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What Just Happened

MPA Rating: R-Rating (MPA) for language, some violent images, sexual content and some drug material.
Moral Rating: not reviewed
Moviemaking Quality:
Primary Audience: Adults
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Length: 1 hr. 47 min.
Year of Release: 2008
USA Release: October 17, 2008 (limited—36 theaters)
DVD: February 24, 2009
Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures Copyright, Magnolia Pictures
Featuring Robert De Niro
Bruce Willis
Stanley Tucci
John Turturro
Kristen Stewart
Moon Bloodgood
Catherine Keener
Sean Penn
Robin Wright Penn
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Director Barry Levinson — “Wag the Dog,” “Man of the Year
Producer Mark Cuban, Robert De Niro, Eric Kopeloff, Art Linson, Jane Rosenthal, Todd Wagner
Distributor Distributor: Magnolia Pictures. Trademark logo.Magnolia Pictures

“In Hollywood, everyone can hear you scream.”

Here’s what the distributor says about their film: ‘What Just Happened’ is a sharp comedy about two nail-biting, back-stabbing, roller-coaster weeks in the world of a middle-aged Hollywood producer—as he tries to juggle an actual life with an outrageous series of crises in his day job.

Academy Award® winning director Barry Levinson reunites with Academy Award® winning actor Robert De Niro and leading producer Art Linson, who wrote the screenplay based on his bestselling memoir. They all join with an all-star cast in this rollicking, shrewd tale of a man besieged by people who want him to be all sorts of things—a money maker, an ego buster, a bad news breaker, an artistic champion, a loyal husband, an all-knowing father, not to mention sexy, youthful and tuned-in—everything except for the one thing he and all the preposterously behaved people he's surrounded by really are: bumbling human beings just trying to survive by any means necessary.

Ben (DE NIRO) is already in over his head trying to balance the tug-of-war of having two ex-wives and two different families with his latest business venture—the boldly “visionary” movie ‘Fiercely’ starring Sean Penn—when everything that can go wrong goes completely screwy.

Fiercely looks like an audience-offending flop which draws the ire of iron-gloved studio chief Lou (Catherine Keener), who forces him into tangling with the film's rebellious and drug-addled director Jeremy (MICHAEL WINCOTT). Meanwhile, he's confused and bewitched by his ex Kelly (Robin Wright Penn) who can't make up her mind about him; shocked by his daughter Zoe (Kristen Stewart), who seems to have grown up overnight; infuriated by his screenwriter friend Scott (Stanley Tucci) who's trying to make a deal with him while making moves on his former wife; horrified by a hirsute Bruce Willis (BRUCE WILLIS) and flummoxed by Willis’ nebbishy agent Dick (John Turturro), who's scared to death of his own clients.

Somehow amidst all the madness, treachery, deceit, runaway egos, rampant commercialism, personal politics and atrocious behavior of America's dream-making machinery, Ben has to find a way not just to make it to Cannes with a finished film, but to cope…”

This film is based on the book What Just Happened?: Bitter Hollywood Tales From the Front Line by Art Linson.

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Movie Critics
…This isn't a Hollywood satire, it's a sitcom. …
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
…funny, sly and highly stress-inducing movie… The movie is brilliant at portraying the incredibly high stakes of the seemingly inconsequential and the tremendous amounts of money spent on it. …
Carina Chocano, Los Angeles Times
…A satirical look at Hollywood lives, viewed through a cynical lens… “Who cares?” I’m asking in earnest. Who, exactly, do Mr. Levinson and the screenwriter, Art Linson, expect to invest time and interest—to say nothing of thought or feeling—in this meandering, passive-aggressive comedy of Hollywood inconsequence?…
A.O. Scott, New York Times
…the real tragedy of “What Just Happened” isn’t that it succumbs to predictable pseudo-satirical farce but that when it does, it loses sight of the very thing that could have made it a film worth caring about…
Josh Rosenblatt, Austin Chronicle
…A story very much by, about and for middle-aged men, and with the commercial limitations that implies, this intermittently amusing outing is graced by one of Robert De Niro's more engaging performances of recent vintage. …
Todd McCarthy, Variety
…the film as a whole kind of sort of feels like four episodes of “Entourage” back to back. … The soundtrack is a marvelous monster…
Elliot V. Kotek, Moving Pictures Magazine