Once
a successful screenwriter, D.E. Randall (John Fairley and Pierre Walters) removed
himself from Hollywood thirty years ago when a chance encounter with enthusiastic
fertilizer salesman Ron L. Price (David Coyne) results in the creation of a cinematic
– and real-life – disaster. Price bets Randall that he could make
a hit movie, casts local “talent”, and goes on to create Lucifer Cicero.
The film is doomed from the start, but it is the circumstances and people surrounding
them who create the real story behind the story – and the tragedies that
will change the small town forever.
Randall
is now breaking its three-decade silence by recounting the story to a documentarian
(J.J. Johnson), who wants to record the tale of the worst movie ever made.
One of the things that stood out in Eleven was the acting. Since I started
to work with Microfilmmaker Magazine, I’ve certainly seen my share of bad,
good, and mediocre acting, but this film really blew me away. I didn’t notice
a moment where the actors dropped character, resorted to cheesy overacting (unless
it was called for, of course), or dropped into the infamous bad monotone (ala
Ricky Nelson in Rio Bravo.) It’s no surprise considering that the film’s
principle cast all have much experience in both stage and screen, and I certainly
applaud the filmmakers’ choice to use professionals rather than friends
or next-door-neighbors. Certainly it can be a more expensive option (although
I didn’t see any indication that the actors actually received a stipend
for their time), but definitely a much better choice. Also, I do believe that
it takes a good actor to know when to act “badly,” something that
is vital in showing the filming of a really bad horror movie.
Though
Eleven has a very serious tone to it, it was not without moments of humor
to lighten the mood. The most obvious were the multiple jokes at the character
of Price – a manure salesman turned wannabe film mogul. In addition, the
concept of a “movie within a movie” left an opening for many inside
jokes, such as Price’s repetition of the phrase “fix it in post”,
something that causes an uncontrollable groan in all filmmakers, or his continued
sloppiness as production goes further and further downhill.
One
of the film’s drawbacks, however, is its multitude of characters and storylines
that dance around each other until everyone meets very suddenly and violently.
The film’s characters aren’t introduced all that well, which gets
to be confusing as it’s sometimes difficult to tell one storyline from the
other. For example, the character of Shelley, who at the beginning of the film
is told that she only has two years to live (something else that isn’t explained
all that well), and later finds out that her mother and step-father were in a
car accident. Initially, I didn’t realize that this was the same character,
as the car accident subplot seemed to come out of nowhere. In addition, it really
doesn’t pop up very often in the rest of the movie, except to show that
Shelley has a sister who is estranged from the father.
