This Vape Store Robbery Footage Is 2019’s Best Comedy Film

This security camera footage of two bumbling fools attempting to rob a vape shop is, by far, the best comedy film of 2019 so far.

Let me explain: The setting of our film is Flamingo Vape Shop in Winnipeg, Canada, early on the morning of March 11. Cam Rochon, the owner of the vape shop, said that the thieves hit the store when it was empty at 1 AM and got away with a laptop, an iPad, a safe, the cash register, and some vape stuff. However, when he saw how fucking terrible the thieves were at looting the place, he decided to put the video on YouTube and record himself making fun of them.

Rochon told a local radio station that those who work at the store “thought we’d have some fun with it, make some jokes about them, because if you saw the footage, you can’t stop laughing.” The video has gone mildly viral, racking up 80,000 views since it was uploaded. He describes the perps as a roughly 5'10", 230-pound man dressed in a yellow reflective jacket, and sweatpants; and 5'6" to 5'8" tall, 300-pound woman dressed in a black jacket and ugg boots. They’re offering a $2,000 award for anyone who can track down the two thieves.

Now, what is an acclaimed film without some over analysis, right? So, as has been the custom around here for a little bit and because I like you, dear reader, I’m going to break this footage down for you.

To start, I would just like to highlight the Ugg boots and a reflective jacket to give you an idea of who we’re working with. Quick bit of advice for my aspiring criminals out there: Maybe, when you try to pull off some escapades, don’t wear clothing intended to attract attention.

Now, this movie starts like any good robbery, with a little bit of breaking and entering. The couple smashes the glass on the door and reaches through the hole in the door to unlock it. Once inside, they spread out and get the light on. That’s when the fun begins.

One of our first signs of the sheer bumbling prowess these two exude comes after the man goes behind the counter in his search of loot. He has a hard time finding something of value, but that’s almost understandable. Ask yourself this question: “If I were to rob a vape store, would I know where to get the valuable loot?” If you answered yes to that question, and don’t work at a vape store, maybe take a long hard look at yourself and your vape-life.

Anyhow, I digress. After this man understandably can’t figure out where the valuable shit is in the store, he gives the testing pods a little push. Nothing major, just like a passive aggressive little push—you can almost here the meek "heh" he presumably let out when he pushed it. It’s a subtle joke, but looks wonderful on security cam footage.

After showing those testing pods whose boss, buddy gets behind the clerk desk to get his hands on the store’s sweet, sweet laptop. However, our dude here does not seem to know how, uh, how chargers work, and a fight ensues. This scrap with the power cord causes our dude to knock pretty much everything onto the ground.

But, hey, at the end of the day, he got the laptop.

Now, in a nice throwback to earlier in the film, the testing pods our boy gave his tiny lil’ push to are back. This time they’re being eyed up by the woman—who finally makes her introduction. So, to start, instead of putting the sledgehammer down on the ground she, for some reason, tucks it under her arm. Then, with the sledgehammer tucked safely in her armpit, she grabs the whole shebang, stand and all, and ostensibly thinks, as we all have at least once in our lives, What the fuck am I doing?

For whatever reason—it’s too heavy, she has nowhere to put it, she definitely can’t continue robbing the place while carrying that bulk, take your pick—she carries the stand a few feet before just bailing on it. So, after lifting it up and dumping a bunch of shit on the ground, she just puts it back on the counter a few feet from where she found it. Then, defeated, she slowly walks over to the glass display case and smacks it a couple times, breaking it.

Our duo obviously didn’t bring like a duffle bag or even, like, a pillowcase in which to put their loot, so they have to get creative. The woman has an epiphany though and grabs a garbage can in the corner—it’ll do in a pinch, I suppose. She starts filling up the can as her partner in crime stumbles up to the glass display case on the counter.

The man, who must have forgotten what glass was, uses what looks like a screwdriver to try to pry this glass box open as you would with some sort of wood or plastic crate. It almost works, as the back falls off, but then the entire thing smashes, and the valuables he wants to jack all fall to the ground among many shards of glass. Nice work, bud!

Now, dear readers, I would like to introduce you to the weirdest sledgehammer swing in the known universe. Behold its majesty!

Now while the man, yes, did steal the scene early in the film with his bumbling glory, here the woman steals the fucking show—beginning, yes, with this weird, insanely awkward backhanded sledgehammer swing. She hits it in such a low impact way that the glass doesn’t even shatter, just kind of dislodges from its frame. While they’re walking away, the glass falls ever so perfectly and clunks the woman on the top of her head, which, you know, rules.

Off screen, earlier in the robbery, the woman went off camera and dumped the contents of the can on the floor. The reason I’m telling you this, dear reader, is because the woman then tries to fill her jerry-rigged loot bag with vapes, but forgets the interior is gone. So, simply put, everything she puts in there just falls out the bottom.

It’s like a fucking Bugs Bunny cartoon.

The whole episode ends with the woman putting her leaky trashcan down to load up her arms with as much shit as she can carry. She hastily grabs her sledge hammer, knocks her trash can over, and makes a move for the door, escaping the scene in a move that, after considering long and hard for the past 20 minutes, I can definitively call “skedaddling.” Which brings us to end of this beautiful short film.

Don’t cry because it’s over, be happy because it happened. Take solace in what Rochan told the local radio station: “[It's] pretty hard to be depressed about this, just because we’re too busy laughing about it.”

Sign up for our newsletter to get the best of VICE delivered to your inbox daily.

Follow Mack Lamoureux on Twitter.

This article originally appeared on VICE CA.