DVD

I used to think that any movie that Robert De Niro attached his name to had to be good. And that used to be true. I was willing to take a chance on low budget or blockbuster films, knowing that De Niro wouldn’t lead me wrong. Then along came Stardust, and honestly, the man hasn’t been in a good film in some years now. Still, my loyalty remains, and What Just Happened looked to be interesting enough that my buddy, Bobby D couldn’t disappoint me again. So, what did just happen? He let me down.Films about filmmaking are always a hazard. We all think that we want to see inside the true Hollywood, don’t we? Gossip programs and internet sites would seem to indicate that we can’t get enough of the inside poop. So, the temptation to deliver accurate films that portray these inside aspects of Hollywood come along every once and awhile. We peek, because we think we want to know. The truth is that voyeurism gets boring pretty quickly. We all want to eavesdrop on other people’s private moments. I’ve done it both professionally as a private detective and even for fun with a scanner that allowed me to listen to cell phones back in the old analog days. You know what? People are boring. It was exciting at first and my friend Mike and I would sit and listen to stuff for hours. We would get together and talk about what interesting things we heard. Before long we both realized that most of it was so painfully mundane that we just sort of stopped doing it. That’s what these films remind us. No matter how exciting the world of movie stars, directors, and producers might look from the outside, 90% of it is pretty pedestrian stuff. Unfortunately this film doesn’t spend much time in the 10% that might be exciting. In the end, not even some good casting could save this picture from making me feel like I did listening to those cell phones.

Robert De Niro is Ben, a big time producer and power broker in Hollywood. He’s dealing with two films at the moment. One is already shot and stars Sean Penn. The film’s director, Jeremy Brunell (Wincott), is a temperamental pill addict. When the advance screening doesn’t go so well, he’s told he has to redo an ending that shows a dog get blasted dead by the film’s bad guys. He doesn’t want to compromise his artistic integrity, but the studio boss, Lou Tarnow (Keener) will pull the plug on his Cannes premier if he doesn’t play ball. Ben’s upcoming film stars Bruce Willis, who shows up for his fitting appointment overweight and sporting a “Grizzly Adams” beard, which he refuses to shave. The studio bosses insist they’ll shut the film down and sue everybody involved if Willis won’t shave the beard and work out to lose weight. Willis’s agent is a crazy hypochondriac who is deathly afraid of his client, so Ben can’t get him to lay down the law. The agent is played wonderfully by quirky character actor John Turturro. Ben needs both pictures to work out because he’s supporting two ex-wives who are used to fancy living at his expense. The film is mostly told from Ben’s point of view, often through De Niro’s narration, as he attempts to save both pictures and deal with the more recent of his ex-wives. They’re actually in therapy to learn how to live without each other.