Movie 43 (2013)

Movie 43 (2013)

Movie 43 is a 2013 American anthology comedy film co-directed and produced by Peter Farrelly, and written by Rocky Russo and Jeremy Sosenko among others. The film features fourteen different storylines, each one by a different director, including Elizabeth Banks, Steven Brill, Steve Carr, Rusty Cundieff, James Duffy, Griffin Dunne, Patrik Forsberg, James Gunn, Bob Odenkirk, Brett Ratner, Will Graham, and Jonathan van Tulleken. It stars an ensemble cast that is led by Elizabeth Banks, Kristen Bell, Halle Berry, Gerard Butler, Leslie Bibb, Kate Bosworth, Josh Duhamel, Anna Faris, Richard Gere, Terrence Howard, Hugh Jackman, Johnny Knoxville, Justin Long, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Chloë Grace Moretz, Liev Schreiber, Seann William Scott, Emma Stone, Jason Sudeikis, Uma Thurman, Naomi Watts, and Kate Winslet.

The film took almost a decade to get into production as most studios outright rejected the script, which was eventually picked up by Relativity Media for $6 million. The film was shot over a period of several years, as casting also proved to be a challenge for the producers. Some actors, including George Clooney, immediately declined to take part, while others, such as Richard Gere, attempted to get out of the project.

Released on January 25, 2013, Movie 43 has been widely panned by critics, with Richard Roeper calling it "the Citizen Kane of awful",joining others who labeled it as one of the worst films of all time. The film won three awards at the 34th Golden Raspberry Awards

Storyline

Ineffectual, 'has-been' film-maker (Dennis Quaid) swindles his way into an interview with a film executive (Greg Kinnear) in order to pitch an outrageous and controversial comedy manuscript. After pitching the first of his thirteen offbeat fables, the dejected artist forces the rest of his disjointed allegory on the executive at gunpoint. He tells stories of a woman on a blind date with a man who has testicles growing from his neck, in another a smitten woman offers her neck to her boyfriend to 'poop' on -as a sign of commitment and love. In yet another two parents take home-schooling to a whole new level of indecency, striving to give their isolated teenage son all the 'regular' torment and humiliation of puberty by bullying, peer-pressuring and even seducing him themselves. An off-beat, elephant-in-the-room type film.

Plot

The film is composed of multiple comedy shorts presented through an overarching segment titled "The Pitch", in which Charlie Wessler (Dennis Quaid), a mad screenwriter, is attempting to pitch a script to film executive Griffin Schraeder (Greg Kinnear). After revealing several of the stories in his script, Wessler becomes agitated when Schraeder dismisses his outrageous ideas, and he pulls a gun on him and forces him to listen to multiple other stories before making Schraeder consult his manager, Bob Mone (Common), to purchase the film. When they do so, Mone's condescending, humiliating attitude toward Schraeder angers him to the point that, after agreeing to make the film "the biggest film since Howard the Duck", he confronts Mone in the parking lot with a gun and tries to make him perform fellatio on the security guard (Will Sasso) (Wessler had gotten on the lot by doing the same thing) and kill him if he does not make the film. Wessler tries to calm Schraeder down with more story ideas to no avail, but Mone pulls out a gun and shoots Schraeder to death. The segment ends with it being revealed that it is being shot by a camera crew as part of the movie, leading into the final segments.

Cast

• Dennis Quaid as Charlie Wessler
• Greg Kinnear as Griffin Schraeder
• Common as Bob Mone
• Charlie Saxton as Jay
• Will Sasso as Jerry
• Odessa Rae as Danita
• Seth MacFarlane as himself
• Mike Meldman as himself

User Review

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I went to the theater with my girlfriend to see Movie 43 because from the trailer it seemed like there would be gross, offensive humor in it with a big star cast.

Well, for those reviews who say they were "let down" or "fooled" by the trailer, I ask why?

I've seen people shocked and outraged that what they saw in the trailer didn't translate into the movie.

Well, yeah it did. And, it should have made it abundantly clear what kind of film you were getting into. A preview which features Anna Farris asking her real-life husband to poop on her, A basketball coach telling his players that they are black and the other team is white, 3 freaked out teenagers at home when one's period starts, and a tied up leprechaun.

All of those things were in the preview, and people still say that they were mislead. I can only infer that from those things, this is going to be a very offensive, shock-humor type movie, and I was not disappointed.

If you want to gross out your friends or have a really fun movie night, this is one to go see.