducing it all to black-white relations. Schuster addresses Panic Mechanic to those who have enough previous knowledge. He wasn't teaching the others. He wasn't revealing big truths. He was simply using everyday life to entertain himself and consequently the audience. And, as everyday life is, this is sometimes more, sometimes less funny and successful.If you don't look for big art, if you are ready to forgive a bit incoherent script (no major holes because there is no firm plot at all), but if your brain is working on level higher than slipping on banana or sitting on freshly painted bench - this is a movie that will hijack you.

... more

Watch Free Now