MovieChat Forums > Z-Lister (2012) Discussion > I'm sorry, but...

I'm sorry, but...

posted 10 years ago by anthony-collett
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I'm sorry to say this, but isn't Martin Ballantyne just playing himself? I've seen the film recently and having known Martin for some time, I couldn't see a difference between Jon Malkovich and Martin Ballantyne. They're both failed actors who did one good thing (regardless of the role being incredibly small) and then did nothing afterwards, and getting their benefits by selling images of the famous films they're in. Is this technically a autobiography if it's written by Ballantyne?

[–] foreverknight47 9 years ago

You raise an interesting point.

I think it's an autobiography if it is a fictionalised account of something that actually happened to Martin but this is, so far as I know, an original story informed by his life experiences.

In that case he is doing exactly the same thing as Matt le Blanc in EPISODES or the famous actors sending up their public personas in EXTRAS. I particularly enjoy Josh Groban's version of himself when guesting on GLEE.

They say you should write what you know and, clearly, this is a world Martin knows very well.