After watching the movie my reaction was, shall we say, nonplussed. It is a low budget film shot at night and on weekends with friends by director Joe Escalante, bass player and founding member of the punk band The Vandals. I give him a lot of credit doing this on his own, the end result holds together as a story, but I didn't feel terribly involved with any of the characters. I guess you could say it holds true to his punk background with a strong do it yourself attitude.
The story follows Selwyn (Warren Fitzgerald, who also wrote the screenplay), a baker languishing in a bakery which specializes in erotic cakes. He is very good at his job, but when he's not baking he is suffering at the hands of a physically abusive girlfriend. Unable to put up with it anymore, runs off as a roadie for the punk band No Use For A Name. But life isn't any better on the road, suffering abuse from the band and their manager. Soon enough, he sets out on his own setting up shop in a small town. Here he gets his life back on track, for a while anyway, setting up one final encounter before the obligatory happy ending.
I don't really want to speak ill about the film, as it is obvious that everyone involved put their heart into it. On the other hand though, I was not terribly entertained. The film just meandered from scene to scene, never really giving me a reason to care about them. There is a goofy attraction to the film, for as nonplussed as I was, there were some funny lines in it, mainly from Scott Aukerman as Mickey the band manager.
I'm not sure what else to say about the film, it left me so uninspired to comment that this has been a struggle to right this. But still, to be fair, it is impressive for a first time filmmaker who has never shot anything before to put this together. It is not easy to put out a film from the ground up like these guys have done. The soundtrack is pretty good as well, laced with punk acts which I don't normally listen to, but this I enjoyed, it seemed to fit the film.
Video. It is presented in a ratio of 1.33:1, which is it's original aspect. It is a little washed out and grainy, fine for a low budget film. Just don't expect an A list looking video. There is also an inconsistency in the video quality, which the director addresses. What it boils down to is that much of the production was done quickly on nights and weekends over a span of over a year.
Audio. Matches the quality of the video, it does the trick but is nothing spectacular. It is presented in Dolby Digital 2.0.
Extras. For a straight to DVD production, it is pretty good.
-Trailer. The original trailer for the film.
-Making of. There is a 25 minute featurette hosted by Joe Escalante taking us through the making of the film from shooting to the finished product. This was a good watch.
-Deleted Scenes. Also includes some bloopers and features commentary with Joe and Warren.
-Commentary. Featuring Joe and Warren Fitzgerald having fun reminiscing about the actors and scenes. Not technically informative, but an entertaining listen.
Bottomline. No something I could honestly recommend, although I realize that I may not be a part of the target audience. I still think they did a great job putting it together, and it may beinteresting to see if he does any more feature films.
Affectionately Not Recommended.
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