My Big Fat Independent Movie
| My Big Fat Independent Movie | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Directed by | Philip Zlotorynski |
| Written by | Chris Gore Adam Schwartz |
| Produced by | Chris Gore |
| Starring | Pauly Shore Jason Mewes Clint Howard Paget Brewster Neil Barton Eric Hoffman Darren Keefe Ashley Head Brian Krow Neil Hopkins Rob Schrab |
| Cinematography | Scott Peck |
| Edited by | Philip Zlotorynski |
| Music by | Joe Kraemer Jeremy Sweet (uncredited) |
| Distributed by | Anchor Bay Entertainment |
Release date | 2005 |
Running time | 80 min. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $3,000,000 |
My Big Fat Independent Movie (2005) is an independent movie that is a spoof of many memorable independent films, such as My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Memento, Swingers, Pulp Fiction, Magnolia, Amelie, Run Lola Run, and El Mariachi. It was produced and co-written by film critic Chris Gore. My Big Fat Independent Movie was eventually acquired by Anchor Bay Entertainment distribution and the film was released on DVD. Broadcast cable rights were picked up by Showtime, The Movie Channel and Sundance Channel.
Synopsis
Template:Spoiler The film begins with a racially-charged scene of a stereotypical African-American thug brutally raping a stereotypical pale white mentally disabled man who has trouble remembering events for more than 15 minutes at a time. We then cut forward in time to two talkative hitmen, Sam (Neil Barton) and Harvey (Eric Hoffman), who mistakenly believe Johnny Vince (Darren Keefe), a hipper-than-thou swingin' hepcat and band trombone player, to be the third member of their gang, assembled by their evil crime boss to pull a "botched robbery" in Las Vegas. Along the way, they take a beautiful hostage – the lovely, desperate and lonely cashier Julianne (Paget Brewster). Little do they know that she will forever changes their pathetic lives. During the journey our foursome encounter their share of freaks including a bald genius, a forgetful thug, a jogging red-head, a bound and gagged girl, rabbis on a mission, lots of lesbians, Project Greenlight's Pete Jones, a crazed though well-dressed mechanic (Clint Howard), a horny answering machine (Jason Mewes), a naive mariachi, an obnoxious practical-joking love-struck French girl, and finally Pauly Shore as himself. As in all indie films, they form an unlikely bond. And like many indie films, the movie ends in a gratuitous shootout where virtually everyone tragically kills themselves in a hail of gunfire.
Reception
My Big Fat Independent Movie was a box office bomb, experiencing a very limited theatrical run in 10 markets, earning only $4,655 in box office receipts. [1] The film was poorly received by the public and critics, receiving a very low 23% rotten rating over at Rottentomatoes.com. The film was also rejected by the Sundance film festival, the Slamdance film festival and most major film festivals even though the film went on to play at some lesser known film festivals with mixed results such as Cinequest, South by Southwest, San Diego Film Festival, Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival, Newport Beach Film Festival, Worldfest Houston and the Temecula Valley Film Festival, where it won best Feature.[2] A firestorm of internet debate soon erupted over the film's lowbrow treatment of independent film classics and, as a result, the movie suffered a backlash from die-hard independent film fans, many of which considered the film to be blasphemous toward the genre.[3]
Chris Parry, entertainment journalist and film critic for efilmcritic.com offered the following analysis about why "My Big Fat Independent Movie" failed to catch on with the public, stating:[4]
If the makers of MBFIM had chosen only awful indie films to ridicule, they might have found it easier to keep the comedy standard high. Alternately, if they decided to go way over the top and jam as many pop culture references in as possible, as a true test of the indie film fan’s knowledge, they might have carried things off on pure geek homage value. But the film as it stands is stranded in a dire middle ground, where the target audience loves the films being ridiculed too much to go along with things, and the wider audience simply won’t get what films are actually being referenced.
Trivia
- The title "My Big Fat Independent Movie" is a parody of the highly successful independent film "My Big Fat Greek Wedding."
- Jason Mewes recorded most of his dialogue, improvized, in a single day. The dialogue was then creatively edited into the film to make it look like an answering machine was hitting on female characters in one the movie's many zany slapstick scenes.