I assume that the way the majority films that receive funding in Hollywood is based heavily on whose assistant can give the best “oral explanation” to the studio executives. I picture in my head a bunch of guys sitting around in suits throwing buzzwords at each other until someone says “alright, I’ll throw 25 million behind that, lets get a script, what is Kevin Smith up to, he can churn out swill.” Then come the hookers and everyone gets blown.

Often I see a group of mid-thirties university educated pseudo accountants throwing words around like: dolphin, penguins, Bill Murray, orange cat, Time Machine, Space Iguanas, Ghetto Rap, Peanut butter billionaire (the original pitch for The Godfather was about a Billionaire Peanut Butter maker in space, maybe). Somehow out of these bizarre little corporate circle jerks arises The Departed or Schindler’s List. Yet at the same time out of these same circles comes such classics as Virtuosity or The Brave Little Toaster. One has to ask the question, how do these movies get funding?

(Schindler’s List)

(Virtuosity)

The other side is movies that are just so weird and unpleasant that no one knows how they were funded in the first place. I am talking about creepy art house projects that are designed to make a human being feel self hate just for walking in the theatre. There are also plenty of B-movies that are just thrown out every year because they make enough returns through DVD sales (see Roger Corman’s IMDB page) so they are excused for being quick money makers. The most profitable genre is horror because no one cares who is in it as long as there are breasts and blood.

The quick list of films that don’t make sense how/why they were made. Of course, the list is by no means exhaustive, but the following are some definite notables that come to mind:

1. Crispin Glover’s What Is It?

From what I understand, this movie is about a guy who is killing snails, smoking them, and then becomes a snail. At the same time it’s a man who is travelling between a number of worlds and is tormented by racist, hubrist spirits. Crispin Hellion Glover is a weird dude. He acted in two Charlie’s Angels movies to fund this.

No idea what the hell any of that means. I know a number of its actors have Down’s syndrome. I know for the sequel there are a large number of porn stars in it and that the whole thing is a planned trilogy. This film haunts my dreams.

2. Tom Green’s Freddy Got Fingered

I saw this the day it came out in theatres.  I was rather confused. I grew up in the same city as Tom did so he was kind of a local hero. I went to the same skatepark and my elementary school was close to his parents’ house. Man was I let down. Apparently The original script was amazing. This film strikes me that a bunch of suits said: “hey, that Canadian fella is popular, lets give him a movie.”

Tom Green proceeded to create a strange anti-comedy and commit career suicide. It is awesome in the sense that he took a lot of money and made Freddy, but at the same time - why?

3. Carnosaur 1, 2, 3 and 4

Just before Jurassic Park came out, this shiny turd hit the video shelves. I assume a bunch of people picked up on the fact that Spielberg was making something big, slapped together a movie, released it a month before and made some money. The first film I could understand but three sequels? Hell no. especially when you consider that they became increasingly goofy as time went on to the point where they were just ripping of Aliens (the sequel to Alien (1979)). There should be an award in film for most effective rip off of Aliens.

GAME OVER MAN!

4. Takashi Miike – Pretty much everything he has ever made

Takashi Miike isn’t so much a filmmaker as he is a pornographer. His work is not really a movie as much as it is basically every major extreme one can imagine. It is unpleasant to watch. Miike once said that the reason one his films (Ichi the Killer) could not be played in North America was that we as an audience just weren’t open minded enough. Maybe North Americans are a little squeamish or maybe we just don’t like our sex scenes to involve chainsaws. In his scenes you can expect anything from murder, to sadomasochism, to bestiality.

5. Catwoman

Did Halle Barry win an Oscar before she made this? Yes, yes she did. It is regarded as one of the worst made films of all time according to Rotten Tomatoes. So let me get this straight, you want to make a Catwoman movie, no Batman, with Sharon Stone, no real plot, with bullet time, and it’s destined to suck? Go for it!

6. The Brave Little Toaster

What demented business school educated bumble-fuck would think that these movies would be profitable? I’m sure on paper the concept of a toaster missing its family and going off on quest to find them with a rag tag group of household appliances made a ton of sense, but when someone looks at it, really, what the hell comes to mind. What were they smoking is another question that pops up, the best part is that it is a completely Christian movie. Yeah, take that your long cherished childhood memories. Poor Phil Hartman (he played the air conditioner).

7. Jason X

I thought these films stopped being profitable after Jason went to hell or took Manhattan. They just keep making them and stoned high school students without girlfriends keep watching them. I am still waiting for Freddy versus Jason Versus Ash (from Evil Dead) versus the old chick from Sex and The City (which one? They are all old). Hurray Wrinkles!

Further Crispin Glover wackiness:

Which did I miss?