Off the Lot

Both my sister and my mother called me up—ON THE PHONE—to tell me about this show they saw on television about young filmmakers trying to break through. Both excited about the find. Excited to tell me about this show that I might not have heard of.

And because I'm not a COMPLETE asshole (yet), I humored them and thanked them for bringing it to my attention.

I completely hate the show, though. I barely made it through the first and second episodes, and I'm FF-ing through the 2-hour third episode. And it's all completely atrocious. It feels like a show that would have been fresh about 5 or 7 years ago. A frothy, shitty, santorumy mix of "Project Greenlight", "The Apprentice" and "American Idol".

But don't take my word for it. Variety, The Hollywood Reporter and The Washington Post break it down rather eloquently. (Shales is great—I love his dig at Brett Ratner.)

It's comforting to know that it's not just film-school prejudices that make the show unwatchable.

Watching someone sing a condensed version of a pop song is one thing, but short films are difficult to sit through. That's the killer. It might be a little better if—like American Idol—they were forced to do covers. Assigned scenes from well-known movies, so at least the audience wouldn't have to deal with shitty original concepts.

And I don't know what it is, but aspiring filmmakers are very hard to feel for. I hate myself already, I'm supposed to feel something for THESE fucks?!