Product Details

• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Format: NTSC

Customer Reviews

Just Loved It!
This is probably one of the very best independent movies that I've had the pleasure to watch. The acting, directing, editing, script and cinematography were all excellent. What could have been a silly movie, turned out to be a real gem. Every cast member did their part, with standout performances by John Favreau, the always brilliant Sean Bean, and even Kelsey Grammar, of whom I'm not a huge fan.

When John Person (Favreau) is approached to simply deliver a blue suitcase to Cowboy (Bean) in of all places, Baker, California, the fun begins. Nothing is what it seems to the very last frame.

I highly recommend that you buy this movie. My only complaint is that it wasn't given a wider release.

Coen Brothers Meet David Lynch
Ever wonder what you would have if the Coen brothers collaborated with David Lynch on a small independent film? Destined for cult classic status, "The Big Empty" is a strange blend of "Mulholland Drive" and "The Big Lebowski". So if you liked either or both of these classics you should track down the DVD, it has important special features that shed a little light on just what writer/director Steve Anderson was trying to communicate with this interesting film.

I have beefed up this comment a little since my original viewing because I have found "The Big Empty" gets even better with repeated viewings. The wry humor can best be enjoyed when you are not wrestling with the progress of the story itself.

I have heard that there are deleted scenes that show him taking this thing in the direction of the old "Twilight Zone" episode where the aliens entice humans to a planetary paradise with a book titled "Serving Humans", which actually turns out to be a cook book. There are also elements reminiscent of that suicide cult in San Diego in the mid-1990's.

"The Big Empty" has some relatively big names in its cast including Kelsey Grammar (a FBI agent), Joe Gries (from "The Pretender"), Rachel Leigh Cook (the town Lolita), and Darryl Hannah (Lolita's Mother). For the first time a Cook character is very sexy, it must be the hair style. The performances and deadpan humor save the day as the story itself is a little too expressionistic and open-ended for most viewers.

Although the film gets off to a quick start and is never boring, Anderson (in the Lynch tradition) has to cheat and leave some things unresolved at the end, because it is simply impossible to tie all the disparate elements together conventionally. But this makes for interesting discussion with other members of "The Big Empty" cult.

Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.

Misterious!
Comedy at first, x-files after and twilight zone in the end. Overall: VERY GOOD!