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We Didn't Walk Out Of Tim & Eric's Billion Dollar Movie Premiere Last Night

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When we read about the angry walkouts at the Sundance screening of Tim & Eric's Billion Dollar Movie, we resisted the temptation to download the film on demand and held out for a theatrical viewing experience. Unsuspecting viewers being immersed in the duo's work is as tantalizing as the prospect of a Tim & Eric movie itself. But contrary to the initial report, Tim Heidecker exhibited no trace of "glee" in discussing the Sundance walkouts when we talked to him at the New York City premiere at Nitehawk Cinema last night. "Where'd you hear that? Did you call someone at Sundance? I don't trust you guys, you guys didn't do your homework. It's not real reporting, it's blogging. Junk journalism."

So, people didn't walk out of the film? "Some did," Heidecker conceded. "It's Sundance, people don't know what they're walking into. Obviously the movie's not for everybody." We asked the pair to name the last movie they walked out on. "Umm, I don't remember," Eric Wareheim replied. "I'm not slanting this interview towards walkouts," Heidecker added.


If anyone walked out of last night's screening at Nitehawk, it was to keep from peeing themselves. Tim and Eric play Tim and Eric: self-centered Hollywood producers who blow a billion dollars of the Schlaaang Corporation's money (Wareheim tells us their budget was "under $3 million") on a short film starring a man they believe to be Johnny Depp. To pay back the furious CEO of Schlaaang (the delightfully crusty Robert Loggia), the two decide to take over a run-down, post-apocalyptic, wolf-infested mall in the middle of America.

The film is a superb balance of disgusting, visceral humor (throats are slit, bowels are emptied, saliva and ejaculate are audible) with the low-fi, Dada public access aesthetic that makes Tim & Eric's Awesome Show, Great Job! so uniquely hilarious. A few gags linger too long, but the movie is an Airplane!-esque study in cramming in as many jokes as humanly possible.

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B$M's bold-faced names don't disappoint, (Will Ferrell, Will Forte, Jeff Goldblum, Zack Galifianakis, and a perfect John C. Reilly as the sickly mall resident Tacquito) but as is true for the show, it's the awkward, unknown character actors that shine, particularly the father and son who run the mall's used toilet paper business. Fans of Robert Axelrod and Tennessee Winston Luke won't be disappointed: they appear in the appropriately titled "Understanding Your Movie" vignettes to assist the audience in digesting what's on the screen (the Food Tube guys also make an appearance).

Heidecker and Wareheim have made the sort of breathtakingly absurd comedy that is the antidote to the Apatow archetype, and it's understandable that some will choose to walk out on something so shockingly different than, well, everything else on the marquee. Hell, people walked out of John Cage's "4:33." "We didn't take very many notes from anyone," Wareheim said. Qualifying his assertion that the movie "isn't for everybody," Heidecker added, "We didn't just make it for the fans. You didn't have to go to Tim & Eric school to like the movie."

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Comments [rss]

  • bigtimegeek

    Their TV show is amazing and I watch it religiously, but I was kind of disappointed by the movie. Their humor just doesn't translate as well in a long-form, plot-based format. It's hard to make Zach G. *not* funny, but even his scenes were a snore. Still, worth a watch for fans.

  • I don't like their TV show, so I'm going to pass on seeing their movie.

  • J

    Those two look frightening. What are they? Oompa loompas? If I saw them on the street, I would scream in fear.

  • krinklecutfires

    Wow Tom, that looks like alot of fun.

  • robingee

    They love bronzer.

  • Stephen Speagle

    Really....I'm looking at their photo and....nothing I've ever seen before screams Hollywood douchebags louder.  The coiffed hair, pseudo tans, cult like smiles, and overall pudgyness reminds me of North Korea on acid.

  • robingee

    fart

  • AlexTheOriginalPartyDog

    I don't think this reply can be topped.

  • Stephen... FAIL! Those are their characters in the MOVIE. Do some research. Unless you're trolling, in which case, Great Job!

  • Stephen Speagle

     Not trolling. Just not characters I want to watch (or know about...)

  • BJ

    Dumbass

  • schmeep

    Don't you love it when people don't know how to say "oops, my bad, I totally fell for it!" and instead try to cover it up in a meek way (especially after a decidedly aggressive original comment)?  Yeah, me too.

    (Oh, in case you didn't realize it and were going to take me literally, I was referring to you).

  • noisejoke

     
    Yo, Chippy (Schmeep) - I think der Speagle WAS trolling.

    On acid!!!!

  • noisejoke

     Can you imagine somebody thought those guys with those choppers were real? Yeesh.

    Meanwhile, I'm sitting here dicking around while my pals are at the Sunshine 7pm screening with a T&E appearance following at 8:30. No shrimp and white wine for me.

  • Can I get a hat wobble?

  • 69GeorgeWBush69

    Computer, load up Celery Man, please.

  • Now Tain I can get into.

  • unretrofiedforu

    The movie is amazing. Absolutely abstract and a work of art; it is a reward for their loyal television viewers. Hipster comedy, u know. 

  • "Hmm, good teeth."

  • nayerr

    And I don't even have asthma. 

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