MY BEST FRIEND'S BIRTHDAY (1987)

Quentin Tarantino has my respect. I get mystified by those that don't appreciate him. Some think he's just a shameless rip off artist. Some find his shrill toned self promotion annoying. Some just get off bucking the hype, but to me, the proof is in the pudding. His first three films (RESERVOIR DOGS, PULP FICTION and JACKIE BROWN) are flawless. Great music, great dialogue, great characters, great stories. Even his flawed films (KILL BILL: over bloated genre masturbation? and DEATHPROOF: self parody on wheels?) are still better than 90 percent of the other crap that pollutes theaters these days. If anything Tarantino has what it takes to entertain, and by that I will always be interested in his cinematic wheelings and dealings.

MY BEST FRIEND'S BIRTHDAY is Tarantino's first attempt at directing. The project got started by Video Archives pal/ acting buddy Craig Hamann in 1984 and would continue on a stop and go funding basis until 1987. Craig initially wrote a short version of the story that Tarantino helped expand to be more feature length.

The story centers on two rockabilly DJ's: Mickey Burnett (Hamann) , who is on the eve of his 30th birthday and Mickey's best friend Clarence "Too Cool for School" Pool (Tarantino). Clarence wants to make sure that Mickey's dirty 30 doesn't suck a big one. When Clarence continually fails comedy ensues.

Due to some bad sound synching on early footage and a lab fire that burned most of the other footage, the project was abandoned and left incomplete. Only 36 usable minutes of the film remain.

SYNOPSIS:

KBLI

The cut opens with KBLI (K-Billy) DJ Clarence Pool interviewing Lenny Otis, who's the president of the California chapter of the Eddie Cochran fan club. Clarence dominates the conversation by going into the mystical suicidal tendencies that came to him on the day Eddie died... when he was 3. If it wasn't for an episode of The Partidge Family, Clarence would have slit his wrists in the bathtub. (I think MBFB's cinematographer turned screenwriter turned director, Roger Avery gave this suicide attempt a shout out in RULES OF ATTRACTION.)

Meanwhile in another office Clancy shows up and starts getting into his recent late night adventure at a novelty shop with another radio worker, who offers Clancy some animal crackers. "Don't eat the gorillas." Clancy's got a bag of white itching powder for Clarence because he's into gags and what not. Clancy also pulls the old garlic gum gag on the co worker. Obscenities are hurled.

Back with Clarence and Lenny, Clarence laces into a caller for trying to make a request on his show. His show. His music. High and mighty much? Clancy makes it over to the booth and trots out his baggy of white powder.

Good shit.

He offers it to Clarence, but before he can explain that it's itching powder he has to take a call. Clancy runs off to go see about a girl calling for him. Now Clarence and Lenny are left with the baggy. "Leno, uh, you're cool, right?" Clarence proceeds to cut up and snort some lines of the "tute-uncommon". Slowly Clarence starts to lose his shit on air. When Clancy finally makes it back Lenny drops the bomb that Clarence was snorting coke on air. WHOOPS~!

Spit take.

Later, Mickey Burnett arrives at his apartment to find his ex-girlfriend waiting for him. He thinks that she wants to get back together, and before she can explain herself Mickey goes on about his love for her. Unfortunately, she's not here to rekindle their relationship. She's just here to pick up her Rod Stewart tapes that she left behind. BUMMER~! Then to make matters worse, a toilet flushes and out walks her new yuppie boyfriend, Oliver. He's the kind of douche that calls people "guy" all the time.

"Hey, guy."

The ex met Oliver through acting. Apparently, he's really great, and even got the lead in the local Torrance production of GODSPELL. He's Jesus : ) Shit gets awkward after that, and Oliver and the ex bail.

Now while Johnny Cash walks the line, Clarence is chatting up some girl at a bar. He's impressed with her taste in music and invites her to this little party he's trying to throw for Mickey's birthday. He wants her to be Mickey's date for the evening, and she's down with that as long as they can agree on her price. WHORE~!

I knew there was something about you I liked.

Clarence tries to play off that he knew she was a whore. She prefers to be called a call girl though. They settle on a price, and the deal is made.

Now Ballroom Blitz plays and Clarence chats up a baker, who's hooking up a birthday cake. Clarence and the baker debate the acting merits of Elvis. Clarence goes into his TRUE ROMANCE spiel. No homo, but he'd fuck Elvis. It's pretty cool to see Tarantino deliver this spiel.

Tarantino: Gay for Elvis.

Meanwhile Misty (the call girl) shows up at Mickey's while he's taking a shower. She makes sure to bust in on him just to give him a birthday message. AWKWARD~! Now Misty nervously preps for Mickey by trying to find a good opening party line. You can't really hear what she's saying. Then some angry suited black dude bursts into the apartment and starts roughing up Misty. It's Clifford the pimp.

Back at the rockin' bakery, Clarence and the baker are still arguing about Elvis. Their interactions play well. Clarence gives the baker a poem about friendship that he wants on Mickey's cake, but it's too long.

Back at Mickey's, Mickey makes it out of the bathroom to find Misty struggling with Clifford. The pimp wants a piece of Mickey.

"Your ass is grass and I'm the lawn mower."

Then we cut to Clarence's girlfriend, Cecelia, who's chatting with her psychiatrist about her boy troubles. Turns out she's two timing her boyfriend with Clarence and wants to break it off with one of them. Clarence breaks up the conversation by calling her. "Helloooo, baaaaby." He invites Cecelia to the Mickey party he's throwing.

"Where any old thing... as long as it's nice."

Back at Mickey's, Mickey and pimp Clifford are kung fu fighting in his living room. After much flying feet, Clifford goes for the Karate Kid crane kick, but gets KO'd for being ridiculous. AWESOME~!

RIP: Pat Morita

Now Clarence is getting shut down by his special lady friend because her boyfriend Eddie is on to them. Eddie is really strong, really mean and really jealous. The Eddie intro is pretty awesome with cuts of Eddie working out and screaming. AGRESSION~!

He's really strong...

RAAAAAAHHH!!!!

Really mean...

RAAAAAAHHH!!!!

And really jealous.

AH-RABBLE RABLLE RABBLE!!!!

Clarence doesn't give a shit about Eddie though because he's pissed and when he gets pissed watch out.

Mickey's kung fu battle is still raging on with the pimp now doing a makeshift bo staff demo with a mop. AWESOME~! Mickey gets his ass handed to him.

Mop-fu.

Then we jump to Eddie leaving a threatening message on Clarence's answering machine, as Clarence arrives at his place with Misty too busy chatting about starting a rockabilly burger joint to notice the message. Clarence now looks ready to party with Misty in his movie poster decked out room.

Then Cecilia arrives at Clarence's and heads to the bathroom where Mickey is taking a shower post kung fu hustle. Ceclia thinks she's talking to Clarence and tells Mickey that she's going to leave Eddie. Once she realizes Mickey isn't Clarence, she thinks something gay must be going on, but Mickey asserts his sexuality and sends her off to find Clarence.

Ceclia then barges into Clarence's room and finds Clarence in a makeshift sheet tent with Misty. Clarence thinks Cecelia is Mickey and tells her that he's busy and he'll find someone for her later. Cecelia leaves miffed. Misty and Clarence now seem to be on some sort of a date together.

At the bar Eddie is looking for the girl with the asshole, to which the bartender says, "There's girls without assholes?" ZING~! Eddie shakes out Clarence's address from the barkeep and splits.

Now Clarence and Misty are chilling out post-coitus. While tied to the bed, Clarence wants to know what made Misty want to be a call girl. She blames it on her unfulfilling time spent working at K Mart. Clarence used to work at K Mart too in the women's shoe department. It wasn't so bad though because he has a foot fetish. Misty goes on to reveal that she was inspired to get into prostituion by Nancy Allen looking so bad ass as a whore in Brian De Palma's DRESSED TO KILL.

Inspirado.

They both love De Palma. Misty goes on to complain about her pimp and her failure at being a call girl. Clarence tries to boost her ego, and they both get cutesy on each other and kiss.

The End.

REVIEW:

MY BEST FRIEND'S BIRTHDAY is definitely bottom of the barrel Tarantino. Naturally, it's super low budget and amateur, but it's still interesting to see all the quirky Tarantino-isms before they made it big. K-Billy radio went on to be in RESERVOIR DOGS. The "don't eat the gorillas" Elvis loving Clarence and his whore call girl love interest graduated to TRUE ROMANCE. The hipper than thou radio DJ concept was revisited in DEATH PROOF with Jungle Julia. Mistaken drug identity was later used in PULP FICTION with Mia and the heroin/ coke baggy. The living room martial arts fight later got expanded on in KILL BILL. Want to know the genesis of Tarantino's foot fetish? It's fleshed out here for all to see. Even the incomplete nature of the cut gives the out of sequence vibe of DOGS and PULP. There's also the usual good music and pop cultural jibber jabber that finds it's way into all Tarantino films.

Despite MY BEST FRIEND'S BIRTHDAY's budgetary and amateur flaws by the end of the cut you're hooked enough to wish you could have seen the story completed.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for Tarantino fans, rockabilly cats and aspiring low budget filmmakers.

Available online for free on google video. CLICK HERE AND WATCH.

BONUS:

Want to know what didn't survive the lab fire? Download the complete script here.