Disastro a Hollywood

Strange feeling for a French person to sit at a Hollywood movie theater to watch a movie about Hollywood. People around me laughed more than me because, presumably, the joke touches a lot of local nerves. The story is introduced by a score resembling the Nino Rota of "La Dolce Vita" but the similarities with "La Dolce Vita" end there. There is nothing new here other than Robert De Niro's performance, the first in a long time in which there is a notable commitment. I found the characters tiresome and far too familiar. I couldn't care less about any of them. The predicament of De Niro's Ben (a thinly veiled producer, writer Art Linson) left me cold. Living the times we're living, to concern myself with this was too much to ask.

Ben (Robert De Niro) is a Hollywood producer struggling to stay on top. His film Fiercely has a horrendous test screening with an ending of the villains shooting the dog in the head. Director Jeremy Brunell (Michael Wincott) insists on keeping it but studio exec Lou Tarnow (Catherine Keener) forces him to cut it or she pulls it from Cannes. Ben's latest movie is threatened with a shutdown unless he can get Bruce Willis to shave his beard. He has two ex-wives. He's jealous of the recent ex-wife Kelly (Robin Wright) who may have a new lover. Zoe (Kristen Stewart) is the daughter from his first marriage.

Robert De Niro is being too serious. There are times when the story has good satire. It either doesn't take it far enough or De Niro gives it too much gravitas. It becomes a series of tired ugly unfunny situations. This is probably funnier on the page than on the screen.

This is just pointless...

I have no idea what they really wanted to say...some Hollywood inside truth? Yeah, I knew that pretty clear, because this is not the first film that discussed that! Worse is that it seems that the actors did not know that it could be so boring...Come on, don't tell me they liked the script...

Robert De Niro himself looked quite "bored" in the film, and I couldn't help but wonder whether he just got disappointed in the midway of making it...His performance was so...plain, that you cannot give any serious comment on it...

Anyway, I do not know what this film is actually trying to convey, but I as a common audience were obviously ignored when it started to tell a story.

This film was really poor. I went with two friends and they both really hated the film. People started walking out of the cinema halfway through. Essentially the film is so condescending and self indulgent. I have no doubt that the movie luvvies who are parodied in the film love it. However for the general public it is a real bore. The over loud gun reports. Bruce Willis wants to keep his beard, big deal.Robert De Niro is late for meetings, that's drama.The moments in the film that appear that are meant to be subtle are laided on with a trowel. Big cast real letdown. Still I am sure everyone involved was well paid. And movie critics will over praise the film to feel like they are part of this oh so wacky world.

Misgivings aside, it has to be said: What Just Happened is Robert De Niro's glorious return to form. Though his performance isn't particularly classic, it's the back-to-basics effortless brilliance of Bobby that we've been recently starved of. The role of producer Ben is perfect for him, mixing hot-headed comedy with grouchy but nonetheless heart-warming sentimentality.

The film itself, however, is not quite as worthy a comeback we would have expected, but still garners some witty laughs and a realistically melancholy view of the bittersweet world of Hollywood. The opening scene is playfully familiar to cinema, particularly the eponymous taboo that horrifies the audience. It's a great scene, mainly because of De Niro's deadpan but wise monologue, which is the first thing to certify this as his return to form.

But despite an effective beginning, the rest of the movie seems scattershot; the narrative tries to skim its way through all the familiar faces of film making (director, studio exec, agent, screenwriter, pompous actor, etc.), while simultaneously trying to prominently develop the long-existing love-hate between Ben and his wife (an acceptable but grounded Robin Wright Penn). Turtorro and Wincott's performances are actually quite hilarious (each idiosyncratic moan delivered at perfect and rib-tickling time by Turtorro, and the outburst and subsequent fall from grace of Keith Richard-esquire Wincott is brilliant).

Even De Niro suffers sometimes; some of the foul-mouthed wit sounds odd and outlandish in the mouth of his reasonably straight-laced character, so some of the gags are lost, but this is more the fault of ill-conceived writing. The Bruce Willis subplot loses interest after Willis' only amusing scene; his enraged breakdown after being told to shave his beard, which, in itself, is helped by Ben's sarcastic but regretful outburst. There are some touching scenes that show Ben's tendency as a reactionary: the chair in his ex-wife's house, and his increasing annoyance at Willis, particularly his comments at a funeral.

The film works best on the good sportsmanship of the cast and their willingness to laugh at themselves, which, as the film tellingly shows, is universal in the cutthroat world of Hollywood.