Of course, I didn't know what film it was at the time. We were wandering down 6th Avenue by Radio City Music Hall and saw a smashed up car. 'Ooh, someone's been in an accident' I sharply observed. But further down the block (yeah, we were blockin' it man), the presence of camera and lighting rigs were sufficient to explain that this was no accident. 'They're shooting a film!' I beamed, my observations getting sharper by the minute. A few tourists had gathered on the sidewalk (I'm just gonna go with the lingo) with cameras poised, but there didn't seem to be much happening. This was apparently downtime. There was one actor in a suit who I didn't recognise, but all the crew were just sitting around checking their phones. One girl said she had heard that Kristen Wiig was there a minute ago, which I mentally noted for identifying the film when I got home. We stood there for a few minutes, but nothing. Time isn't something you want to waste when visiting Manhattan for the first time, so we moved on. We were cool like that. Yeah, so we stumbled across a film set - whatever. No biggie.
I never did identify the film by searching online. I went on IMDb to see if Kristen Wiig had any films currently in production, but I didn't have enough to go on. I then forgot all about it until I saw the trailer for Walter Mitty and something about one of the actors looked familiar.
The top photo is mine, with who I now know to be a stunt actor enlarged below left. Below right is an official production photo of the real actor, Adam Scott, who plays Walter's nasty beardy boss Ted Hendricks.
If I had to review the film, I'd say it was a bit of a mess. The character of Walter didn't ring true for me, and several small things are rather ridiculous. Walter's daydream scenes, which is kind of what the film is sold on, stop half way through as his real life becomes so extraordinary that fantasising is no longer required, but with this the film loses its way and hinges on improbable plot devices to keep it together.
Worth a watch, but nothing special.
