We Watch As Hollywood Masturbates

By C. Sterling

What Just Happened starring Robert De Niro had the audience asking aloud, “What just happened?” Aside from the first scene where a sweet, innocent, loving dog who comes to his master’s aid (played by Sean Penn,) and gets his head blown off sending blood and guts splattering onto the screen in exchange for his loyalty, the rest of the move was just another Hollywood exercise in masturbation. But, before we move to that topic, back to the dog for a moment. As if that wasn’t enough to watch a dog get a bullet to the head, we had to suffer through watching the pooch’s body lay twitching on the ground beside Penn as he was being pumped full of lead. At least one good thing came out of the scene…Penn was put out of his misery.

But the audience wasn’t put out of theirs. As a reviewer for WritersNewWeekly.com I felt obligated to watch as Hollywood once again played with its self, knowing all along what the ending would be. What Just Happened is a story about, surprise…surprise, a Hollywood producer (De Niro) with two ex-wives, who is desperate to make his movie, aptly titled “Fiercely” a success. Why? He has to pay alimony. And this is supposed to endear him to the audience? Anyway, “Fiercely” (the movie within a movie) has a really bad ending (dog guts on the screen) and the director, (Michael Wincott,) who is a recovering drug addict with a foreign accent, refuses to re-cut the ending. Studio chief (Catherine Keener) threatens to pull the film from the Cannes Film Festival. She knows she's going to lose money on the film, but if the ending changes, she will lose less money. As she puts it, it’s better to lose 15 million dollars then 25 million. Now that I agree with. After being fed drugs by the producer, the director decides to do a kinder, gentler cut.

But, De Niro’s woos aren’t over. He has to deal with an over-indulgent, self-important actor named Bruce Willis with an overgrown beard, who mislabels his super-ego for creative expression and thinks his acting is what attracts audiences. Wait a minute, that was Bruce Willis—that wasn’t an actor. The beard, unbelievably, is his “creative” expression, but the big, bad studio wants him to shave it off. Bruce wants to keep it. Oh my, what a huge crisis. How can America sleep at night? There was a brief moment where I almost smiled when Bruce was acting, and I use the word lightly, out of his indignation over being told to shave the fur. But, being a consistent movie, it was one gigantic stereotype and quickly ceased to be funny. Masturbation. Stereotypical, and did I mention, predictable?

At the beginning of the film, after that horrendous doggie disaster, I told the women next to me that I didn’t want to ruin the ending for her but that the director would not make the cut and we would have to suffer the same gut-wrenching scene, only this time we would be at Cannes. She said, “They wouldn’t dare.” Oh, they dared all-right. And I wasn’t wrong about Bruce and the beard, either, when I told her how that problem would be solved. Would he or wouldn’t he shave? I know that had me on the edge of my seat. Yeah, right. Now think about this for a moment: Bruce being Bruce faced with the dilemma of to shave or not to shave, what do you think he would do?

A. Shave
B. Don’t Shave
C. All of the above.

For those of you that aren’t Bruce Willis fans this could be tough. However, because I don’t want you to waste your time or money to watch Hollywood’s failure to launch, I’ll give you the answer:
He shaved half his face. Wow! What a surprise. Didn’t see that one coming, did ya?

The Actors

De Niro is a great actor. Even when he’s the bad guy, you somehow find yourself rooting for him because he’s De Niro. But in this film, he’s not good or bad. He’s just tired. I understand why he choose this film. It could have been edgy, it could have been artistic, it could have made a statement but it did none of these things.

Sean Penn is a great actor. Even when he’s the bad guy, you somehow find yourself rooting for him because he’s Penn. But if you’re expecting a wonderful exchange of witty dialogue between these two great actors, you won’t find it in this movie. Penn is not much more than a cameo. Laying beside a dead dog for shock value would have been something that I thought was so beyond Penn, but sadly it wasn’t.

Bruce Willis: He didn’t act. He was just being himself

Catherine Keener: Good acting. Bad choice of movie.

Michael Wincott: Good acting. Bad choice of movie.

Dog: I love Dog. Even when he’s the bad guy, you somehow find yourself rooting for him because he’s Dog. Dog wins the best actor award. That is unless they really shot him. Nah, we have laws against those kinds of things. But again, this is Hollywood and they just played with their privates on the big screen. Someone, please…tell me the dog is still alive. Please.

The rest of the cast: They tried. It’s just hard to forgive the bad choice they made. Discernment—I wonder if any of them know the meaning of that word.

Barry Levinson: I used to love Levinson, but after this film, not so much anymore. He simply doesn’t have what it takes to be a true artist…and only a true artist would be able to kill our canine friend, smear our faces in its blood and get away with in. The thing is this: A true artist would not be so self-absorbed, conceited and removed from his art to think that he could pull off the dead dog thing. Yes, true art often offends, confronts and confuses. Levinson tried to lessen the assault by using stupid, contrite dialogue and overdone scenes (Penn rolling, and rolling and rolling down the hill) but the fact remains, HE KILLED THE DOG! One good thing, though, this movie will lose money and Levinson will be standing near the outside of the big P in producer.

So to answer the question: What just happened? Hollywood committed the biggest sin it could commit. No, not masturbating in public. Hollywood is so in love with itself and so lost in its own self-importance that it forgot about you and me, the moviegoer. Unless you enjoy watching the family pet get murdered or enjoy watching the big hand of Hollywood going up and down on itself, stay home. Rent a movie. Watch Hitchcock. Now that was someone who knew how to choose a script and make a great film. De Niro may wish to stick with acting.

I give this movie two thumbs down and two middle fingers up.

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