Blu-Ray Review: Barry Levinson Wastes Great Ensemble in ‘What Just Happened’

Printer-friendly versionE-mail page to friendPDF version

Blu-Ray Rating: 2.0/5.0

CHICAGO – They made a movie about Bruce Willis’ beard. “What Just Happened” is yet another head-scratcher from one of the more acclaimed directors of the ’80s and ’90s, Barry Levinson. Like “Envy” and “Man of the Year” before it, Levinson has spit out yet another inert comedy with a great ensemble but no passion, creativity or life to it. A mediocre Blu-Ray presentation does nothing to enhance the film.

Art Linson is one of the most successful and notorious producers in Hollywood. His name is on “Into the Wild,” “Spartan,” “Fight Club,” “Heat,” “Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” and more. He wrote a memoir about his complicated times in Hollywood and adapted his own book into the screenplay for “What Just Happened”.

What Just Happened was released on Blu-Ray on February 24th, 2009.
Photo credit: Magnolia

Linson has been turned into Ben (Robert De Niro), a producer trying to keep two troubled projects together while juggling a problematic personal life at the same time. One of his projects, “Fiercely,” stars Sean Penn (playing himself) in a dark drama with a downbeat ending that the financiers (headed by the great Catherine Keener) want radically changed. Ben has to convince the hothead director (Michael Wincott) to play along or see their movie shelved forever.

Meanwhile, Ben has to convince Bruce Willis (playing himself) that his weight gain and bushy beard could completely derail his about-to-shoot project. Willis was hired for his looks and Ben has to work with him and his agent (John Turturro) to keep the film from shutting down before it even begins. Robin Wright Penn, Kristen Stewart, and Stanley Tucci co-star.

What Just Happened was released on Blu-Ray on February 24th, 2009. Photo credit: Magnolia

In one of the few interesting special features on “What Just Happened,” Levinson speaks about giving a rather anecdotal book without much action “pace” and how “you have to work it out”. The funny thing is that they didn’t. We never get to know anyone in “Happened” and the “insight” into Hollywood feels a few years behind the times.

The problem with making a movie about tinseltown is that it’s been done SO well before. It’s impossible not to think of “The Player” or “Entourage” when you’re watching “What Just Happened” and the script by Linson simply isn’t sharp enough to be in the same satirical knife drawer as those great behind-the-scenes looks at Hollywood. “Happened” wants to be a “bitingly sharp comedy” but we’ve seen all these personalities before. It’s going behind-the-scenes on something that has become the scene itself.

To be fair, there are elements of “What Just Happened” that works. The hilariously simple quote on the front of the case that advertises “priceless, laugh-out loud lines” isn’t that far off. Yes, there are a few funny lines, and De Niro looks more awake than in recent junk like “Righteous Kill”. It’s also impossible to be completely bored by an ensemble that includes both Penns, Tucci, Turturro, and Wincott. They’re all having fun. The problem is that they’re having more fun than you probably will.

The Blu-Ray release from Magnolia is average to mediocre. The 1080P High Definition 16x9 (2.40:1) picture is surprisingly flat. The colors are distinct and there’s not an excessive amount of grain or visual noise, but the picture looks about the same as an average upconverted standard DVD. The audio in 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio is similarly never distractingly bad but also unimpressive.

The special features continue the mediocrity of “What Just Happened”. The commentary with Levinson and Linson is shockingly dull. The two take long, regular pauses and spend way too much time describing the action. There needs to be a class or a book to guide commentary participants away from simply talking about what we’re watching. The deleted scenes are the most interesting special feature, especially a nauseating epilogue in which each character gets a happy ending that was very thankfully cut.

What’s most annoying about the special features for “What Just Happened” are mini-docs that run about 2 minutes long. There really needs to be a law that anything that throws you back to a menu after two minutes can not legally be called a “special feature”. The only featurette with anything interesting (and the only one that should have been included) is the roughly 23 minute “Making of What Just Happened: From Book to Screen”.

A few years ago, a Barry Levinson movie with Robert De Niro, Catherine Keener, John Turturro, Sean Penn, and Bruce Willis would have been a major, major event. Perhaps the most insightful thing that “What Just Happened” has to say about the ups and downs of Hollywood is that the movie so clearly was not.

By BRIAN TALLERICO Content Director HollywoodChicago.com [email protected]