Get Shorty (1995)
Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld
Chili Palmer is a Miami mobster who gets sent to L.A. to collect a bad debt from Harry Zimm, a Hollywood producer who specializes in cheesy horror films. When Chili meets Harry's leading lady, the romantic sparks fly. After pitching his own life story as a movie idea, Chili learns that being a mobster and being a Hollywood producer really aren't all that different.
7 connections found
View:
7 films that influenced Get Shorty
What critics say influenced Get Shorty
Travolta, who has been working up a movie idea of his own, and has a near-encyclopedic recall of great movies (from Orson Welles's "Touch of Evil" to "Rio Lobo"), smells a great opportunity.
It pays homage to scrappy "B" movies, Orson Welles' great noir Touch of Evil, and the films of Howard Hawks (Rio Bravo), who no doubt would have been the first one to enjoy Get Shorty.
At one point, he takes in a screening of Orson Welles's "Touch of Evil," and the boyish delight he gets from its climax suddenly makes him look 20 years younger.
It pays homage to scrappy "B" movies, Orson Welles' great noir Touch of Evil, and the films of Howard Hawks (Rio Bravo), who no doubt would have been the first one to enjoy Get Shorty.
"Pulp Fiction" meets "The Player" could be the subtitle for "Get Shorty", but it all goes to proves that Travolta's success is deserved.
Take a heady dose of "The Player," with guffaws instead of snickers, add a little "L.A. Story" and throw in some "Married to the Mob," and you might end up with something almost like "Get Shorty."
He has made a small jewel: a film that demonstrates, to our amazement, that even the Hollywood characters in " The Player " were not quite at the bottom of the barrel.
Take a heady dose of "The Player," with guffaws instead of snickers, add a little "L.A. Story" and throw in some "Married to the Mob," and you might end up with something almost like "Get Shorty."
Advertisement
Although Leonard's gonzo novel predated the movie work of Quentin Tarantino, it's hard not to recognize the debt (in terms of gangster atmosphere and repartee, and hip soundtrack songs) that director Sonnenfeld (who made "The Addams Family") and screenwriter Scott Frank owe to "Reservoir Dogs" and "Pulp Fiction."
Harry says the would-be movie is his "Driving Miss Daisy," but he's too financially strapped to make it.
"Get Shorty" was directed by Barry Sonnenfeld , a former cinematographer (" Miller's Crossing ," " Misery ") who directed the two Addams Family movies.