Synopsis
Stephen Burrows plays Milwaukee Steve plays a northern from Milwaukee who heads off to LA to seek fame and fortune under the bright lights. He lands his first job in a jock itch commercial and quickly becomes famous for this. Unable to land anymore work he decides what he needs to do is fake his own death and then make a miraculous return.
First he decides to go on “Wheel of Fortune” and becomes notorious when he is sued by the Merv Griffin Corp. Suddenly everyone wants him and se…tles in to write a script, things don’t turn out the way he hopes and he finds himself desperate, lonely, and broke and on his way back to Milwaukee. On his return home he finds that his mother has rented his room out to a border (played to perfection by a toque and parka wearing meat scarfing Traci Lords). He regales her with tales of his time in LA as they wander through some of Milwaukee’s more “interesting” locales.
Video
The transfer quality of this 1.85:1 anamorphic transfer is decent. The image is fairly consistent if a bit washed out. Grain is kept to a minimum but the odd piece of film grit finds its way on screen occasionally. Edge enhancement is kept to a minimum as well. Overall it looks decent but average.
Audio
This is a fairly dialogue driven film so it never really makes use of the Dolby Digital 5.1 track on the disc. Dialogue is again clear and consistent with everyone’s Milwaukee accent coming through rather nicely. Outside of that the film never really ventures outside of the front channels.
Special Features
The extras features start off with deleted scenes and outtakes both of which come with an optional director’s commentary (which is pretty entertaining). Next there are the focus group lo-lights as the film continues to poke fun at the movie making machine that is Hollywood. We also get two different full length commentaries one for the film and one for the commentary, that’s right a commentary on the commentary, funny stuff. Lastly we have a trailer for the film and an interview with Traci Lords. The menus are scored but nothing out of the ordinary, there was far more extras then I expected and they add to the feel of the film rather nicely.
Final Thoughts
Take an original storyline, add in some pretty decent acting and you get a nice little film that pokes fun at Hollywood and is enjoyable at the same time. Funny enough the studio didn’t think that the film would do very well so they held off on releasing it, something that actually gets touched on in the story. Tons of fun! You owe it to yourself to check out this little hidden gem.
Special Features List
- Deleted scenes and outtakes
- Focus group lo-lights
- 2 Audio Commentaries
- Interview with Traci Lords
- Trailers