Inserts (film)
Encyclopedia
Inserts is a 1975 British film, written and directed by John Byrum
while he was in his twenties, and starring Richard Dreyfuss
, Jessica Harper
, Bob Hoskins
and Veronica Cartwright
. Featuring full-frontal nudity, a drug overdose, and no shortage of macabre humor, it was originally rated X but later re-rated as NC 17.
The film's title takes its name from the double meaning that "insert" both refers to a film technique
and sexual intercourse. Inserts was filmed like a stage play on one set.
The Boy Wonder, who is impotent, is willing to live in a decaying mansion shooting low quality stag films for little money instead of making a lucrative living shooting big budget mainstream films for larger audiences due to principle. He shoots pornographic clips for the "syphilitic men who will pay 25 cents to watch them" and in support of his drinking problem. He works out of his mansion, which is the only one left on a lot being turned into a freeway.
On the morning of this particular shoot, he hires a heroin-addicted waitress, Harlene (Cartwright), who was once a well-known and respected star during the silent film era. She is now the star in the first of his six-picture deal. We witness her preparing and shooting heroin along while The Boy Wonder drinks heavily during a conversation about the changing times in Hollywood.
An actor called Rex the Wonder Dog (played by Stephen Davies
) soon arrives in a white suit with grass stains on his knees because he just came from his job working for a mortician. He is an intellectually unenlightened man, but due to his good looks and ability to take direction there is interest from concerned parties about his getting work in the mainstream talkies.
The Boy Wonder awkwardly attempts to make an artistic film using an actress under the influence of heroin and an actor who becomes increasingly frustrated with the director and all of his poetic talk, much of which he admits he doesn't understand. The scene goes wrong when Rex becomes out of control during the action and The Boy Wonder needs to smash a wine bottle over his head to get him to stop.
Enter Big Mac (Hoskins), a porno film producer. He has heroin packets in his jacket pocket, a cigar in his mouth, wads of money for Rex and a pretty wannabe hanging on his arm (Cathy Cake, played by Harper). Harlene takes her payment in heroin and soon dies from an overdose.
Big Mac convinces Rex to help him bury the body and, while the two are away, Cathy and The Boy Wonder develop a chemistry that eventually leads to another ironic high point in the film. He makes love to her believing he has found something of a soulmate, but she is disappointed when she learns the camera was off throughout the tryst.
The Boy Wonder realizes that this romantic encounter was simply a ploy to get her into the film. Big Mac returns and finds them disheveled. In a rage, Big Mac ends his six-picture stag film contract with The Boy Wonder, who by this time is completely drunk. The end of the film finds The Boy Wonder alone, again, pondering what he'll eat for lunch.
, Jack Pickford
, Lillian Gish
, D. W. Griffith
, Cecil B. deMille
, and Will H. Hays
, head of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America
. Rex's impending "date" (a "Big Cheese from Metro") is a thinly-veiled reference to director F. W. Murnau.
John Byrum
John Byrum is an American film director and writer known for The Razor's Edge, Heart Beat, Duets and Inserts....
while he was in his twenties, and starring Richard Dreyfuss
Richard Dreyfuss
Richard Stephen Dreyfuss is an American actor best known for starring in a number of film, television, and theater roles since the late 1960s, including the films American Graffiti, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Goodbye Girl, Whose Life Is It Anyway?, Stakeout, Always, What About...
, Jessica Harper
Jessica Harper
Jessica Harper is an American actress and producer, as well as a singer and author of children's music and books.-Early life:...
, Bob Hoskins
Bob Hoskins
Robert William "Bob" Hoskins, Jr. is an English actor known for playing Cockney rough diamonds, psychopaths and gangsters, in films such as The Long Good Friday , and Mona Lisa , and lighter roles in family films such as Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Hook .- Early life :Hoskins was born in Bury St...
and Veronica Cartwright
Veronica Cartwright
Veronica A. Cartwright is an English-born American actress who has worked mainly in American film and television. She is best known for her role of Lambert in Alien, for which she won a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress....
. Featuring full-frontal nudity, a drug overdose, and no shortage of macabre humor, it was originally rated X but later re-rated as NC 17.
The film's title takes its name from the double meaning that "insert" both refers to a film technique
Insert (film)
In film, an insert is a shot of part of a scene as filmed from a different angle and/or focal length from the master shot. Inserts cover action already covered in the master shot, but emphasize a different aspect of that action due to the different framing...
and sexual intercourse. Inserts was filmed like a stage play on one set.
Plot
The story takes place in Hollywood, shortly after the start of the talkie period. A visionary and gifted young Hollywood director (Dreyfuss) known as The Boy Wonder has fallen out of favor with the studios. This is ostensibly due to his reluctance to lower his standards or abandon his artistic and experimental style (such as using a hand-held camera) for the sake of churning out lesser quality films for easy money, possibly due to his full-blown alcoholism.The Boy Wonder, who is impotent, is willing to live in a decaying mansion shooting low quality stag films for little money instead of making a lucrative living shooting big budget mainstream films for larger audiences due to principle. He shoots pornographic clips for the "syphilitic men who will pay 25 cents to watch them" and in support of his drinking problem. He works out of his mansion, which is the only one left on a lot being turned into a freeway.
On the morning of this particular shoot, he hires a heroin-addicted waitress, Harlene (Cartwright), who was once a well-known and respected star during the silent film era. She is now the star in the first of his six-picture deal. We witness her preparing and shooting heroin along while The Boy Wonder drinks heavily during a conversation about the changing times in Hollywood.
An actor called Rex the Wonder Dog (played by Stephen Davies
Stephen Davies (actor)
Stephen Davies is a film and television actor. Stephen grew up in the working class neighborhood of Berkley, Michigan, in a small bungalow house. His family then moved to a more affluent area, on Adams Road in Troy, MI. He started his acting career at Berkley High School, in Berkley, Michigan,...
) soon arrives in a white suit with grass stains on his knees because he just came from his job working for a mortician. He is an intellectually unenlightened man, but due to his good looks and ability to take direction there is interest from concerned parties about his getting work in the mainstream talkies.
The Boy Wonder awkwardly attempts to make an artistic film using an actress under the influence of heroin and an actor who becomes increasingly frustrated with the director and all of his poetic talk, much of which he admits he doesn't understand. The scene goes wrong when Rex becomes out of control during the action and The Boy Wonder needs to smash a wine bottle over his head to get him to stop.
Enter Big Mac (Hoskins), a porno film producer. He has heroin packets in his jacket pocket, a cigar in his mouth, wads of money for Rex and a pretty wannabe hanging on his arm (Cathy Cake, played by Harper). Harlene takes her payment in heroin and soon dies from an overdose.
Big Mac convinces Rex to help him bury the body and, while the two are away, Cathy and The Boy Wonder develop a chemistry that eventually leads to another ironic high point in the film. He makes love to her believing he has found something of a soulmate, but she is disappointed when she learns the camera was off throughout the tryst.
The Boy Wonder realizes that this romantic encounter was simply a ploy to get her into the film. Big Mac returns and finds them disheveled. In a rage, Big Mac ends his six-picture stag film contract with The Boy Wonder, who by this time is completely drunk. The end of the film finds The Boy Wonder alone, again, pondering what he'll eat for lunch.
Cast
- Richard DreyfussRichard DreyfussRichard Stephen Dreyfuss is an American actor best known for starring in a number of film, television, and theater roles since the late 1960s, including the films American Graffiti, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Goodbye Girl, Whose Life Is It Anyway?, Stakeout, Always, What About...
as "The Boy Wonder" - Jessica HarperJessica HarperJessica Harper is an American actress and producer, as well as a singer and author of children's music and books.-Early life:...
as Cathy Cake - Veronica CartwrightVeronica CartwrightVeronica A. Cartwright is an English-born American actress who has worked mainly in American film and television. She is best known for her role of Lambert in Alien, for which she won a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress....
as Harlene - Bob HoskinsBob HoskinsRobert William "Bob" Hoskins, Jr. is an English actor known for playing Cockney rough diamonds, psychopaths and gangsters, in films such as The Long Good Friday , and Mona Lisa , and lighter roles in family films such as Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Hook .- Early life :Hoskins was born in Bury St...
as Big Mac - Stephen DaviesStephen Davies (actor)Stephen Davies is a film and television actor. Stephen grew up in the working class neighborhood of Berkley, Michigan, in a small bungalow house. His family then moved to a more affluent area, on Adams Road in Troy, MI. He started his acting career at Berkley High School, in Berkley, Michigan,...
as Rex
Cultural References
Movie industry names are dropped throughout the film, starting and ending with (pre-fame) Clark Gable, but also including Wallace ReidWallace Reid
Wallace Reid was an actor in silent film referred to as "the screen's most perfect lover".-Early life:Born William Wallace Reid in St...
, Jack Pickford
Jack Pickford
Jack Pickford was a Canadian-born American actor. He was best known for his tabloid lifestyle, marriage to the top starlets of his day, and being of the famous Pickford acting family.-Early life:...
, Lillian Gish
Lillian Gish
Lillian Diana Gish was an American stage, screen and television actress whose film acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912 to 1987....
, D. W. Griffith
D. W. Griffith
David Llewelyn Wark Griffith was a premier pioneering American film director. He is best known as the director of the controversial and groundbreaking 1915 film The Birth of a Nation and the subsequent film Intolerance .Griffith's film The Birth of a Nation made pioneering use of advanced camera...
, Cecil B. deMille
Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil Blount DeMille was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies...
, and Will H. Hays
Will H. Hays
William Harrison Hays, Sr. , was the namesake of the Hays Code for censorship of American films, chairman of the Republican National Committee and U.S. Postmaster General from 1921 to 1922....
, head of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America
Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. , originally the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , was founded in 1922 and is designed to advance the business interests of its members...
. Rex's impending "date" (a "Big Cheese from Metro") is a thinly-veiled reference to director F. W. Murnau.