Expired (2007)

A turbulent and intriguing love story between two parking officers in the city of Los Angeles.

Director:

Cecilia Miniucchi

Writer:

Cecilia Miniucchi

Stars:

Samantha Morton, Anthony John Crane, Gina St. John

1 win & 1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Samantha Morton	...	Claire Barney
Anthony John Crane	...	Blue Car Owner
Gina St. John	...	Woman with Expired Meter
Ron King	...	Ex-Boyfriend
Rolando Molina	...	Meters Money Collector
Teri Garr	...	Mother Barney / Aunt Tilde
Joe Camareno	...	Stephen
Sonia Iris Lozada	...	Jade (as Sonia Lozada)
Terence Bernie Hines	...	Mark (as Terrence Bernie Hines)
Carlease Burke	...	Supervisor at Roll Call
Kyle Hatch	...	Pedestrian
Kestrin Pantera	...	Woman with Baby
Jason Patric	...	Jay Caswell
Adam Gropman	...	Green Car Owner
James C. Burns	...	Red SUV

Storyline

Man or woman, the sight of a dark-suited municipal employee dolling out parking violations stirs a primal hate in all but the most enlightened souls. And the heroine of EXPIRED, the parking officer Claire, knows it. The film revolves around Claire, a kind soul who resents having to enforce the law at all times, and Jay, an angry traffic officer who loves his job, being the perfect outlet for his anger and frustrations. Coming both from a place of despair and loneliness, Jay and Claire meet and engage in a tumultuous relationship which will eventually teach them that love can spread his magic seeds of redemption and hope, even in the darkest and most perverted of all affairs. And don't forget to put money in the meter.

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Plot Keywords:

job | f rated | new year's eve | character says i love you | answering machine message | 

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Taglines:

Sometimes all it takes is a little change...

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Genres:

Comedy | Drama | Romance

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Certificate:

R

Did You Know?

Goofs

When Claire is helping Wilma hang Christmas lights, the arrangement of the lights changes several times between shots.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Claire: I'm one of the most hated people in the world. Nobody likes me. People run from me like the plague. Give me the finger. Insult me. Verbally abuse me.
[tickets a car]
Owner of the Bug: [running toward his car] Hey! Hey, come on, I'm here.
Claire: Sorry.
Owner of the Bug: Fuck you!

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Connections

References Wheel of Fortune (1983)

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Soundtracks

The Sun Has a Hat On
Performed by Cecilia Miniucchi
Written by Cecilia Miniucchi
Courtesy of Jeffrey Coulter (BMI)

User Reviews

This is a very intense, powerful and darkly funny film.

The movie Expired is really unlike most of the feature films you'll see these days. It has an intensity, a committed vision that grabs you and holds you in its grips for the entire hour and a half or so. Of films in recent years that share this quality, I can think of Todd Solondz' "Happiness".

Expired is the story of two L.A. parking officers, or "meter maids", one female and one male, who meet on the job and have an increasingly dysfunctional, mercurial relationship. Samantha Morton plays it extremely sweet, wide-eyed and gentle as Claire, a meter maid who lives with her stroke-incapacitated, essentially mute mother and hates having to ruin peoples' days with tickets. Jason Patric is Jay, a taut, seething, bull-shouldered ball of defensive machismo in a blue uniform with a ticket-gun and a hilarious dark mustache. He likes slapping parking tickets on folks the way some LA cops like cracking heads.

The first two thirds or so of the film especially are darkly comedic, and the purposefully stylized elements- lighting, dialogue, supporting actors, visual action, set design, musical score- create a very sharp, bittersweet, somewhat tragic kind of comedy, like the best of the Coen Brothers films. This isn't broad American multiplex comedy, this is comedy that comes from true pathos, sadness and the small calamities of life. While Morton's face shows sensitivity and vulnerability- two of her big strengths- Patric's Jay character is fantastic because he offsets the angry disciplinarian guy with loose moments of real charm and also sarcastic, almost whimsical humor.

The film progresses with a few traditional "plot points" that serve to accelerate the conflicts and create moments of challenge and decision for the characters, but really the film is also greatly a close-up examination of the attempted close relationship of two equally extreme opposites- the "naive, yearning do-gooder" and the "previously injured, prickly, defensive bully." At its core it's just a film about human beings- what they have, what they want and need, and the different places they're coming from emotionally.

Visually, the film was shot in a crisp, almost beautiful way, at once seeming straightforwardly no-nonsense and yet heavily atmospheric. A lot of the production design strongly complements the film- from the richly hued, antique-laden apartment Claire and her Mom live in to the various LA coffee shops and streetscapes. The musical scoring is also highly evocative and appropriate- with the best of it reminding me of great melodic work Michael Penn and Jon Brion did in P.T. Anderson's film 'Hard Eight'.

Ileana Douglas is perfect as Claire's decent-hearted, energetic busybody neighbor and Teri Garr is rock solid as the mute, wheelchair-bound Mom but hilarious and deliciously campy in a second role as the Mom's crazy sister in Pomona! With its strong vision and execution, 'Expired' should certainly put writer/director Cecilia Miniucchi on the Hollywood map.

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

15 August 2008 (Sweden)

Also Known As:

Expired

Filming Locations:

Pomona, California, USA

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$6,596, 22 June 2008

Gross USA:

$29,796

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$65,003

Company Credits

Production Co:

Aga Films, FR Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

107 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1