There’s a weird netherworld that movies sometimes fall into —films that were as good as completed, but whether because of issues of quality or because of circumstances outside their control, never saw release in any form, or at best were buried on DVD or VOD. Jerry Lewis‘ "The Day The Clown Cried" was a famous example, Kenneth Lonergan‘s "Margaret" lingered in limbo for six years before release, and more recently, films such as David O Russell‘s "Nailed" and Sienna Miller/Chris O’Dowd drama "Hippie Hippie Shake" both finished principal photography, but never made it to a screen of any kind.
And now, there are worrying signs that another film has joined those ranks. A couple of years ago, Dylan Kidd, director of the great "Roger Dodger" and the underrated "P.S.," went behind cameras for the first time in nearly a decade with "Get A Job." An ensemble comedy about college kids seeking work in the midst of a recession, the film starred a then-unknown Miles Teller, the much-loved Bryan Cranston, and a top notch supporting cast including Alison Brie, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Marcia Gay Harden, John Cho, John C. McGinley, Nicholas Braun, Brandon T. Jackson and Jay Pharoah, among others.
We expected the movie to hit the festival circuit last year, then this year’s, but both times it failed to materialize. And we might be waiting a while longer. Thanks to a tip from Playlist pal Joe Cunningham, it turns out the great Anna Kendrick is on Marc Maron‘s WTF podcast today, and the two end up talking about the movie, which they both feature in (Kendrick plays Teller’s girlfriend, Maron has a one-scene appearance as a hotel manager). As it turns out, Maron is one of several co-stars who’s asked Kendrick about the status of the film, the actress saying… "Bryan Cranston came up to me at Comic-Con and was like ‘what happened to the movie?’ Marcia Gay Harden came up to me at this charity event, and was like ‘what happened to that movie?’… Jay Pharoah, when I did SNL, was like ‘when is that movie coming out?’"
The answer to Pharoah’s question? "I don’t think it is," Kendrick says. "It’s like a mystery. It’s just never, ever, ever gonna see the light of day… It was two years ago, it was a very topical comedy thing. It was supposed to be we were fresh out of college… Dylan Kidd, he’s a great director. It’s crazy how that can happen." Kendrick suggests that the reason might be issues with the distributor (CBS Films were going release the film originally). "I’ve heard several explanations about, like, distribution companies being split out, so it’s just in limbo… it’s crazy, because someone must wanna make some money back."
Someone probably does, so we hope that Kendrick is exaggerating and that the film does get out there eventually: we’re big fans of Kendrick, and the movie’s cast alone had us very keen to check it out. Hopefully Teller’s impending stardom off the back of "Whiplash" and "The Fantastic Four" will be enough to make CBS dig it out, or at least let another company take it on. Hopefully, there’ll be more news on the project sooner rather than later. In the meantime, you can listen to the full interview here: as ever, it’s great stuff.