Every so often, a film comes along that re defines the boundaries of cinema.
And every so often there is a movie about two middle-age men driving around and having lunch.
In the intermittently semi-brilliant quasi-documentary “The Trip,” British comics Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon pilot a Range Rover through northern England on a restaurant tour, during which they exchange insults, do impressions and generally try to make each other laugh.
The film, condensed from a popular TV series by director Michael Winterbottom, is meant to appear to be an entirely improvised documentary. The loose feel and sense for random comedy (as when a bore suddenly starts lecturing Coogan about the geological details of the cliff he is standing on) are spiffy. Each man plays a version of himself — Coogan’s character being an arrogant heel dissatisfied with his Hollywood career who, after a tiff with his girlfriend on the phone, sleeps with a hotel clerk.
Along with some hilarious moments, such as the boys’ warring Michael Caine impressions (Brydon for the win), the movie randomly sweeps up some tiny morsels of wisdom — about the pain that lies within ABBA’s “The Winner Takes It All,” about how old people “seek out aggravation,” about whether Coogan would trade his child’s appendicitis for an Oscar (he has to think about it). The subtext is about the relentlessness of the comedy call to duty. After Brydon reels off several consecutive impressions during a visit with Coogan’s parents, the dad says, “Exhausting, keeping all of this going all the time.” Then there’s the scene in which Brydon casually refers to celebrating one’s 20th birthday with alcohol, one’s 30th with drugs and one’s 40th with food. Sorry, can’t laugh at that one. Too busy weeping.