Living In Oblivion (1995) It's as obvious as hell that independent writer-director Tom DiCillo based this funny, knowing film on his own experiences toiling in the low budget trenches.
And it couldn't have shown up at a better time than the mid 1990's.....the Golden, Glory era of the Sundance Film Festival and all the emerging breakout talents who shook up cinema every other day......(or so it seemed.)
DeCillo chose to cast a brutal satirical eye on a few working days of harried indie director Nick Reve (Steve Buscemi), struggling to get two major sequences done without losing his mind.
With the help of his small, ragtag crew, Nick hopes to nail his script's crucial love scene.....but he's undone by perpetual technical glitches and the growing lack of chemistry between his dysfunctional leads, the anxious, struggling Nicole (a terrific Catherine Keener) and hot young newly minted movie star Chad Palomino (James LeGros, in a hilarious display of preening egotism.)
We should point out here that Tom DiCello denied the standard rumor that he based Chad Palomino on Brad Pitt, who starred in the director's previous film 'Johnny Suede'. LeGros himself claimed he took his inspiration from some other unnamed actor he's worked with before.
As Nick's movie spirals into an escalating comedy of errors, DiCillo and his entire cast have enormous fun lampooning all the human foibles (and passions) of everyone who, for one reason or another, pursue their devotion to the arts of cinema
Steve Buscemi's a comic wonder, his eyes bulging ever wider as increasing panic and hysteria overtake him. His all too motley crew include Dermot Mulroney as his cinematographer and Danielle von Zerneck as his working-on-her-last-nerve assistant director.
And not surprisingly, the film's supporting MVP is Peter Dinklage, making his feature film debut as a dwarf actor, simmering with anger, recruited for a dream sequence because....well, don't movie dream sequences always include one dwarf? (In his real career, Dinklage refused to take such insulting, cliche roles and he's given a superb moment here to eviscerate any director who'd cast a dwarf as a cheap, cornball ploy to throw in Fellini-esque surrealism to a dream
This film's a 'don't miss' for anyone who's immersed in the blood, sweat and tears of making a movie. But it's just as much fun for everybody else, since it's loaded up with scenes both laugh out loud and poignant.
Come to think of it, 'Oblivion' would make a perfect double feature with 'Saturday Night'..... and 20 years after its release, it remains a comic gem of the indie world. 4 stars (****)
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