Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure

I saw this documentary at the Traverse City (MI) Film Festival. Two Midwestern college grads move to California in 1987, only to find that their new apartment has a pair of profane, arguing drunks living next door. After being awakened repeatedly by their new neighbors' rants, the guys start audio taping the fights. Eventually they collect dozens of hours of material, share bits with their friends, and an underground sensation begins. Tapes, comic strips, a play, and even a puppet show depicting Peter and Ray, the fighting neighbors, emerged throughout the 90's. At one point 3 competing movie productions were planning films about the couple.

The first 30 minutes or so of the doc sets up the scenario and lays the background to the story. It is this part, when we are first introduced to the vulgar fighting couple, where the movie is at its best. Unfortunately the film can't sustain the humor and energy from the first third of the film, as we follow the legal battle to determine who has the rights to the recordings. The film ends with the college guys returning to the scene of their recordings, 20+ years later, and investigating what has happened to their old neighbors. Still, I found the story engrossing and interesting enough to sustain my attention through the second half of the film. The movie is entertaining, but if you're easily offended by profanity look elsewhere!

In the end, this movie felt like an excuse to milk the tapes for a little more fame and/or money.

The first 2/3rds nicely chronicle how the whole phenomenon took place. And it truly is fascinating. You get a sense of how strange, serendipitous and organic it must have been to have a personal project turn into a meme.

But the key word is "organic". Other people drove the Pete and Ray story. The partners, correctly, said "go ahead" since, in effect, it wasn't really theirs to control.

It's when they take control that movie inadvertently reveals that, rather than a sweet, hapless pair that fell into something, they've staked their identities on this one thing and they've become kind of self-important assholes.

When Eddie Lee made proclamations about "art" my first thought was - "Really? What other art have you created? Because an artist normally creates more than one piece of art and all you did was tape some guys screaming at each other. Other people picked it up and turned it into something. Duping tapes and giving them to people...well...that's not really art." After that, the pair goes on a quest to do the one thing that art should never do - explain itself. Tracking down Ray, the roommate, felt like a stunt. It was a fishing trip to solve the riddle of whether Pete and Ray were lovers. That's dull and pointless.

Art, imho, allows people to project themselves into and onto what they see. These two, Eddie in particular, seem to want to prove something that doesn't need to be proved. Wrapping up the film with the Pete and Ray dancing sucks everything that's interesting about the relationship out of it.

It may actually be a plus that the director takes no moral viewpoint about the material, but it is disturbing that no one really sees the ugly moral, if not legal, ramifications of the exploitation of the two drunks. Yes, it is difficult not to laugh at any colorful alcoholic, as comedians have alway known, and the recent suppression of such humor may only add the laughs we are indulging in when we hear these two.

The pranksters, of course, went way past that and harassed them with prank calls, still, it could have been viewed as edgy, if caustic, humor. Those who went crazy for this stuff, however, are the type of people who kick a cripple, and watching the attempts to turn this fad into a big Hollywood payoff is car wreck time, you want to look away but you can't.

It's funny that the identity of the big name comic who wanted to do the movie is protected, the two losers are granted no such compassion or dignity. Indeed, the director displays no real interest in them other than as push pin dolls for comic derision. Who were they, really, and how did they get to such a desperate state of life? To ask these questions might have spoiled the fun of deriding them.

The story of Raymond and Peter, mean drunks and awful roommates whose constant shouting matches - committed to tape by frustrated neighbors - made them an unwitting, unsuspecting pair of underground celebrities. Like the thematically-similar Winnebago Man, the quest to learn more about these clueless cult legends is much more rewarding than what's actually at the end of the trail. While the focus hovers on revisiting the tapes, hearing the men who recorded them reminisce about the glory days, and watching dozens of talking heads throw on a headset and burst into genuine fits of laughter, it's a light, cheery smile a minute. Later, when the inherent humor of the material begins to run out, the whole picture begins to look downright pathetic. Hearing about the legal struggles that surrounded the story's film rights, witnessing the self-important ruminations of the guys who held the mic, seeing how confused and flabbergasted Peter was about the phenomenon, captured on film years later... these actually take away from what made the tapes so enjoyable in the first place. As a momentary distraction, an escape from the mundane to voyeuristically laugh at the worst state of the human condition, the tapes are in their element and at their best. This level of over-inspection only rubs away the veneer and many of the laughs.

It's difficult to believe that simple recordings of unorthodox arguments had the ability to go viral in the 1980's. It may seem unfathomable, but Tribeca's new documentary Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure assures us that it happened. In 1987, two young punks named Eddie Lee Sausage and Mitchell "Mitchell D" Deprey moved into a bright pink, low rent apartment (eventually coined the "Pepto Bismol Palace") and were consistently bothered by their next door neighbors loud, inane arguments that would happen throughout hours of the night.

The neighbors were apparently on a life long welfare and alcohol binge. They were bigoted and homophobic Raymond Huffman and openly homosexual Peter Haskett. Though it appears them living together was a contradiction in itself, sources claim that the two were close friends when sober. Which, as we can assume from watching the film, wasn't too often.

Peter and Raymond would argue like a married couple, using profanity so explicit it may be questioned why they weren't thrown out. They would exchange insults back in forth with Peter usually yelling "shut up, little man!" at Raymond. After growing weary of the yelling, and after an attempt to stop them did not work, Eddie and Mitchell decided to tie a microphone to a ski pole and raise it out the window so they could record their neighbors' mindless rants for their personal record. They recorded them to a cassette tape, and the newly discovered mechanism of evidence and defense eventually became used for enjoyment and curiosity. They continued doing it for the logical reason of human nature; to see how far they would go next time. The result makes for a surprisingly entertaining documentary. Just like the documentaries F**k and Winnebago Man, it proves that the topic of swearing, if taken seriously and effectively, will produce a very interesting breed of films.

What makes this documentary so interesting was it shows how things went viral before computers. What if the "Shut Up Little Man" recordings had Youtube under their belt? They would've spread uncontrollably, but due to the primitive technology, it took longer for them to be heard.

The film was made for two major reasons; the first being because, at one time, three separate films from three separate groups were trying to make a film on this subject, including Eddie and Mitchell, and all were rejected or stuck in development hell. And the second reason because one big question lingers over Eddie and Mitchell's heads "do they owe Peter and Raymond anything?" Both men died in the nineties, but is it fair to market their recordings for a profit without giving them something in return? It's a little late, but the duo do the best they can to try and make amends. This involves tracking down a third member of some of the infamous recordings. To say what happens when they meet him would be criminal. Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure is funny, engaging, and genial. There's nothing to really be biased about, which is why I believe the documentary didn't feel like a burden at all. Just like with Winnebago Man, things could've quickly spiraled into a whirlpool of mindless swearing and inconsistencies. Luckily enough, the film doesn't get preoccupied with ridiculous, directionless comments which is a lot more than can be said about some of the actual recordings.

Starring: Eddie Lee Sausage and Mitchell Deprey. Directed by: Matthew Bate.