Coup de Cinema is about a group of filmmakers at a production company hijacking the film they’re all working on because “man, does it ever suck and we’re tired of making crappy films, so let’s heist it to make it not of the suck”. Sounded fun – film within a film, deliberately bad acting because the film they’re originally working on is so god awful – good stuff! It ended up being pretty cute too – totes adorbs as I like to say. There were a few less cute moments, however, that weighed it down a bit.

A film crew hijacks their company’s current production and improves it behind the director’s back.

How dare you suggest we would heist your movie? We call shenanigans!

Let’s start with the good:

• Buster Owens is the BEST. He’s the guy in the red jacket vest thing up above and he is my favorite character here. The actor is wonderful and his character is…honest, for a lack of a better way to put it. He rings true. Totes love him.
• I love how this film conveys the sense of fun & passion involved in film-making. You need both to make a film and this has it in spades. I also enjoyed the involvement of the pretentious assholes because, man, do you run across those in the film/theatre community. The representation of film-making is pretty spot on is what I’m saying.
• The film within a film is HILARIOUS. Like, I’m not entirely sure what the plot is but it involves some Indiana Jones-ish character, a damsel in distress, ninjas (I think?), a jungle, and terrible dialogue. I would SO watch that movie.
• The director of the original terrible movie is so delightfully clueless and arrogant. He has some great one-liners – “maybe it’s not working because they’re in an evergreen forest in winter and they’re supposed to be in a jungle?”…Director: “no. no, that’s not it”.

I am the best character in this movie. K, thx, bai

Now, for the not necessarily bad, but things I liked less:

• One character starts out sounding distinctly NOT Scottish, but by the end is very Scottish?? Am unsure if my hearing has gone to shit or if that was a thing. While confusing, I definitely enjoyed his later accent.
• At one point, the heisting crews’ video files all get deleted from the computer. They go to great lengths to recover it (stalking & a foot chase around town), but I couldn’t help thinking “Why don’t they just recover it from the computer itself? Nothing is ever truly gone, even if you delete it. That would’ve been way less work.”
• There are definitely some silly elements happening in this film, none more so than the ending. The melodrama is laid on thick and it was a little much. As much of a dick as the clueless director was, what he does at the end seems a bit over the top and not entirely in character? And then everything is resolved fairly quickly which is a bit unrealistic. “Aww, you just tried to commit violence at me? It’s cool, man. Totes.” is basically what happened.
• I hate the main character, Miles. I legitimately and adamantly did not like him. He’s an asshole. What made me dislike him most though was the running theme of him liking a friend of his. I have no idea if this was his best friend or a former girlfriend or a new friend – that wasn’t clear. What was clear was that he dug her, heisted the movie to impress her, and was a total jerk to her. Not only did he throw a tantrum when he found out she had a boyfriend and didn’t like him (seriously grow tf up dude) but he was kind of a jerk to her the whole time. He insulted her livelihood, ffs. I wouldn’t go out with him either.
• The whole “Miles likes his friend” plotline felt entirely unnecessary. It didn’t add anything to the film; it was kind of distracting tbh. We kept getting scenes every once in awhile of them talking awkwardly on the phone and it took away from the actual heist story. I don’t know if it was just used so she could be the catalyst for Miles wanting to heist the film in the first place, but I think there could have easily been another catalyst that fit into the overarching themes much more smoothly. I think Miles being “what the actual bloody hell kind of films is this production company making? Oh god, oh god, my eyes.” was really reason enough to heist a film to make it better.

Not interested, dude. You’re kinda a jerk.

So. Overall, Coup de Cinema is a fun film. It had a lot going on for it, but there were definitely elements that needed some work. The majority of the characters were a blast, Buster Owens is a doll, and I’m glad I watched it. Just, maybe next time make the main character a bit more likeable.

The film is currently on Amazon Prime Video, so you can watch it for FREE! Go on, hop on over and check it out. (Just be sure to yell at Miles a lot like I did. ;))