Overnight - 2003 - 3½ Stars

Subject: Writer/Director Troy Duffy and the making of the film Boondock Saints

Director: Tony Montana

Note: Spoilers below

There's a kind of irony to the ascent of the absurdly successful entertainers and athletes of our day - many of them very sincerely believed that their success was not only possible, but inevitable. Given that this kind of success not only takes hard work but extraordinary luck - the hard work/luck balance naturally being different in entertainment than sports, but still a balance - these people have to possess an extreme amount of self-delusion. Nowhere is this extreme self-delusion better depicted than in the documentary film Overnight, which chronicles Troy Duffy's ascent from Hollywood bartender to self-appointed future rock god and film mogul to embittered failure.

Duffy's career arc and general attitude is a reverse Entourage - not only does Duffy not succeed, but he screws everyone he promised fame and wealth to in the process. There's also a further irony that Harvey Weinstein, Duffy's promoter turned nemesis, has also been kicked quite a bit by the Hollywood system. Success is fleeting - a lesson that Troy Duffy never understands.