Showing posts with label satire. Show all posts
Showing posts with label satire. Show all posts

Monday, August 12, 2013

Wearing Hitler's Pants - the Uber Comedy



This video presentation is a feature length satire.  It took me a little over two years to complete (2004-2006).  I consider this project my "film school" days, since I wrote, directed, shot, and edited the movie, which, I would add is quite a bit of work...  It is a comedy that mostly lampoons the self importance of those bent on the creation of "art'.  The movie starts with a group of wanna-be Hollywood directors in a coffee shop arguing the virtues of Tim Burton's movie Planet of the Apes verses the original '68 movie of the same name.   Upon bumping heads on the subject one of these silly characters comes up with the idea of hiring a video crew to shoot a behind the scenes look at the mounting of a play about Adolph Hitler's reported love affair with Ernst Rohm...  The story follows the foolish meanderings of Matt Jackson on his awkward quest to perfect his performance of Hitler - a horror!  Driven to stupidity, Jackson loses his car. he loses his girl, he loses his sense of humor, and, perhaps, his life.  This movie is two hours in length (admittedly, that will take a very special attention span), and, it is potentially offensive (F-bombs have been bleeped, but, there is a scene where an actor - who, apparently, is a closet Nazi - badgers a director at a coffee shop).  This project was a lot of fun...  I would like to think that this movie verges on true "Art"., but., then, if I actually believed that, I would be as pompous as the characters presented in this story.  Enjoy.

Monday, July 15, 2013

they tell me satire is dead.


A conversation in a bar the other night has led me to post this scene from my feature length satire film titled Wearing Hitler's Pants.  The person I spoke with expressed a passionate concern for a "lack of equity in our country" as he pointed to the television which was on a news show re-capping the Zimmerman trial, and then he promptly asked me about my ethnic background...  I described myself as a mutt with some German, some English, and, I assume mostly French (a guess due to my French last name) heritage.  With said information in hand, he began to ridicule my German decent by indicating - "what if Hitler was a brother?"  (I'm not sure that it matters, but to me it makes this incident much more humorous - the man I spoke with was African American)  I believe he was mostly serious (as humor sometimes is) which caused me to laugh.  My laughter at his seriousness about Hitler-because-I-was-a-percent-German perplexed him.  "What, you think hate is funny?"  He asked.  To which I responded by reciting several lines from this clip.  He reluctantly chuckled.  Please keep in mind...  It's satire.  According to Wikipedia - Satire is a genre of literature, and sometimes graphic and performing arts, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement.  I think the irony in this little scene is amazing..  The actor's really good as well (Morrocco Omari http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0648339/) Regardless, I've been told that satire is dead.