Jarmon Mugg (John LaFlamboy) returns to the apartment building he and his brother Marion (Mike Bradecich) inherited from their deceased mother to find that tenants are vacating the premise and those that are staying are losing pets daily. Marion has done his best to keep things operating during Jarmon's absence, but even together, the brothers' best is but half a normal wit and will.

Almost immediately, the brothers discover that the culprit behind the missing pets is an inhuman monster living somewhere in the bowels of their ramshackle building. When collecting courage at the bottom of shot glasses in the bar downstairs fails to resolve the issue, the Brothers Mugg must finally face and defeat the beast they call the Mole Man of Belmont Avenue.

Without the help of the local police (who have made it clear they'd rather arrest the Muggs than look at them) or their few faithful tenants, the brothers arm themselves with hardware store weapons and descend into the dark underbelly of their building, rife with secret bootlegging tunnels from Chicago's prohibition past.

For a lengthy 90 minutes, The Mole Man of Belmont Avenue kept me in stitches. Billed as a comedy-horror film, it's definitely weighted in favor of the comedy. This wouldn't have been possible without some tremendous acting and skillful directors at the helm. Bradecich and LaFlamboy wear several hats throughout the production of the film including writing, acting, and directing.

LaFlamboy’s Jarmon grabs the wider humor and runs with it, managing to never bust beyond silly and lovably stupid into that annoying Lewis-style "Is he mentally handicapped?" realm. Bradecich’s Marion takes the straight-man sardonic role and delivers perfect deadpan bull’s-eyes every line. Both characters manage to be as soft and likable as spring puppies.

The other characters are all as odd and flawed as the brothers and are solid enough to have their own spin-off movies (an idea that was mentioned at the film’s Chicago premiere). From the brass-tacks prostitute in apartment XXX to the philandering Mr. Hezekiah Confab (Robert Englund), each character is more than a gag line or flat representation of a human being. They all have a sense of individuality and purpose to the film.

This is one of those films that I’d love to have a coffee table book of the boards. The whole shows plays out like a competently boarded comic book. The quick-cut montage segments, and there are several, are all deftly handled and heap on the humor. At one point, the brothers experience a drug-induced side-trip that had me laughing long after the story had moved on.

Set design, lighting, costuming, camerawork... it's all terrifically handled. I didn’t catch this until the second time around, but there’s a scene shot from behind the two brothers’ heads in which a boom mike is clearly visible. I have to wonder, given the unimportance of the shot itself, if this was no accident but perhaps an homage to poorly produced indie films. Regardless, I found it funny and hope it makes the final cut.

Ask me how important audio is in a film. Go on. Ask. Make or break! Audio in The Mole Man scores HUGE points all around. Not only is the dialogue and foley crisp, loud, even, and easy to hear, there's also nothing but amazing original scores and music in this film from indie singer/songwriters. Most of which are also very funny in their own right. If a soundtrack comes of this film, it's worth paying for a download. I can’t find the credits for each original song, but there’s one that captures a true soul grit on the vocals outside with a delicious nougat of innuendo and lyrics on the in.

The Mole Man is billed as a horror film. So is it? I've focused on the humor since it's so remarkable. But this isn't fair to the horror. There are a few moments of real eeriness happening in Mole Man. There could always be more, but a few good full-body scenes were enough to satisfy.

The filmmakers took the daring route with their monster, choosing to show it early on, up close, and in full light. And it still pulls off disturbing! Some frame-cutting trickery aids in this, causing the Mole Man's movements to be inhuman. The creature's face is kept obscured till later in the film when’s revealed in full. The facial design and the editing make for an effective creepiness.

If a flaw is to be found, it's that we're allowed to follow the brothers on side adventures. Many, many side adventures. At one point, I got that brownie-baked sensation of "Wow, this thing's been going on for a long time and we’re still not near a resolution," but that didn't detract from my enjoyment of the whole film. Believe it or not, I am a sentimentalist who's not allowed near an editing table for fear a film would be twice its original length when I left rather than twenty minutes shorter. I wouldn't know what to cut from this movie if it were to be shorter; I loved it all!

The film isn't yet available on DVD or as a download. Your best bet to catch it is to keep an eye on the website and seek it out when it hits a film festival near you.