Spartans Movie 2011
IMDb 2.7 86 min When Xerxes (Ken Davitian), the evil god king of Persia, sends his massive army to Sparta, King Leonidas (Sean Maguire) and 13 strapping warriors rise up to defend their homeland.The first battles are of the hip-hop variety, and taking position at the narrow Thermopylae pass provides a huge strategic advantage, but a goat trail back-door is betrayed to Xerxes.
| Born | Jason Friedberg October 13, 1971 (age 47) Newark, New Jersey, United StatesAaron Seltzer January 12, 1974 (age 45) Mississauga, Ontario, Canada |
|---|---|
| Alma mater | University of California, Santa Barbara |
| Occupation | Directors, screenwriters |
| Years active | 1996–present |
Jason Friedberg (born October 13, 1971) and Aaron Seltzer (born January 12, 1974) are an American-Canadian film director and screenwriter team known for making parody movies that have received extremely unfavorable reviews, but have generally done well at the box office. They have written/directed films such as Spy Hard, Date Movie, Disaster Movie and Vampires Suck.
The duo have often been strongly criticized for their style of humor, regarded as lazily capitalizing on passing trends and mistaking scatological humor and fleeting references for jokes. Their work has often been nominated for Golden Raspberry Awards, though the two have never won one themselves. Some of the films the pair have personally written and directed have become regarded as some of the worst films of all time.
- 1Biography
- 2Filmography
- 3Awards and nominations
Biography[edit]
Interviews with the duo are rare, but in an exclusive 2014 interview with the publication Grantland, their background was discussed: Seltzer is part of a Canadian shoe salesmen family from Mississauga, Ontario, and Friedberg, who was born in Newark, New Jersey, was raised in Paterson, New Jersey and is the son of director Rick Friedberg. Seltzer and Friedberg met at the University of California, Santa Barbara and bonded over their love of film, especially comedy. Both are Jewish.[1] They did not attend film school, with Seltzer majoring in art history and Friedberg in history, but decided to try a career in the film industry after attending a class about Martin Scorsese in their last semester.[1]
Spy Hard, Scary Movie and Screenwriting[edit]
While writing screenplays at night, both spent the day attending jobs to pay their tuition, selling homemade T-shirts, starting their own food delivery service, and opening shoe shops in Los Angeles. When Rick Friedberg made the comic instruction video Bad Golf Made Easier with Leslie Nielsen, he showed his son's script for a spy film spoof to him. Nielsen approved, and this led into 1996's Spy Hard.
Friedberg and Seltzer then spent some years as screenwriters for hire, with Seltzer estimating the duo sold 'upward of 40 scripts'. The only finished project was an uncredited rewrite to the Jean-Claude Van Damme film Maximum Risk (1996), while an unproduced Liberace biopic (unrelated to Behind The Candelabra) introduced them to future collaborator and producer Peter Safran. In 1998, Safran managed to sell to Dimension Pictures a horror film spoof spec script of Friedberg and Seltzer's named Scream If You Know What I Did Last Halloween. Shawn Wayans and Marlon Wayans, with Buddy Johnson and Phil Beauman, developed a similar project and, thanks to a WGA decision, all six writers were credited on what became Scary Movie, despite Friedberg and Seltzer not actually working on the final script.[2] The film was a sleeper hit in 2000, and brought much attention to Friedberg and Seltzer.
Directing[edit]
Songs by coldplay. Tired of unmade projects as screenwriters, and with Regency Enterprises unable to find a director for their romantic comedy spoof, Seltzer and Friedberg opted to direct Date Movie (2006) themselves.[1]Date Movie opened with $12.1 million and earned $48.9 million overall.[3] Moving forward, they would direct their own scripts, leading to a long tract of parody films, spoofing major blockbusters. Disaster Movie opened with $5.8 million and earned $14.2 million total in the United States.[3]Vampires Suck, which opened on a Wednesday, earned an estimated $19.7 million in its first five days.[3]
Announced projects[edit]
Friedberg and Seltzer announced their intention to release Who the F#@K Took My Daughter?, a parody of Taken.[4] On February 8, 2017, it was reported they were developing a parody of Star Wars titled Star Worlds Episode XXXIVE=MC2: The Force Awakens The Last Jedi Who Went Rogue.[5] Filming was set for fall 2017[6], but no news has emerged since.
Filmography[edit]
| Year | Film | Directors | Producers | Writers | RT Approval Rating | Metacritic | Budget | Worldwide Gross |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1996 | Spy Hard | 8% | 25/100[7] | $18 million | $26,960,191 | |||
| 2000 | Scary Movie | 54% | 48/100[8] | $19 million | $278,019,771 | |||
| 2006 | Date Movie | 7%[9] | 11/100[10] | $20 million | $84,795,656[11] | |||
| 2007 | Epic Movie | 2%[12] | 17/100[13] | $20 million | $86,865,564[14] | |||
| 2008 | Meet the Spartans | 2%[15] | 9/100[16] | $30 million | $84,646,831[17] | |||
| Disaster Movie | 1%[18] | 15/100[19] | $20 million | $34,816,824[20] | ||||
| 2010 | Vampires Suck | 5%[21] | 18/100[22] | $20 million | $80,547,866[23] | |||
| 2013 | The Starving Games[24] | 0%[25] | $4.5 million | $3,889,688[26] | ||||
| 2014 | Best Night Ever[27] | 0%[28] | $289,511[29] | |||||
| 2015 | Superfast! | $20 million | $2,075,731[30] |
Other[edit]
| Year | Film | Notes | Budget | Worldwide Gross |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1996 | Maximum Risk | Uncredited rewrite | $25 million | $51,639,438[31] |
| 2001 | Scary Movie 2 | Based on characters created by | $45 million | $141,220,678 |
| 2003 | Scary Movie 3 | Based on characters created by; also wrote a draft[1] | $48 million | $220,673,217 |
| 2006 | Scary Movie 4 | Based on characters created by | $45 million | $178,262,620 |
| 2013 | Scary Movie 5 | Based on characters created by | $20 million | $78,378,744 |
Awards and nominations[edit]
Golden Raspberry Awards[edit]
| Year | Nominated work | Category | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | Epic Movie | Worst Prequel or Sequel('rip-off of every movie it rips off') | Nominated |
| Worst Screenplay | |||
| 2009 | Disaster Movie | Worst Picture | |
| Worst Prequel or Sequel | |||
| Worst Director | |||
| Worst Screenplay | |||
| Meet the Spartans | Worst Picture | ||
| Worst Prequel or Sequel | |||
| Worst Director | |||
| Worst Screenplay | |||
| 2011 | Vampires Suck | Worst Prequel or Sequel | |
| Worst Director | |||
| Worst Screenplay |
Recurring cast members[edit]
| Actor | Date Movie | Epic Movie | Meet the Spartans | Disaster Movie | Vampires Suck | The Starving Games | Best Night Ever | Superfast! |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Diedrich Bader | ||||||||
| Carmen Electra | ||||||||
| Adam Campbell | ||||||||
| Matt Lanter | ||||||||
| Tony Cox | ||||||||
| Ike Barinholtz | ||||||||
| Crista Flanagan | ||||||||
| Nicole Parker | ||||||||
| Jennifer Coolidge | ||||||||
| Fred Willard | ||||||||
| Jim Piddock | ||||||||
| Tad Hilgenbrink | ||||||||
| Amin Joseph | ||||||||
| Nick Steele | ||||||||
| Jareb Dauplaise | ||||||||
| John Di Domenico |
Criticism[edit]
—Korey Coleman of Spill.com, 2010.[32][dead link]
The critical reception of Friedberg and Seltzer's films has been extremely negative.[33][34]Disaster Movie and Meet the Spartans were rated the two worst films of 2008 by The Times.[35] Additionally, every film they have directed has made it into Rotten Tomatoes' 'Worst of the Worst' for the 2000s, only one scoring a spot outside of the bottom 25.[36] The pair appear more often than any other person on the fan-voted list of 'The 50 Worst Movies Ever' in noted British film magazine Empire; almost all of their films appear with a rank, and all are mentioned in the full review text.[37]
Flavorwire collectively lists the duo's entire filmography at #9 in its list of the 50 worst films of all time, saying:
You may as well lump them all together, because they all bleed together in cinematic hell: the “parody” efforts of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer[..]. They’re sad, limp affairs that have all but single-handedly reduced the “spoof movie” from parody to mere quotation: From Napoleon Dynamite to Borat to the “Leave Britney alone!” guy, no payoff delights these comic geniuses more than cutting away to the flavor of the month, presumably causing the audience to roar with laughter, smack themselves on the forehead, and exclaim, “Hot damn, how the hell’d the Kardashians end up in thar? Hyuck, hyuck!”[38]
The duo are frequent nominees of the Golden Raspberry Awards. The first was a Worst Screenplay nomination for Epic Movie at the 2007 Razzies[39] and the following year the pair were nominated for Worst Picture, Worst Director, and Worst Screenplay for both Meet the Spartans and Disaster Movie.[40] At the 2011 Razzies, Vampires Suck was nominated for Worst Picture, Worst Director, Worst Screenplay, and Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-Off or Sequel.
Irregular verbs list printable version. Critic Josh Levin of Slate commented that 'Friedberg and Seltzer..are not filmmakers. They are evildoers, charlatans, symbols of Western civilization's decline..'[41] Josh Rosenblatt of The Austin Chronicle said that 'Writer/directors Friedberg and Seltzer are a scourge. They're a plague on our cinematic landscape, a national shame, a danger to our culture, a typhoon-sized natural disaster disguised as a filmmaking team, a Hollywood monster wreaking havoc on the minds of America's youth and setting civilization back thousands of years.'[42] Austin critic and animator Korey Coleman, of Spill.com and Double Toasted, has claimed that he is 'bothered' by the duo's films, as he believes they are dumbing down the film industry and popular culture in general.[32]
Critic Nathan Rabin also gave their work an indignant condemnation, calling them 'comedy antichrists'[43] and saying about their films:
'Spoof movies, as practiced by the cultural blight that is Seltzer-Friedberg, aren't just troubling from an aesthetic viewpoint. They're horrifying from a moral standpoint as well. The parody of the Zucker brothers and Mel Brooks is defined by love, knowledge, and appreciation: The Zucker brothers and Mel Brooks love, know, and appreciate the source material they're spoofing enough to get all the details perfect. The comedy of Seltzer-Friedberg, in sharp contrast, is defined by contempt: contempt for the attention span, intelligence, maturity, and frame of reference for the audience, and an even more raging contempt for the source material they're spoofing. Friedberg and Seltzer aren't writers; they're comic terrorists who cavalierly destroy what others create for their own ugly self-interest. Their success is entirely dependent on making comedy a dumber, crasser, less dignified place.[44]
References[edit]
- ^ abcdPatches, Matt (January 31, 2014). 'Surely They Can't Be Serious? - The unlikely rise of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, Hollywood's majorly hated, hugely successful kings of the modern-day spoof'. Grantland.com. Retrieved February 2, 2014.
- ^https://soundcloud.com/thechamps/shawn-marlon-wayans-1
- ^ abcStewart, Andrew (2010-08-22). ''Expendables' tops crowded B.O'. Variety.
- ^Tartaglione, Nancy (May 15, 2014). 'Cannes: Spoof Specialists Take On 'Taken' With 'Who The F#@k Took My Daughter?''. Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved February 8, 2017.
- ^Chitwood, Adam (February 8, 2017). ''Star Wars' Spoof in the Works from 'Epic Movie' and 'Meet the Spartans' Filmmakers'. Retrieved February 8, 2017.
- ^McNary, Dave (February 8, 2017). ''Star Wars' Spoof 'Star Worlds' in the Works From 'Scary Movie' Duo'. Variety. Retrieved February 8, 2017.
- ^'Spy Hard on Metacritic'. Retrieved 2011-08-12.
- ^'Scary Movie on Metacritic'. Retrieved 2011-08-12.
- ^'Date Movie on RT'. Retrieved 2010-07-10.
- ^'Date Movie on Metacritic'. Retrieved 2010-08-28.
- ^'Date Movie on Box Office Mojo'. Retrieved 2010-10-14.
- ^'Epic Movie on RT'. Retrieved 2010-07-10.
- ^'Epic Movie on Metacritic'. Retrieved 2010-08-28.
- ^'Epic Movie on Box Office Mojo'. Retrieved 2010-10-14.
- ^'Meet the Spartans on RT'. Retrieved 2010-07-10.
- ^'Meet the Spartans on Metacritic'. Retrieved 2010-08-28.
- ^'Meet the Spartans on Box Office Mojo'. Retrieved 2010-10-14.
- ^'Disaster Movie on RT'. Retrieved 2010-07-10.
- ^'Disaster Movie on Metacritic'. Retrieved 2010-08-28.
- ^'Disaster Movie on Box Office Mojo'. Retrieved 2010-10-13.
- ^'Vampires Suck on RT'. Retrieved 2010-08-26.
- ^'Vampires Suck on Metacritic'. Retrieved 2010-08-28.
- ^'Vampires Suck'. Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2010-10-13.
- ^'Hunger Games Gets the Scary Movie Treatment'. 2012-05-10.
- ^'The Starving Games on RT'. Retrieved 2013-11-17.
- ^'The Starving Games (2013) - International Box Office Results - Box Office Mojo'. Retrieved 2014-09-24.
- ^'Best Night Ever (2014)'. IMDb.com. Retrieved 2014-02-20.
- ^'Best Night Ever on RT'. Rottentomatoes.com. Retrieved 2014-03-04.
- ^'Best Night Ever (2014) - International Box Office Results - Box Office Mojo'. Retrieved 2014-09-24.
- ^Superfast! -- Box Office Mojo
- ^'Maximum Risk'. The Numbers. Retrieved 2015-02-06.
- ^ abVampires Suck Audio Review Spill.comArchived July 28, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
- ^Catsoulis, Jeannette (2008-01-26). 'Doing Battle on the Field of Parody'. The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-05-05.
- ^Scott, A. O. (2007-01-27). 'Bravely Setting Out to Mock Others'. The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-05-05.
- ^The 100 Worst Movies of 2008 The Times Accessed 12-12-08
- ^'Worst of the Worst 2009 – Fear Dot Com'. Rotten Tomatoes. Archived from the original on 2010-02-10. Retrieved 2010-08-09.
- ^Helen O'Hara; Alastair Plumb; Phil De Semlyen (2010-01-29). 'The 50 Worst Movies Ever'. Empire Magazine. Retrieved 2010-02-01.
- ^'The 50 Worst Movies Ever Made'. Flavorwire. 2014-09-17. Retrieved 2019-03-20.
- ^John Wilson (2008-01-21). 'Razzies – 2007 Nominees for Worst Screenplay'. Razzie Awards. Archived from the original on 2009-01-26. Retrieved 2009-01-22.
- ^John Wilson (2009-01-21). 'RAZZIES.COM 2008 Nominations'. Razzie Awards. Retrieved 2009-01-22.
- ^Levin, Josh (2008-08-28). 'Yet another terrible spoof movie from Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. – By Josh Levin – Slate Magazine'. Slate.com. Retrieved 2010-08-09.
- ^'Film Listings'. AustinChronicle.com. 2008-09-05. Retrieved 2010-08-09.
- ^Rabin, Nathan. 'Superhero Movie'. Film. Retrieved 2019-02-26.
- ^Rabin, Nathan (2013-01-29). 'The surreally incompetent Not Another Not Another Movie is beneath contempt · Dispatches From Direct To DVD Purgatory · The A.V. Club'. Avclub.com. Retrieved 2014-02-20.
External links[edit]
- Jason Friedberg on IMDb
- Aaron Seltzer on IMDb