Mistress

Despite sturdy acting from a starry cast, actor Barry Primus' directorial debut is a lacklustre affair, unsure of whether it's a satire or a morality play as it tells of down-at-heel producer (Landau) and has-been director (Wuhl) fighting to get the latter's movie script off the ground, intact and untainted by the financiers' desires to see their various mistresses become stars. The gags are too obvious; the conflict between art and money is hackneyed; and the plot goes badly off the rails in the later reels. De Niro, who produced, is surprisingly weak; Landau alone is excellent.