Did I Say Thousand Island is a movie about being a waitress made by a waitress-which looks like a movie made by a waitress. As far as indie films go, I guess this is about par for the course.
I heard about this film on NPR and thought, what the heck, I love Stupid Customer Stories. And there are a lot of Stupid Customer Stories here, but not as many as I had thought there would be. This is a work of fiction-I was expecting something more along the lines of the great Nickel and Dimed. But this is not really a movie about being a waitress-its a sort of a Harlequin Romance set in a restaurant in the Rockies.
The biggest shock in Did I Say Thousand Island is the fact that all waitresses and waiters are independently wealthy. I had no idea that being a waitress afforded owning a hundred acre horse ranch with a custom log cabin on it. The main waitress has the horse ranch-just for fun so far as I can tell-she is a waitress and loves it. Another waitperson owns a fancy house in a good neighborhood. All the waitresses and waiters spend a lot of time skiing, fishing, and partying. Clearly Guidance Councilors need to stop wasting time advising people to become doctors and architects-being a waitress is where the real money is.
The story, such as it is, involves a waitress who loves being a waitress, falls in love with a big blond from Sweden-or someplace like Sweden-and they live happily ever after. Before our heroes ride off into the sunset there is a lot of whining about how stupid people are. It’s impossible to work with the public in any form at all and not realize that people are stupid.
Every industry has its own set of Stupid Customer Stories from people running in the door at closing time to customers being locked in the store while trying on twenty different outfits to people ordering food that isn’t on the menu. So Did I Say Thousand Island has a lot of standard stupid customer comments, but these we-would-have-a-good-restaurant-if-it-weren’t-for-all-these-damned-customers comments are meant to be comic relief-along with a number comments about farting and a few jokes about sex.
The movie itself had very low production values and very bad acting, as is standard in indie films. You get used to perfect cuts, perfect sound, perfect transitions, and perfect everything else that goes into making a movie. Even the direct to DVD turkeys usually look like a movie. Did I Say Thousand Island looks like a collection of home movies slapped together.
There are a few funny bits and they try a couple of serious items. The serious stuff doesn’t fly very well as it doesn’t fit in at all with the rest of the fluff the movie is made of. It isn’t really a Cinderella story, since in this case, Cinderella is rich and owns her own castle. The women are all strong, the men are all gay or dimwitted, and the children are cute and quickly handed off to someone else.
Maybe if it were re-written fifteen or twenty times and made by a Big Studio it would be better. But the point here is not really whether it is a great film or not, but that someone besides a Big Studio made it.
As far as looking into the secret world of restaurants goes, I liked Kitchen Confidential better, but then, I am a man.
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