You're just saying that because you have Preparation-H on your face
Added 7/7/2009
Living in Oblivion is a film by Tom DiCillo that was made on a low budget. The actors weren't paid, and even put up their own money. In fact, anyone who put up any money eventually got a part. It is a parody of independent films and the Hollywood Twinkies who occasionally deign to participate in them, with Steve Buscemi playing director Nick Reve, James LeGros as leading man Chad Palomino, Dermot Mulroney as Wolf, the cameraman, and Catherine Keener as the actress Nicole Springer.
It is hard to get into Living in Oblivion because it is too much the inside joke. Nicole Springer is a really bad actress, and though it was probably a crack up to Catherine Keener and the cast, crew, and director Tom DiCillo, to those of us watching, it just seemed like bad acting.
Chad Palomino was even worse, and his ideas for blocking really sabotaged every scene he was in. He seemed to be a parody of Brad Pitt. Actually, Brad was supposed to play Palomino, but had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts. So, James LeGros has indicated that it was actually Patrick Swayze whose self-involved attitudes and mannerisms were lifted.
The two had just worked together in Point Break, which also starred Keanu Reeves as ex-football player turned FBI agent Johnny Utah trying to crack a case involving a gang of surfers who rob banks wearing masks of ex-presidents. Swayze is Bodhi, the leader of the gang of surfers. Bodhi is short for Bodhisattva. Bodhisattva is a term in the Buddhist religion meaning an enlightened being who, out of compassion, forgoes nirvana in order to save others. Bodhi means "wakefulness".
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Chad: What did you call me?
Nick: You heard me. I called you a "Hostess Twinkie ************," ************!
=================================
Anyway, once you get past the fact that the movie they are making is not very good and start paying attention to the real story, the behind the scenes shenanigans, you will begin to enjoy Living in Oblivion slightly more. A key thing to notice is that there are a lot of dream sequences. In fact, practically every scene is a dream sequence, with the possible exception of the dream sequence they are trying to film. Even the director's name, Reve, or Dream in French, is a clue.
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Nick: Great! I freak in your dream, I freak out in my dream, no wonder I'm so ******* exhausted.
=================================
Synecdoche New York (2008) .... Catherine Keener was Adele Lack
The Wedding Date (Widescreen Edition) (2005) .... Dermot Mulroney was Nick Mercer
Capote (2005) .... Catherine Keener was Nelle Harper Lee
Being John Malkovich (1999) .... Catherine Keener was Maxine Lund
The Big Lebowski - 10th Anniversary Edition (1998) .... Steve Buscemi was Theodore Donald 'Donny' Kerabatsos
Box of Moonlight (1996) .... Directed by Tom DiCillo and Dermot Mulroney was Wick
Fargo (1996) .... Steve Buscemi was Carl Showalter
Where the Day Takes You (1992) .... James LeGros was Crasher and Dermot Mulroney was King
Reservoir Dogs (15th Anniversary) (1992) .... Steve Buscemi was Mr. Pink
Johnny Suede (1991) .... Directed by Tom DiCillo and Catherine Keener was Yvonne
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Nicole Springer: I feel like such an *******.
Nick: You're just saying that because you have Preparation-H on your face.
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0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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3.5 stars out of 4
Added 4/13/2009
The Bottom Line:
A smart, biting, and very funny comedy about the perils of independent filmmaking, Living in Oblivion always feels accurate even when it enters the realm of satire--worth a look if you like comedies in which no one farts.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Just watch Keener and Buscemi
Added 2/1/2009
It's just fun -- a hilarious film. Touching moments as well. Buscemi and Keener are certainly two superb "under-the-radar" actors.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Not what I hoped for. Much worse.
Added 1/3/2008
I love the odd art film and had many people recommend this film. It just didn't work for me. I love most of the actors in it and tried really hard to see the funny but I just found it dull and below amateurish in execution. Thank God for Peter Dinklage; he gave me the few laughs I got from the entire production.
Sometimes low budget is just low quality as well. Fortunately, most of the good actors here have moved on to far better fare.
1 out of 4 people found this helpful.
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"Have you ever had a dream with a dwarf in it?"
Added 10/9/2007
"Living in Oblivion" (1995) - is a 91 minutes long low-budget independent movie about trials and tribulations during making a low budget independent movie called.. "Living in Oblivion". Writer-director Tom DiCillo made in 1991 a film called "Johnny Suede" starring a young and unknown at the time actor named Brad Pitt. "Johnny Suede" was a failure with both critics and viewers but an artist can learn from any experience however disappointing or devastating it is. DiCillo wrote a short story from his frustration and turned his experience into a smart, funny, playful, and highly enjoyable second feature "Living in Oblivion" that takes place during one day of shooting a low budget film. Photographed with the color-to-black-and-white transitions, "Living in Oblivions" has surreal, strangely poetic and amusing quality to it.
The cast is solid and consists of DiCillo's friends who are the regulars in his films. Steve Buscemi, the king of independent movies, in the rare starring role, plays Nick Reve, a long-haired, dedicated but frustrated director who in the moments of creative inspiration has to get back to earth and to deal with the tensions between his leading lady (Catherine Keener, before her star-making turn in "Being John Malkovich" but already a wonderfully talented beautiful and sexy actress) with whom he is silently in love and the male star, arrogant egotist Chad Palomino (James LeGros does an un-flattering but hilarious and quite accurate impersonation of the real life model for Chad). If these problems are not enough, there is eye-patch wearing sensitive leather-clad cameraman named Wolf (Dermot Mulroney) who went through a painful break-up right on the set. There is a great scene with an irritated dwarf Tito (Peter Dinklage) who was hired for a dream sequence and who hates dreams with the dwarfs in them: "Have you ever had a dream with a dwarf in it? Do you know anyone who's had a dream with a dwarf in it? No! I don't even have dreams with dwarfs in them. The only place I've seen dwarfs in dreams is in stupid movies like this!" There is also a smoke machine that explodes every time when turned on...And to top it all, Nick's senile mother surprisingly shows up during the shot and eventually saves the dream sequence and the movie. That's what the mothers are for, aren't they?
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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You're just saying that because you have Preparation-H on your face
Added 7/7/2009
Living in Oblivion is a film by Tom DiCillo that was made on a low budget. The actors weren't paid, and even put up their own money. In fact, anyone who put up any money eventually got a part. It is a parody of independent films and the Hollywood Twinkies who occasionally deign to participate in them, with Steve Buscemi playing director Nick Reve, James LeGros as leading man Chad Palomino, Dermot Mulroney as Wolf, the cameraman, and Catherine Keener as the actress Nicole Springer.
It is hard to get into Living in Oblivion because it is too much the inside joke. Nicole Springer is a really bad actress, and though it was probably a crack up to Catherine Keener and the cast, crew, and director Tom DiCillo, to those of us watching, it just seemed like bad acting.
Chad Palomino was even worse, and his ideas for blocking really sabotaged every scene he was in. He seemed to be a parody of Brad Pitt. Actually, Brad was supposed to play Palomino, but had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts. So, James LeGros has indicated that it was actually Patrick Swayze whose self-involved attitudes and mannerisms were lifted.
The two had just worked together in Point Break, which also starred Keanu Reeves as ex-football player turned FBI agent Johnny Utah trying to crack a case involving a gang of surfers who rob banks wearing masks of ex-presidents. Swayze is Bodhi, the leader of the gang of surfers. Bodhi is short for Bodhisattva. Bodhisattva is a term in the Buddhist religion meaning an enlightened being who, out of compassion, forgoes nirvana in order to save others. Bodhi means "wakefulness".
----------------------
Chad: What did you call me?
Nick: You heard me. I called you a "Hostess Twinkie ************," ************!
=================================
Anyway, once you get past the fact that the movie they are making is not very good and start paying attention to the real story, the behind the scenes shenanigans, you will begin to enjoy Living in Oblivion slightly more. A key thing to notice is that there are a lot of dream sequences. In fact, practically every scene is a dream sequence, with the possible exception of the dream sequence they are trying to film. Even the director's name, Reve, or Dream in French, is a clue.
------------------------
Nick: Great! I freak in your dream, I freak out in my dream, no wonder I'm so ******* exhausted.
=================================
Synecdoche New York (2008) .... Catherine Keener was Adele Lack
The Wedding Date (Widescreen Edition) (2005) .... Dermot Mulroney was Nick Mercer
Capote (2005) .... Catherine Keener was Nelle Harper Lee
Being John Malkovich (1999) .... Catherine Keener was Maxine Lund
The Big Lebowski - 10th Anniversary Edition (1998) .... Steve Buscemi was Theodore Donald 'Donny' Kerabatsos
Box of Moonlight (1996) .... Directed by Tom DiCillo and Dermot Mulroney was Wick
Fargo (1996) .... Steve Buscemi was Carl Showalter
Where the Day Takes You (1992) .... James LeGros was Crasher and Dermot Mulroney was King
Reservoir Dogs (15th Anniversary) (1992) .... Steve Buscemi was Mr. Pink
Johnny Suede (1991) .... Directed by Tom DiCillo and Catherine Keener was Yvonne
--------------------------
Nicole Springer: I feel like such an *******.
Nick: You're just saying that because you have Preparation-H on your face.
============================================
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
3.5 stars out of 4
Added 4/13/2009
The Bottom Line:
A smart, biting, and very funny comedy about the perils of independent filmmaking, Living in Oblivion always feels accurate even when it enters the realm of satire--worth a look if you like comedies in which no one farts.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Just watch Keener and Buscemi
Added 2/1/2009
It's just fun -- a hilarious film. Touching moments as well. Buscemi and Keener are certainly two superb "under-the-radar" actors.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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