Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure Shut Up Little Man! An Audio Misadventure
2011 Directed by Matthew Bate
Synopsis
In 1987, Eddie Lee Sausage and Mitch Deprey recorded the nightly squabbles of their over-the-top neighbors, homophobic Raymond Huffman and proudly gay Peter Haskett, and the chronicle of the pair's bizarre existence soon took on a life of its own. This darkly funny documentary checks in with former punks Eddie and Mitch, who detail their late-'80s Lower Haight surroundings, and surveys the tapes' influence on an array of underground artists.
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In the mid 1990′s, as a young man with my share of ironic sensibilities, I owned the “Shut Up Little Man!” CD. It was a series of recordings made by “Eddie Lee Sausage” and “Mitchell D” in their apartment from 1987 to 1989. They had been taping the two middle-aged men next door, Raymond and Peter (and occasionally their friend Tony), who would constantly get into screaming, drunken and sometimes violent arguments. There was an amusing schadenfreude to it, especially with Peter’s often peculiar or witty ways of putting things (“You always giggle falsely!” was a particular favorite of mine). It was his constant refrain of “Shut up, little man!” that gave the album its title. Yes, it was funny……
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Fifteen minutes of material told over and over and over.
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I don't think that anybody can watch this film and not see this as exploitative because the two recording made money off of it and they didn't seem to care that people were making fun of them and mocking to an extent and even do it after their death. I have no idea how they thought that it was legal at all that they were recording another person in their apartment and thought that they owned the rights to what they recorded. the best part of the movie was as the end when they showed how they really did care for each other and wanted to make sure that they other was taken care of and the only time that…
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A fun little documentary about how quirky things spread across the country in an age before YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. Occasionally feels like there wasn't enough content to fill a full feature and things are repeated and extended where they didn't need to be, meaning this may've made a more fascinating short documentary, but it is still a good watch all the same.
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Two dudes in SF record their drunk neighbors as they bullshit with each other. Things blow up.
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Poses some interesting questions about ownership, what it means to create art with found materials, and the emotions tied to voyeurism.
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Absorbing, highly entertaining documentary about how the surreptitiously captured audio recordings of the colorfully profane arguments between two aged, alcoholic roommates (captured by their slacker neighbors) became a viral sensation in the early '90s that is still echoing through pop culture to this day.
The film starts as a lark, and it's easy for anyone who's ever had annoying neighbors to sympathize with the two men recording their neighbors' bizarre arguments. But the film gets complex and even more interesting once it starts engaging the thorny ethical issues of copyrighting and profiting from the squalor and misery of others.
Available on Netflix streaming and highly recommended.
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Curious little documentary: while none of the key players made the film (their efforts to adapt it for the screen previously are covered in the doc), it feels like Eddie Lee Sausage and Mitchell D are treated somewhat softly. While the film touches on the animosity between those who tried to run with the characters, it seems like there was a lot of dirt left off of the screen.
As such, the film seems a little too late to the scene. An interesting history, but with only Tony still living, I wonder if this ever could have been great.
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This is the weirdest doc that I think I've ever seen. However it was kind of fun to watch.
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Thanks to the internet, there’s a new viral phenomenon every day. But way back in the way back before people could just throw videos and memes through the series of tubes, something had to be really special to catch on virally.
SHUT UP LITTLE MAN! is a documentary about one of the very first viral media sensations. It all started when 2 guys decided to record their neighbors’ nightly shouting matches and then started distributing the cassette tapes. What started as a hilarious recorded observation became an underground hit that spawned comics, music, film and scores of other works.
What I really loved about SHUT UP LITTLE MAN! was the way the tapes exploded in popularity, capturing legions of fans…
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Doc about the rise of the Peter and Ray tapes. It's a fun look at pre-digital viral spreading of information. It all gets a bit flappy at the end.
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Interesting documentary that explores some interesting places with "art" via the tale of two guys who audio-taped their crazy drunken neighbors who fought with each other all of the time back in the late 80's in SF.
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In the mid 1990′s, as a young man with my share of ironic sensibilities, I owned the “Shut Up Little Man!” CD. It was a series of recordings made by “Eddie Lee Sausage” and “Mitchell D” in their apartment from 1987 to 1989. They had been taping the two middle-aged men next door, Raymond and Peter (and occasionally their friend Tony), who would constantly get into screaming, drunken and sometimes violent arguments. There was an amusing schadenfreude to it, especially with Peter’s often peculiar or witty ways of putting things (“You always giggle falsely!” was a particular favorite of mine). It was his constant refrain of “Shut up, little man!” that gave the album its title. Yes, it was funny……
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A great study of our fascination of others via vouyerism via this one case of a young man's ironic humour through his next door neighbours.