Not Quite Hollywood DVD (2008)

Not Quite Hollywood details

Format:	18 DVD
Director:	Mark Hartley
Genre:	Documentary - Entertainment, General
Studio:	ELEVATION

DVD 1 disc

Name	Discs
Not Quite Hollywood	18 Feature

DVD Information

Run time:	1 hour 43 minutes
Rental release:	30 Mar 2009
Main languages:	English

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Most helpful review Not Quite Hollywood

Unenlightening

By Al80 (59 reviews) from Brighton, England , 27 Mar 2009

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS Show review anywayHide

[Highly rated reviewer]

This is another one of those worryingly fashionable and prominent documentaries that offers plentiful soundbites set to almost non-stop music, but precious little insight. Like that terribly overrated skateboarding flick Dogtown And Z-Boys, this is a barrage of information that you didn't care to know, delivered by people sometimes visibly salivating at the prospect of recounting a story that isn't really worth telling.

Many of these subjects are so rigorously determined to mythologize this period of Aussie filmmaking, that they end up telling tales that make them look like a smirking misanthropy collective. Wasn't it funny when that actress nearly drowned, just because some schmuck of a director couldn't get the shot that he wanted? How about when Henry Silva, an actor petrified of heights, almost pissed himself with fear because a camera crew took him 70ft off the ground without warning him? And that ECT sequence in Patrick? They considered giving the actor real shock therapy! What lovable rogues! What twats.

Stir in the endless shrugging off of numerous instances of casual racism and misogyny, and you're left with a pretty empty document of little genuine significance.

There are a handful of interesting, level-headed contributors (one of them being an uncharacteristically restrained Quentin Tarantino) but there is no form, structure or analysis of any cultural impact that this movement may have had. Which is a shame, because such analysis may have justified the film's existence.

There may well be valuable things to say about this subject, but it'll take a much more ambitious director to do it.
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Repulsive, creepy and obnoxious... but enough about Tarantino

By zorilla (228 reviews) from Kew, Richmond , 06 Oct 2012

Is there a human being on the planet who hates women more than Quentin Tarantino?

What could have been a funny, insightful documentary about the birth of a country's film industry told by the mavericks and characters that made it happen becomes something altogether more disturbing when it becomes legitimized by Tarantino getting all excited by the humiliation, rape and murder of women and the claim that 'when you see an Australian car chase you can't help but jerk off'.

Why would anybody with a brain cell want to give this nasty, unpleasant, middle aged adolescent misogynist any more oxygen than is absolutely necessary to keep him restrained and comatose.

I saw this film on the same day I saw the DVD of A Fistful Of Dollars with a commentary by Christopher Frayling. Leone's film is as violent, fetishistic and exploitative as anything that ever came out of Australia. Frayling's reading of it is funny, insightful and intelligent. He explains the film's complex imagery in a wide cultural context while displaying at least as much passion for his subject as Tarantino without ever glorifying the violence or attempting to justify Leone's lapses into misogyny.

Tarantino is a truly repulsive human being.
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Not Quite Hollywood

By Tonia (2 reviews) from Plymouth , 21 Nov 2009

Not what the trailer indicated - some good bits but really not worth watching unless you're a complete film buff!
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fascinating look back

By conformist (24 reviews) from Ulverston , 10 Oct 2009

this is a highly entertaining look at the genre boom in Australian cinema roughly from Barry MacKenzie to Mad Max. Ranging from curates egg (good in parts) movies like Razorback to the truly dreadful such as Alvin Purple and including much hilarious commentary from producers, directors, actors, critics and (we shouldn't be suprised I suppose) Quentin Tarantino this is a must for anyone who takes a broad view of cinema. Just one observation - why is there an assumption that if you like the better end of genre movies you dislike art movies? Why can't you go for both? After all Bruce Beresford went from Barry Mackenzie to Breaker Morant and Black Robe.
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Fantastic Thrash

By JamesMc (134 reviews) from London , 28 Sep 2009

If you like the British sex comedies of Robin Askwith, or trashy horror films from the 80s, you'll love this. It's about their Australian equivilant, and covers a lot of films I'd never heard about, and I now want to see every one of them. Don't see if you don't like low budget thrash, do see if, like me, you love a bit of it.
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Waste of a perfectly good disc

By Manamal (2 reviews) from Amersham , 15 Sep 2009

What a load of boring rubbish about the history of Oz nudety ect in film. took us about 5 mins to realise we were actually watching the movie and another 2 to turn it off. Disc would get more use as a coaster!
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