I resolve to exercise and eat a lot more fibre after watching Bad Milo!

“Bad Milo!”, a comedy horror about one man fighting his inner demons, takes the metaphor quite literally while elevating toilet humour to a different level.

Ken Marino plays Duncan, a stressed out accountant at an investment firm run by sleazy bully Phil (Patrick Warburton, for once playing against his usual simple buffoon type) who lives with his girlfriend Sarah (Gillian Jacobs). Their life is pretty happy apart from two things: frequent visits from Duncan’s domineering mother (Mary Kay Place) and her toy boy lover and the chronic constipation which has been plaguing Duncan for months. When a routine ultrasound reveals a large obstruction in Duncan’s bowels, it soon becomes apparent that this is no ordinary cyst. Pressured by everyone around him, Duncan’s stress has manifested as a demon living in his colon who emerges in moments of severe stress to wreak terrible vengeance. As a last resort, Duncan visits a therapist (the great Peter Stormare) who suspects the key to understanding the condition lies with Duncan’s estranged father (Stephen Root).

Milo, as the demon is named at the suggestion of the therapist, becomes something of a gastrointestinal equivalent of The Hulk and “Bad Milo!” touches on the same themes of fatherhood and abandonment that Ang Lee’s “Hulk” did, just with far less lofty aims and more gags. Actually, given its gross-out premise and lowbrow ambitions, there are actually very few poop jokes and on the grand scale of cinematic horror, this is firmly at the “Gremlins” end of the spectrum.

The frenetic finale brings both the horror and the funny as Milo pursues Sarah in a slapstick and savage chase through Duncan’s mother’s house, including a detour into a sex dungeon containing the world’s most shoddily installed sex swing, while Duncan takes desperate measures to stop his personal demon ruining the lives of his loved ones.

“Bad Milo!” takes its schlocky premise and embraces the absurdity to deliver an agreeably lively fable of learning to live with your inner demons and as a bonus, there are alternate takes and bloopers during the end credits.