Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure (2011)

When two friends tape-recorded the fights of their violently noisy neighbors, they accidentally created one of the world's first 'viral' pop-culture sensations.

Director:

Matthew Bate

Writer:

Matthew Bate

Stars:

Ivan Brunetti, Daniel Clowes, Mitch Deprey

1 win & 3 nominations.

Cast

Credited cast:
Ivan Brunetti	...	Himself
Daniel Clowes	...	Himself
Mitch Deprey	...	Mitchell D
Peter Haskett	...	Pete
Raymond Huffman	...	Ray
Mike Mitchell	...	Himself
Henry S. Rosenthal	...	Himself
Eddie Lee Sausage	...	Himself

Storyline

When two friends tape-recorded the fights of their violently noisy neighbors, they accidentally created one of the world's first 'viral' pop-culture sensations.

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Plot Keywords:

noisy neighbor | audio recording | gay neighbor | homophobe | tape recording | 

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Genres:

Documentary | Comedy | Drama | History

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Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

Australia

Language:

English

Release Date:

25 August 2011 (USA)

Also Known As:

Shut Up Little Man!

Box Office

Opening Weekend:

$4,117 (USA) (30 September 2011)

Gross:

$19,654 (USA) (30 September 2011)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Closer Productions, South Australian Film Corporation, The

Technical Specs

Runtime:

90 min

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

First feature to be made and released from the South Australian Film Corporation's FilmLab initiative.

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Connections

References The Odd Couple (1968)

User Reviews

Ultimately, A Rationalization

In the end, this movie felt like an excuse to milk the tapes for a little more fame and/or money.

The first 2/3rds nicely chronicle how the whole phenomenon took place. And it truly is fascinating. You get a sense of how strange, serendipitous and organic it must have been to have a personal project turn into a meme.

But the key word is "organic". Other people drove the Pete and Ray story. The partners, correctly, said "go ahead" since, in effect, it wasn't really theirs to control.

It's when they take control that movie inadvertently reveals that, rather than a sweet, hapless pair that fell into something, they've staked their identities on this one thing and they've become kind of self-important assholes.

When Eddie Lee made proclamations about "art" my first thought was - "Really? What other art have you created? Because an artist normally creates more than one piece of art and all you did was tape some guys screaming at each other. Other people picked it up and turned it into something. Duping tapes and giving them to people...well...that's not really art." After that, the pair goes on a quest to do the one thing that art should never do - explain itself. Tracking down Ray, the roommate, felt like a stunt. It was a fishing trip to solve the riddle of whether Pete and Ray were lovers. That's dull and pointless.

Art, imho, allows people to project themselves into and onto what they see. These two, Eddie in particular, seem to want to prove something that doesn't need to be proved. Wrapping up the film with the Pete and Ray dancing sucks everything that's interesting about the relationship out of it.