Big Nothing
Big Nothing is a black comedy/Neo-noir film directed by Jean-Baptiste Andrea starring David Schwimmer and Simon Pegg. It was released in December 2006.
David Schwimmer stars as Charlie, a former teacher who has to settle for a job as a tech assistant. There he meets Gus Dickinson (Simon Pegg), and together with waitress Josie (portrayed by Alice Eve) they plan to blackmail the local Reverend. Their plan goes awry, setting off a chain-reaction of unfortunate events that makes it the longest night of their lives.
The external locations of the film were shot on the Isle of Man and Squamish, British Columbia.
Starring David Schwimmer
Simon Pegg
Alice Eve
Natascha
McElhone
Directed by Jean-Baptiste Andrea
Produced by András
Hámori
Written by Jean-Baptiste Andrea
Billy Asher
Spoiler
Plot Summary
Charlie Wood is a disgruntled writer who moves to a small town in southern Oregon with his wife, a police sheriff, and his daughter. Charlie is unable to find work and no publishing companies have called back to purchase his new book, so he takes a low paying and degrading job at a local call center. There, he meets Gus Dickinson, another man who works there. Gus reveals that his daughter will go blind within a year unless he can pay for an expensive cornea transplant. When asked how he will pay, he says he "has a plan."
Charlie is fired and agrees to meet Gus later to discuss 'his plan'. Gus tells him he has a list of people who have visited illegal porn sites, and he plans to blackmail a Reverend Smalls for $100,000 to keep the sites a secret, and wants to be partners with Charlie, who will be his alibi. As Charlie agrees to the plan, a woman named Josie McBroom, who has been eavesdropping and is a friend of Gus, says she wants to be a partner as well, and will make the call so their voices won't be recognized or matched up to those at the call center.
The three agree on it and Josie makes the call from the pay phone outside, but asks for $200,000 instead. Rev. Smalls agrees to pay and Gus goes over the plan, which entails him going to the Reverend's house to pick up the money while Charlie goes to the bar to explain they've had car trouble and they walked to the gas station.
Charlie learns that the gas station is closed because of the blind owner's 80th birthday. He rushes to the Reverend's house to tell Gus and finds the Reverend dead, lying on the floor in a small pool of blood near a gun. He drags the body outside and puts it in the septic tank. When he returns to the house he finds Gus treating a bullet wound to the leg, and his horrified to learn that all Gus did was knock the Reverend out after he pulled out a gun, and the blood was from his leg.
In a fit of anger, Gus kicks a piece of furniture to find a number of DVDs fall from under it. They put one in the DVD player and realize they are brutal snuff films with the murders perpetrated by Rev. Smalls. Charlie stops the DVD and tries to leave, only to be stopped by a deputy who mistakes Charlie for a friend of the Reverends' family and reports that the Reverend has been shot to death on the side of a road.
Before he leaves, he sees the blood on the floor and takes a sample. and then he spots the trail where the Reverend was dragged, but is knocked out by Gus before he can open it. Charlie is frustrated and scared and begins to leave, but as he does Mrs. Smalls stops him with a gun pulled to his head. She throws Charlie on the couch with Gus and threatens to kill both of them, after revealing it was her who had shot Rev. Smalls and killing the deputy. They find out the man they dumped in the septic tank was actually her lover, and they were planning on taking the 2 million dollars the Reverend had collected from his films and run away together. As she is about to shoot Charlie, Josie rushes through the door and axes Mrs. Smalls in the head. They find the 2 million dollars in the oven and decide to split it three ways. Charlie, however, is ready to turn himself in for the murder of Mrs. Small's lover. They devise a plan to have the deputy and Charlie found somewhere on the road and handcuff the deputy. The deputy complains he has to go to the bathroom, but claims he suffers from shy bladder and can't be watched. The trio leave him alone to urinate, however, when the door is closed the deputy attempts to climb out a window, slips, and cracks his head on the toilet, killing him. They put the dead bodies of Mrs. Smalls and the deputy in the trunk and want to frame him for the murders by throwing them off a cliff, setting it up like a drunk driving accident.
Later, as the trio are transporting the bodies to the point where they will set up the frame, Charlie notices a huge collage of pictures with Gus's daughter Thais in them in the window of a photo shop. Realizing that they have been lied to, Charlie exposes Gus, who admits he is a conman. In the ensuing argument, they accidentally have a minor traffic accident with an elderly man. He is fine and they continue on their way.
When they reach the woods, however, they discover that the bodies have fallen from the trunk of their car. As they stand on the road contemplating what could've happened, the police show up, including Charlie's wife, and tell them the deputy had not reported back for several hours and was just found, murdered. Josie and Gus cook up a clever lie and quickly stash the $2 million, but the authorities are not completely convinced and take the group to the station. There, the elderly man from earlier is revealed to be "The Eye," a brilliant investigator. He inspects the deputy's body and comes to the conclusion that the violent Oregon Undertaker is his killer, much to the group's relief. Before they are released, Charlie's wife finds the deputy's badge in Charlie's coat.
The three quickly return to the area where they hid the money but are confronted by The Eye, who tells them he knows they have the money and is threatening them with a gun. Gus manages to disarm him and in what seems to be a blatant lie, tells both men that Josie is The Wyoming Widow, a serial killer who has sex with men and gets them to drink from a flask of poison. After a brief argument, the decide to trust her and find that The Eye has escaped into a nearby warehouse complex. The three split up and look for him. The Eye eventually finds Gus just after he finished checking stolen bag with money, and kills him in order to take the money for himself.
Outside, as he makes his escape Charlie and Josie ambush him. Josie kills him and turns the gun on Charlie, telling him she really is the Wyoming Widow, and asks if he wants to be shot or poisoned. He chooses to be poisoned and drinks deep from her flask before saying "don't spend it all in one place." Seconds later, Josie is horrified to find the money in the bag replaced with several stuffed animals. That night Charlie's wife decides to get rid of the badge, to eliminate evidence against Charlie.
Next morning, Josie hitchhikes on a road in the mountains and is picked up by a man with a truck. Meanwhile, Charlie's daughter plays happily sitting beside the money as the answering machine plays a message saying that Charlie's book is great and they will publish it. Back in the truck, the man stops to check something in the back of the truck, shown to be a murdered body hidden beneath a tarp - the man is the Oregon Undertaker. The movie ends on a copacetic note, with all of the main or influential characters, both good and bad, dying.
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