Fired!

Annabelle Gurwitch is a character actress/comedienne who is not quite a household name (unless that household has watched TBS' "Dinner & A Movie" for the last decade), but has still crafted herself a more successful career than most in her field. Her name may not be well known, but the average movie goer or TV watcher probably see her and think, "Oh yeah, she was in 'The Cable Guy'!" or "Wasn't she in that Marisa Tomei episode of 'Seinfeld'?". Needless to say, she has made a career playing supporting roles, but has not yet to my knowledge taken on a lead role, or even made her own documentary.

For starters, she does pretty well with "Fired", a documentary that begins with her being fired from a Woody Allen play and expands itself from there. Gurwitch starts out by saying that being hired for a Woody Allen production is every actor's dream (which it probably is). The scene that comes next is of course inevitable given the title of the documentary, but still painful to hear. Naturally, Allen didn't make a cameo in this scene, but the Woody Allen stand in, the voice-over sound-alike, and Gurwitch's realistic reactions to Allen's supposed words were powerful elements to start this documentary off right.

From there, Gurwitch interviews a number of celebrities and asks them about the times they were fired, and so goes the rest of the film. Some of the insights are very funny, others are reassuring, and then there are some which fall a bit flat. I thought Gurwitch picked some great people to interview, such as Jeff Garlin and Tim Allen. The shots of Paul F. Tompkins and Illeanna Douglass performing live on stage were also good add-ins, and they were very funny.

With these commentaries, though, came the shifting of focus as to what this documentary was actually about. The documentary's subject was about the pain of being fired. Given how Gurwitch claimed to have been fired (i.e. because Woody Allen didn't think she was a good enough actress, not because of what she did), one would think the film would focus around how people were let go of their jobs despite their best efforts. However, as the film went on, you could see that some of the people being interviewed talked about how they got themselves fired intentionally from jobs they hated. That case was especially true for Andy Dick.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: there should be a rule in film-making textbooks that if you put Andy Dick in a movie, there is a high probability it will suck. Andy Dick is not a good comedian, and is famous more for his outrageous (and often times off-putting) antics, drug use, sketchy behavior, and overall arrogance. Any employers who fired him were probably as annoyed by him as the members of SNL who blame him for Phil Hartman's death (as he allegedly supplied Hartman's wife with the supply of heroin that would ultimately be her last). His presence alone contributes nothing to this documentary.

Furthermore, the documentary loses itself to the subject of factory workers and others being laid off, and echos more of Michael Moore than Gurwitch probably intended to do. However, watching this after the recent stock market crash that led the U.S. into a recession, there is some really eerie truth that comes from the interviewed economists (including Ben Stein) which members of the Bush White House probably should have listened to before.

Above all, though, the documentary was pretty good. If there's anything to take away from it moral-wise, it's that being fired from anything is not the end of the world. Of course, any career service office could tell you that, but it's good to hear from moderately successful entertainers too. I just wish the movie would have ended with how Gurwitch herself moved on from such a career speedbump, and what kinds of projects she has coming up. It also would have been good to hear more about what she had accomplished before the Woody Allen incident for many moviegoers who don't know.

I recommend this movie for its entertainment value and for bringing up a subject more than a few people have experienced (myself included). I find myself torn between giving this film 6 or 7 stars, but I will give it seven stars since I enjoyed watching it.

Fired! (2007)

** (out of 4)

After being fired from a play by Woody Allen, actress Annabelle Gurwitch turned the experience into a stage play as well as this documentary that takes a look at what it's like to be fired. Gurwitch tells her story and we get appearances from other famous people who share their stories of being let go from their jobs. Some of these people include Tim Allen, Andy Dick (shock), Illeana Douglas, Sarah Silverman, Fred Willard, Andy Borowitz, Fisher Stevens, Jeffrey Ross and Richard kind. I think there might have been a good idea somewhere in the story but sadly FIRED! isn't nearly as funny or charming as it thinks it is. I think there are several problems with the biggest one being that the film bounces back and forth between silly, over-the-top comedy and then it tries to take some sort of serious look at being fired. At just 72-minutes the film seems to go on even longer because we get some pretty boring and silly scenes like when Gurwitch is talking to her Rabbi about being fired by Woody Allen and we get another bit where she talks to a grief councilor. Towards the end of the film we start to get more dramatic tellings including the issues in Detroit where thousands of people have lost their jobs to save companies money yet the companies give their CEOs raises. The entire film just feels very uneven and the mix and comedy and drama doesn't work. Plus, it doesn't help that the majority of the time the comedy doesn't work. We basically get celebrities talking about what they did to get fired and while watching most of them I kept asking myself why I should care. Even the main story, Gurwitch getting fired, seems to be a forced issue because if it wasn't Woody Allen who fired her then she really wouldn't have a story or a message. It's because she got fired by a famous person that allowed her to make this. It's too bad she couldn't have interviewed Allen.

This entertaining, informative documentary takes the concept of "something good coming out of a negative situation" to the max: Annabelle Gurwitch was fired from a play by none other than Woody Allen, and rather than moving to Las Vegas and drinking herself to death, she decided to turn the experience into art.

The film cleverly opens and closes in the style of a Woody Allen movie, complete with jazz music and his trademark stark black and white credits. In between, many "real life" people and celebs appear, some of them onstage in a production that Gurwitch created, and some in interview form, sharing their tortured stories of being canned from their positions, in show biz and otherwise, and who hasn't been fired at some point in their lives?

The movie is funny - the best comedy, after all, does come out of pain; humor, as we all realize, is one of the most effective coping mechanisms known to mankind - but the movie is more than merely amusing, it has depth. While not overtly political or heavy-handed like a Michael Moore joint, Gurwitch does include interviews with people who were fired by GM "through no fault of their own" - corporate restructuring crap - and government layoffs are included as well. This isn't a profound movie by any stretch, but it does have some good insights from real people about what it means to be out of a job.

Annabelle Gurwitch has a certain amount of sadsack charm, but that's not enough to carry an entire film that is mostly about comedians and other performers who regale us with their ever-so-funny experiences about getting fired.

This is a one-trick pony of a film that somehow pretends to have much deeper import -- i.e. 'downsizing in America,' which is a truly devastating problem affecting many millions of people in the U.S. and other Western countries. It's isn't light-hearted hilarity to be driven to the sidelines of society, perhaps never to return.

I think Gurwitch means well, but I kept wondering how many of the stories in this film were actual or imagined. Call me cynical (which I am, of course), but performers are trained (and paid) to be 'on,' to pretend they're someone else.

There's too much 'padding' in this film. The segments with the truly irritating Andy Dick, as just one example, should have been excised or at least shortened. Somebody, somewhere, once told Dick that he was funny and, alas, he took it seriously. And I've never seen Fred Willard, Jeff Garlin and Harry Shearer so UNfunny. How is that possible?

Nice try anyway.

I took a chance on watching this documentary and it was well worth it. Admittedly, the first 20 minutes (out of 72) are a bit dull, but then it picks up significantly.

The experiences, insights and perspectives from those who have been fired were fascinating. Although most of the interviewees are from the movie industry, their openness and humor provided universal insight and comfort that can be appreciated by all. Plus, there were some great segments with a former human resource manager, executive placement director, various politicians, and others.

Since all most everyone in the film is discussing past (vs. current) situations, it was uplifting to see that "being fired" is a simple fact of life and that people routinely go through this experience and continue onwards. There were also quite a number of insightful thoughts and "words of wisdom" that come across.

Now, the show was not quite "perfect" - there was time wasted on watching people like "Andy Dick" and Richard Kind act zany. However, I think this movie is definitely worth watching if you are curious about the subject of firing.