Behind the Scenes of “Total Hell” (Straight Shooter Film Review)

Posted by on Jun 12, 2013 | 21 comments

Straight Shooter Review
Behind the Scenes of “Total Hell”
Behind the Scenes of Total Hell CoverDirector: Andy Wilton
Production Company/Distributor: Once Upon a Tyne Productions
Genre: mockumentary
Running Time: 97 mins; (Collector’s Edition has 190 mins of extras)
Budget: $2000
Expected/Actual Rating: R for adult themes and language
Website: Click Here
Trailer: Click Here
View Online: Click Here
Purchase: Click Here
Review Issue: Issue #88 (06/13)
Reviewer: Kari Ann Morgan
Final Score: 9.4 – Worth watching at an arthouse Screening or small festival!

Do you want to love Independent films, but, too often, run into esoteric, self-exploratory narratives that have no connection to you as a viewer?

Do you want a micro-budget film that you can be proud to support with your time and your purchasing dollars?

Award of Superiority

Have you been looking for a new take on the Spinal Tap mockumentary that aims its sites squarely at both the reality television industry and the ultra-indie filmmaking community that inspired it?

Are you a human being who is able to understand English and have a sense of humor?

If any (or none) of these things are true, then there’s a high probability that Andy Wilton’s Behind the Scenes of ‘Total Hell’  (BTSOTH) is just what the doctor ordered!

Story

Jamie Gunn (Grey McCulloch) is a director with a budget that is inversely proportional to his ego, and an artistic vision that is as directionless as Helen Keller trying to play Marco Polo. Through sheer force of personality, he manages to convince a handful of people to help him make his cinematic opus: Totalitarian Hell. Armed with all the smug self-assurance and overbearing, condescending attitude of a big-shot Hollywood director, Jamie scoffs at minor details like a script or planning, and blusters ahead with his film, confident that it will be a success. This behavior ends up sabotaging most of the production, resulting in a film with no script, no money, disappearing equipment, a dwindling and disillusioned cast and crew, and a producer on the run from loan sharks. A documentary film crew chronicles the entire hilarious fiasco as Jamie deteriorates into directorial destruction.

Jamie Gunn is a man on a mission...to boldly go where too many Indie filmmakers have gone before!

Jamie Gunn is a man on a mission…to boldly go where too many Indie filmmakers have gone before!

Watchability

Here’s the twist with the mockumentary of BTSOTH: many of the actors weren’t really acting, because they’d been told that Jamie Gunn was the actual director and that Totalitarian Hell was the movie they were making. (As such, it’s kind of like the most brilliant sociological experiment you’ve ever been privy to, focusing on how much people will really put up with if they think they can be in a movie!)

Partway through production, those same actors were told the truth (that Jamie Gunn was in fact an actor named Grey McCulloch), but no one told McCulloch that everyone now knew the truth. This served to enhance the conflicts between Jamie and his cast and crew. Everyone’s dialogue is completely ad-libbed, and all of the footage is genuine (i.e. there were no setups, takes, or re-shoots). Knowing this background makes the events in the film more bizarre… and much more hilarious, as you want to keep watching to find out what these people are going to do next.

There’s a fine line between bizarre/awkward humor and painful-to-watch humor, but BTSOTH manages to present awkward situations without lingering there to the point of painful embarrassment.

In this crazy, yet brilliant film, many of the actors were kept in the dark on what was and wasn't real.

In this crazy, yet brilliant film, many of the actors were kept in the dark on what was and wasn’t real.

How Far Did you Watch Through It:

100%

Why?
Even though Straight Shooters are designed to give reviewers the out that actual audience members have, I always watch MFM films all the way through, on principle. If a film doesn’t start out good, I want to give it a chance to redeem itself, and if it’s horrible, I’ll watch the whole thing just to tell you exactly WHY you should avoid losing that 2hrs of your life. (And because I hate it when anyone tries to convince me that a movie can be awful for 1 hour and 55 minutes and somehow become brilliant with “just the right ending” in the last five. As such, I stick it out for the people!) No need to thank me, Citizen, just doing my job.

None of that really matters because BTSOTH is a genuinely hilarious movie, especially if you’ve ever made or been involved in a film yourself (or if you’ve ever seen a reality show in any country that hasn’t outlawed them). The acting is so good that it’s difficult to tell where the line between acting and reality is.

Closing Thoughts

Behind the Scenes of ‘Total Hell’ is a great Independent comedy that will leave you inspired to try out other Indies in the future! As a wonderful bonus from Wilton and his team, you can watch the film for free on their YouTube page. (And, if you like it, you can get their awesome collectors’ edition for not too much cash! Certainly a lot less than the Lord of the Rings Boxed set!)

Final Score:

9.4: Worth watching at an arthouse Screening or small festival!

Kari Ann Morgan is a retired Independent film producer living in Lexington, KY. Ms. Morgan’s tumultuous transition from rock’n’roll/gamer chick to mother and then back again (with children in tow) led to her becoming a humor columnist. She currently writes the independent (and highly ironic) blog, Mother Irreverent. When she's not writing, she's introducing her kids to old-school NES video games, making playhouses from cardboard boxes, baking nerd-themed cakes and cupcakes, and learning about physics. And she fervently maintains that she is cleverly disguised as a responsible adult.

    21 Comments

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