November 30, 2001 | Before deciding
whether to see The
Independent , you should take the following pop quiz:
A.) Do you include biker flicks, women-in-prison melodramas and no-budget
monster mashes on your list of guilty pleasures?
B.) Are you amused to know that, long before they graduated to Oscar-worthy
features, filmmakers like Jonathan Demme, Ron Howard and even Francis
Ford Coppola were involved in Caged Heat , Dementia 13 , Grand
Theft Auto and similarly disreputable fare?
C.) Do you occasionally stumble across Beach Blanket Bingo , The
Thing With Two Heads or Invasion of the Saucer Men while
viewing American Movie Classics and find yourself, like a rubbernecking
bystander near a ghastly traffic accident, inexplicably unable to avert
your eyes? Indeed, do you find nothing at all odd about seeing these
movies on something called American Movie Classics in the first place?
If you answer “yes” to any or all of these
questions, well, you should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself. More
important, you should also count yourself among the target audience
for The Independent , a wildly
uneven but often uproarious bagatelle aimed squarely at anyone who fondly
recalls the low-budget, high-concept quickies of New World Pictures,
American-International and other now-defunct manufacturers of schlock
cinema.
To be sure, many of the movie's inside jokes and spot-on parodies will
be lost on non-buffs and stuffed shirts. But if you're in the right frame
of mind, and you catch enough of the wink-wink, nudge-nudge references,
you'll laugh until Pepsi squirts out of your nose.
A genially slapdash mix of sketch-comedy riffs, faux-documentary interviews
and traditional sitcom-style narrative, The Independent surveys
the life and career of Morty Fineman (Jerry Stiller), a notoriously prolific
multi-hyphenate whose credits include Groovy Hippie Slumber Party , LSD-Day and Teenie
Weenie Bikini Beach .
Friends, admirers and former co-workers
characterize the maverick moviemaker as an influential artist who somehow
transcended tight budgets, marginal talent and an unfortunate tendency
to put moves on his leading ladies. Karen Black, playing herself and
being a great sport about it, remembers that, when dealing with Morty's
romantic overtures, “It helped to be
drunk.”
Unfortunately, the clips from Morty's movies paint a decidedly less
flattering picture of a quick-buck, no-shame mini-mogul.
Not surprisingly, the funniest scenes in The Independent are
the snippets and coming-attraction trailers used to illustrate the highlights
of Morty's less-than-illustrious career: Brothers Divided (conjoined
twins – one a pacifist, one a gung-ho warrior – are drafted for Vietnam
duty), Christ for the Defense (a courtroom drama with a truly
miraculous defense attorney), The Foxy Chocolate Robot (blaxploitation
sci-fi with Fred Williamson and a mechanical co-star) and The Eco-Angels .
The latter segment, a hilariously precise parody of 1968's The Miniskirt
Mob , is a small gem of persuasive verisimilitude: The actors look,
dress and sound just like regulars in mid-'60s B-movies, and the faded
color appears to have degenerated for three or four decades.
Working from a hit-and-miss script he co-wrote
with producer Mike Wilkins, director Stephen Kessler strives for a
similar kind of plausible fakery during the “interviews” with Karen Black and other real-life notables.
Maintaining a reasonably straight face, Peter Bogdanovich claims Morty “would
try something, and two years later, somebody would copy it and win an
Oscar.” Ron Howard, Roger Corman and Nick Cassavetes also weigh in with
testimonials.
To link the inspired bits and pieces, Kessler and Wilkins spin a mildly
amusing story about Morty's umpteenth comeback effort. Still doing what
he does best (or, more precisely, worst) in the fifth decade of his filmmaking
career, Morty is unable to complete his latest opus -- Ms. Kevorkian ,
the saga of a gun-wielding sexpot who supports assisted suicide -- because
he is, once again, flat broke. Worse, his creditors want to claim his
427-film library, and sell off the individual titles – yes, even The
Eco-Angels and Christ for the Defense -- for
$8 a pound.
Morty needs a miracle. What he gets is Paloma
(Janeane Garofalo), his long-estranged daughter, who reluctantly takes
command of her father's failing production company. Meanwhile, Ivan
(Max Perlich), Morty's faithful assistant and tireless gofer, tries
to elevate his mentor's profile by talking a film festival – any festival, anywhere – into
honoring Morty with a retrospective tribute.
Trouble is, few festivals are sufficiently desperate to even consider
sponsoring such an event. The only encouraging response comes from a
brand-new festival in a small Nevada town where, since the closing of
a nearby military base, the only local industry of note is legal prostitution.
Which, naturally, makes it the perfect spot for a tribute to Morty Fineman.
The Independent doubtless would
have worked better with a few more ersatz coming-attraction trailers
and much less filler between the really funny bits. Even so, Stiller
gives a robustly comical performance as the most enthusiastically self-deluded
Hollywood fringe-dweller since Ed Wood. No obstacle, not even his own
ineptitude, gets Morty down. Told that he's bankrupt, he cheerfully
responds: “Then our creditors are screwed!”
Garofalo shines as a dry-witted, common-sensible realist who can't help
wanting to help her father, if only to repay him for producing Cheerleader
Camp Massacre after she failed to make the grade as a high-school
pom-pom girl. And Perlich brings a hangdog sweetness to scenes in which
he dutifully recites words of wisdom he has received from Morty. On the
subject of loyalty: “Milk the cow until it's dry, then make hamburger
and wallets.”
By the way: When you have the chance, take a peek at www.finemanfilms.com,
the fake-out website dedicated to Morty Fineman's dubious oeuvre. It's
almost funnier than The Independent itself.