Baghead
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''Baghead'' is a 2008
comedy horror Comedy horror, also known as horror comedy, is a literary genre, literary, television genre, television, and film genre that combines elements of comedy and horror fiction. Comedy horror has been described as able to be categorized under three ty ...
film written and directed by
Jay A jay is a member of a number of species of medium-sized, usually colorful and noisy, passerine birds in the Crow family, Corvidae. The evolutionary relationships between the jays and the magpies are rather complex. For example, the Eurasian m ...
and
Mark Duplass Mark David Duplass (born December 7, 1976) is an American filmmaker, actor, writer, and musician. With his brother Jay Duplass, he started the film production company Duplass Brothers Productions in 1996. Duplass has written and directed films, ...
. The film stars Ross Partridge, Elise Muller,
Greta Gerwig Greta Celeste Gerwig (; born August 4, 1983) is an American actress, screenwriter, and director. She first garnered attention after working on and appearing in several mumblecore films. Between 2006 and 2009, she appeared in a number of films b ...
, and
Steve Zissis Steve Zissis ( el, Στηβ Ζήσης; born December 17, 1975) is an American actor, writer and producer. A longtime friend of Jay and Mark Duplass, he has appeared in and co-produced some of their productions, including the films ''Baghead'' (2 ...
. The film had its world premiere at the
Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,66 ...
on January 22, 2008. The film was given a
limited release __FORCETOC__ Limited theatrical release is a film distribution strategy of releasing a new film in a few theaters across a country, typically art house theaters in major metropolitan markets. Since 1994, a limited theatrical release in the Unite ...
by
Sony Pictures Classics Sony Pictures Classics Inc. is an American film production and distribution company that is a division of Sony Pictures. It was founded in 1992 by former Orion Classics heads Michael Barker, Tom Bernard and Marcie Bloom. It distributes, produc ...
on July 13, 2008.


Plot

Four actors – Matt ( Ross Partridge), Catherine (Elise Muller), Michelle (
Greta Gerwig Greta Celeste Gerwig (; born August 4, 1983) is an American actress, screenwriter, and director. She first garnered attention after working on and appearing in several mumblecore films. Between 2006 and 2009, she appeared in a number of films b ...
), and Chad (
Steve Zissis Steve Zissis ( el, Στηβ Ζήσης; born December 17, 1975) is an American actor, writer and producer. A longtime friend of Jay and Mark Duplass, he has appeared in and co-produced some of their productions, including the films ''Baghead'' (2 ...
) – attend an art festival and watch a low-budget movie directed by Jett (Jett Garner). After the showing, Jett explains to them that he kept the budget so low by not telling his actors they were in a movie until the final piece was ready. The group then goes to an after party; however, Matt is unable to gain entry into the club after not wanting to appear desperate by asking his old friend Jett to get him in. The four actors go to a different bar, where they decide to go to Chad's isolated cabin in the woods to write their own movie to star in, since they were fed up having only been cast as extras. After arriving at the cabin, Michelle gets drunk and decides to go to bed, whereupon Chad hits on her, although she rejects his advances, telling him he is like a brother. Later, Michelle rushes outside of the cabin to vomit, where she encounters a man with a bag over his head. The next morning, Michelle believes this to have been a dream and decides to tell the others in the hopes of creating a horror movie based around the character 'baghead'. At night, the group gathers to brainstorm ideas. Michelle writes several notes to Matt to meet her in her room, before she goes to bed. While in her room, a figure wearing a bag over the head enters. At first, Michelle believes it to be Matt, but she becomes increasingly uncomfortable before the figure eventually leaves. Upset, Michelle confronts Matt, who denies it was him, leading the pair to believe it was perhaps instead Catherine trying to scare Michelle, because she is jealous of her connection with Matt. Catherine also denies the accusations and angrily leaves the cabin to smoke a cigarette, while Matt convinces Michelle to stay at the cabin. The following morning, Chad wakes up Matt and Michelle and says he cannot find Catherine. Chad then quickly learns of Michelle's advances on Matt, and upset he too leaves the cabins, only for his screams to be heard minutes later. Matt and Michelle find his ripped
t-shirt A T-shirt (also spelled tee shirt), or tee, is a style of fabric shirt named after the T shape of its body and sleeves. Traditionally, it has short sleeves and a round neckline, known as a ''crew neck'', which lacks a collar. T-shirts are general ...
in the woods, but believe it to be a prank and so go back to the cabin. Michelle again advances on Matt, but feeling bad for Chad, Matt goes upstairs where he is attacked by figures wearing bags over their heads, revealed to be Chad and Catherine getting revenge for the romance between Matt and Michelle. Later, as night falls, the group hangs out before Matt and Chad see a figure through the window. The group investigates outside and finds their car has been disabled before apparently encountering the actual "baghead" figure. Matt and Chad attempt to attack him, but upon seeing he has a knife, the members of the group flee into the cabin, and they barricade themselves in until morning. The following day, the group decides to hike the to the nearest freeway. After hours of walking, the group becomes lost in the woods before stumbling upon an abandoned car. As Chad is about to break a window to get in, "baghead" appears and chases the group through the woods. Matt is caught and stabbed to death in front of the others. Catherine and Michelle reach the freeway and attempt to flag down a car, but it continues to drive on past them. Chad emerges from the woods further up the road and is subsequently hit by the car as it swerves to miss the girls. Catherine and Michelle help the unconscious Chad into the truck before Matt emerges from the woods uninjured and "baghead" is revealed to be Jett. Sometime later at the hospital, Chad awakens distraught over Matt's death. Catherine and Michelle explain to him that Matt and Jett orchestrated the whole thing and had been secretly filming them to create a movie. Chad demands to see Matt and asks him to see the
footage In filmmaking and video production, footage is raw, unedited material as originally filmed by a movie camera or recorded by a ( often special) video camera, which typically must be edited to create a motion picture, video clip, television show or ...
. After watching, Chad tells Matt that they should edit it down and take it to a
film festival A film festival is an organized, extended presentation of films in one or more cinemas or screening venues, usually in a single city or region. Increasingly, film festivals show some films outdoors. Films may be of recent date and, depending upon ...
, as he believes it will be a success.


Cast

* Ross Partridge as Matt *Elise Muller as Catherine *
Greta Gerwig Greta Celeste Gerwig (; born August 4, 1983) is an American actress, screenwriter, and director. She first garnered attention after working on and appearing in several mumblecore films. Between 2006 and 2009, she appeared in a number of films b ...
as Michelle *
Steve Zissis Steve Zissis ( el, Στηβ Ζήσης; born December 17, 1975) is an American actor, writer and producer. A longtime friend of Jay and Mark Duplass, he has appeared in and co-produced some of their productions, including the films ''Baghead'' (2 ...
as Chad *Jett Garner as Jett


Release

The film had its world premiere at the
Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,66 ...
on January 22, 2008. Shortly after it was announced
Sony Pictures Classics Sony Pictures Classics Inc. is an American film production and distribution company that is a division of Sony Pictures. It was founded in 1992 by former Orion Classics heads Michael Barker, Tom Bernard and Marcie Bloom. It distributes, produc ...
had acquired distribution rights to the film. The film went on to premiere at
SXSW South by Southwest, abbreviated as SXSW and colloquially referred to as South By, is an annual conglomeration of parallel film, interactive media, and music festivals and conferences organized jointly that take place in mid-March in Austin, Te ...
on March 9, 2008. and the
Tribeca Film Festival The Tribeca Festival is an annual film festival organized by TriBeCa Productions, Tribeca Productions. It takes place each spring in New York City, showcasing a diverse selection of film, episodic, talks, music, games, art, and immersive progra ...
on April 26, 2008. The film was released in a
limited release __FORCETOC__ Limited theatrical release is a film distribution strategy of releasing a new film in a few theaters across a country, typically art house theaters in major metropolitan markets. Since 1994, a limited theatrical release in the Unite ...
in the
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
on July 13, 2008. The film had its Latin American premiere at the
Mar del Plata Film Festival The Mar del Plata International Film Festival ( es, Festival Internacional de Cine de Mar del Plata) is an international film festival that takes place every November in the city of Mar del Plata, Argentina. It is the only competitive feature fest ...
on November 6, 2008. and the European Premiere at the Hamburg Film Festival in September 2009.


Reception

The film received mostly positive reviews from Duane Byrge (''
The Hollywood Reporter ''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...
''), Bill Weber (''
Slant Magazine ''Slant Magazine'' is an American online publication that features reviews of movies, music, TV, DVDs, theater, and video games, as well as interviews with actors, directors, and musicians. The site covers various film festivals like the New York ...
''), Peter Debruge (''
Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'') and
Ty Burr Ty Burr (born August 17, 1957) is an American film critic, columnist, and author who currently writes a film and popular culture newsletter "Ty Burr's Watchlist" on Substack. Burr previously served as film critic at ''The Boston Globe'' for two ...
(
The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
). It also received two "See It"s from Michael Phillips and
Richard Roeper Richard E. Roeper (born October 17, 1959) is an American columnist and film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times''. He co-hosted the television series '' At the Movies'' with Roger Ebert from 2000 to 2008, serving as the late Gene Siskel's success ...
during '' At the Movies''. On
review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...
website
Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
the film holds a 79% approval rating, based on 99 reviews with an average rating of 6.6/10. The site's consensus reads, "Pitting actors against murderers in a self-aware struggle for stardom, ''Baghead'' successfully skates the borders of horror and comedy." On
Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, ''Baghead'' have a rank of 62 out of a 100 based on 23 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Todd Gilchrist of ''
IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
'', while attending
Los Angeles Film Festival The LA Film Festival was an annual film festival that was held in Los Angeles, California, and usually took place in June. It showcased independent, international, feature, documentary and short films, as well as web series, music videos, episod ...
in 2008, wrote: "Mumblecore makes its first horror film with this indie opus". Dana Stevens of ''
Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...
'' magazine compared the film to early works by
John Sayles John Thomas Sayles (born September 28, 1950) is an American independent film director, screenwriter, editor, actor, and novelist. He has twice been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, for ''Passion Fish'' (1992) and ''L ...
and
Eric Rohmer The given name Eric, Erich, Erikk, Erik, Erick, or Eirik is derived from the Old Norse name ''Eiríkr'' (or ''Eríkr'' in Old East Norse due to monophthongization). The first element, ''ei-'' may be derived from the older Proto-Norse ''* ain ...
. ''
The Village Voice ''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture paper, known for being the country's first alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Mailer, the ''Voice'' began as a platform for the crea ...
''s
Robert Wilonsky Robert Elliott Wilonsky (born October 24, 1968) is an American journalist, and the former host of ''Higher Definition'', an interview program on the cable television network HDNet. Biography Early life Wilonsky was born in Dallas, Texas to Marg ...
, said that "
he film He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
better in its first half, when it pokes gentle fun at the film festival circuit where ''Baghead'' asbeen stretching its legs since its debut at Sundance in January". The DVD release of the film got a score of 8 out of 10 by Christopher Monfette of ''IGN'' who called the film "A first-rate horror/comedy mash-up" and " scary, charming, funny, frightening must-scene indie flick".


See also

*
Mumblecore Mumblecore is a subgenre of independent filmHoberman, J. (August 14, 2007).It's Mumblecore!. ''The Village Voice''. Retrieved on July 27, 2008.Lim, Dennis (August 19, 2007)Mumblecore – The New Talkies: Generation DIY ''The New York Times''. Retr ...
* Mumblegore


References


External links

* * *
Interview with Mark and Jay Duplass
at ''
Cinefantastique ''Cinefantastique'' is an American horror, fantasy, and science fiction film magazine. History The magazine originally started as a mimeographed fanzine in 1967, then relaunched as a glossy, offset printed quarterly in 1970 by publisher/editor ...
'' {{Jay and Mark Duplass 2008 comedy horror films American comedy horror films American independent films Sony Pictures Classics films Duplass Brothers Productions films 2008 comedy films 2008 films 2000s English-language films 2000s American films 2008 independent films