¶ … Sit Through "What Just Happened?"
With veteran director Barry Levinson leading a generally brilliant cast of actors in a script about Hollywood by Art Linson, a longtime Hollywood producer, the newly-released "What Just Happened?" should have been great. Instead, the title -- borrowed from Linson's book, What Just Happened: Bitter Hollywood Tales from the Frontline -- could easily be querying this film's makers as to what, exactly, went wrong.
It is impossible to make a god movie without a good script, and that is really the issue at hand here. There is no sense of bitterness towards the Hollywood establishment lampooned here; the film comes off much more as one buddy (that would be screenwriter Linson) giving his other buddies a good ribbing. There is no meat; no real viciousness to the satire. The result is a rather limp and sometimes funny farce; all imbroglio and no indictment.
Don't let all that ruin it for you, though. The movie does have it's funny moments, like most bad television (a more appropriate format for this film), and if you're in the mood to leave the theatre chuckling and patting yourself on the back for not being a part of the moral and spiritual sinkhole that is Tinsel Town, then this is the movie for you. The cast -- including Bruce Willis as himself with a new-found sense of artistic commitment that includes a beer and a belly, John Turturro as his anxiety-ridden agent (especially fun to watch), and Robert De Niro as a producer dealing with two crumbling projects and a second crumbling marriage. His teenage daughter (Kristen Stewart) throws in some fun, if predictable antics, too.
If the characters had a little more depth, the comedy and the story would play better. Only one character actually is an adolescent, but everyone behaves that way. Even if this is an accurate description of Hollywood, it's no fun to watch. People go to the movies to get away from their teenagers, not babysit someone else's, and this movie felt like a chore. My regular readers know I am loathe to adopt a points system, but I have to say that this one deserves at least six-and-a-half question marks.
