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Mark Borchardt, Tom Schimmels, Miriam Frost, Tom Dallace, Robert Richard Jorge ... see more see more... , Jack Bennett

An alcohol/drug abuser re-examines his life until he nearly dies from an overdose. Then a friend convinces him to join a self-help group which turns out to be demonic.

Flixster Users

21% want to see it

126 ratings

Critics

38% liked it

8 critics

Unrated, 40 min.

Directed by: Mark Borchardt

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DVD Release Date: June 6, 2000

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Flixster Reviews (20)


  • February 10, 2012
    This little no budget horror short is the end result of the hard work and struggles by Mark Borchardt and Co. as depicted in the documentary American Movie.

    It concerns a loser substance abusing writer who tries to re-examine his life and change things around by going to a supp... read moreort group to fix things. The group he goes to however, end up being more sinister tha nthey first seem, and our protagonist gets far more than he bargained for or expected.

    To see this film's creation, and to hear Mark talk about it, and filmmaking in general, it seems like he really knows what the hell he's doing, and all of his struggles are not due to lack of knowledge or training in the art of filmmaking. What this film ends up being though, is maybe realistically more of what everyone but Mark can see: a messy, amateurish, and slightly pretentious B-movie that, while entertaining, is sorta worse than anyone might admit.

    I actually kinda like it though. Sure, it's not good, but compaed to some of the crap that my friends and I made or tried to make when we were bored kids trying to stay out of trouble, this is frickin' art. It's not great, but it's far better and more competantly put together than it could have been, especially ocnsidering the context surrounding its creation.

    Also, because I watched American Movie before I saw this, I think that too weighs in with how I feel about it. You have to give Mark and Co. some credit, and you really want ot see them succeed, even if in your heart you know that realistically things will never be as great as they envision it in their heads.

    Yeah, the film is pretty rough and raw, but it really adds to the atmosphere of the story and gives it character. As far as the acting goes, well, it's not great, but I've seen big budget Hollywood films that were far worse. Again, I'm contextualizing and juding it through a certain lens, but even if I didn't this would still be better than a lot of things I've seen.

    All in all, this is a msut-see if you got anything positive from American Movie, and you give a dman about struggling filmmakers whose dreams and ambitions far outweigh everything else in their lives. Plus, it's only 40 minutes, so if you hate it you won't lose too much of your time.

Critic Reviews


Stefan Birgir Stefansson
May 19, 2008
Stefan Birgir Stefansson, sbs.is

pretentious and amaturish

MaryAnn Johanson
February 14, 2001
MaryAnn Johanson, Flick Filosopher

[A] pretty damn good little film... Full Review

Jake Euker
October 30, 2004
Jake Euker, F5 (Wichita, KS)

No review available.

Philip Martin
August 29, 2002
Philip Martin, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

No review available.

Jeffrey Westhoff
August 15, 2002
Jeffrey Westhoff, Northwest Herald (Crystal Lake, IL)

No review available.

Jeremiah Kipp
January 27, 2002
Jeremiah Kipp, ToxicUniverse.com

Click to read the article Full Review

Greg Dean Schmitz
January 1, 2000
Greg Dean Schmitz, Greg's Previews at Yahoo! Movies

Click to read the article Full Review

Cheryl DeWolfe
January 1, 2000
Cheryl DeWolfe, Apollo Guide

Click to read the article Full Review

Critic ratings and reviews powered by RottenTomatoes.com

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