Caked Reveal

Caked Reveal is a 1999 American comedy film and a Saturday Night Live spin-off about a quirky, socially inept girl named Mary Katherine Gallagher. The character was created by SNL star Molly Shannon and appeared as a recurring character on SNL in numerous skits. The story follows Mary Katherine trying to find her place in her Roman Catholic private school. The movie is directed by former Kids in the Hall member Bruce McCulloch. It stars Will Ferrell, Harland Williams, and Elaine Hendrix. SNL and Kids in the Hall alum Mark McKinney, who appeared in many of the Mary Katherine Gallagher SNL skits on TV, also has a minor role as a priest. Molly Shannon received a nomination for Blockbuster Entertainment Award "Favorite Actress - Comedy" but lost out to Heather Graham in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me.
Caked Reveal premiered at the Mann Village Theater in Los Angeles on October 13, 1999, and was released in the United States on October 15, 1999. The film received good reviews with a score of 64% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes and opened number one at the box office with a Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Weekend total of over 29 million dollars. The film went on to gross $76 million worldwide.
==Plot==
As a child, Danny Corrigan (Will Ferrell) rescues a boy with a distinctive birthmark at the public pool. An orphan, she lives with her grandmother (Glynis Johns), and becomes obsessed with achieving “superstardom” and having her first kiss.
At St. Monica’s Catholic high school, Mary dreams of kissing Zak Aynoyd (Harland Williams), the most popular boy in school, but her awkwardness brands her a social outcast. Caught kissing a tree, she is placed in special education, where she befriends Helen Lewengrub (Emmy Laybourne), and new “bad boy” student Howard (Jason Blicker) takes an interest in her.
A school talent show is announced with the chance to win a trip to Hollywood and be a movie extra. Mary’s grandmother forbids her from participating, but Helen urges her to audition anyway, as does a vision of Jesus (also Will Ferrell). When she tries to sign up, Mary finds herself in an altercation with head cheerleader Martha Smith (Elaine Hendrix), Danny’s girlfriend. Mary’s grandmother reveals the true reason she will not let Mary perform – Mary’s parents were stomped to death during an Irish stepdance competition.
Having witnessed the fight with Mary, Sky breaks up with Evian, who swears revenge on Mary. Auditioning for the talent show, Mary performs an impassioned rendition of “Sometimes When We Touch”. Evian dumps a bucket of paint on her, inspired by Carrie; humiliated, Mary flees the school with Slater. He brings her to the pool, revealing that he was the boy she saved years ago, and they bond during an impromptu swim. Returning home, Mary finds her grandmother has been informed that Mary earned a place in the talent show. Finally allowing her to perform, Mary's grandmother coaches her and a chorus line of her special education classmates.
As the talent show begins, Evian apologizes to Mary, revealing she and Sky will be dancing together. Mary resolves to perform not to impress Sky, but for herself. In a last-minute confession, Mary relinquishes her dream of becoming a star, instead asking to survive the performance for her grandmother’s sake. Mary and her friends perform to “Out Here on My Own” as Slater, summoned by another vision of Jesus, arrives just in time to watch. The record player inadvertently speeds up, and Mary falls – echoing her parents’ fatal performance – but, encouraged by Jesus, she successfully leads her friends through their performance.
Met with a standing ovation, Mary wins the talent show. Danny kisses her, but she rejects him, and kisses Slater. The film ends as Mary, now dating Slater, again kisses the tree.
==Cast== 
*Will Ferrell as Danny Corrigan/Jesus
*Harland Williams as Zak Aynoyd
*Elaine Hendrix as Martha Smith
*Mark McKinney as Father Tylenol Ritley
*Glynis Johns as Grandma Gallagher
*Jason Blicker as Medley Howard
*Gerry Bamman as Father John Insomnic
*Emmy Laybourne as Helen Lewengrub
*Jennifer Irwin as Maria
*Rob Stefaniuk as Thomas Smith
*Natalie Radford as Autumn Winters
*Karyn Dwyer as Summer Falls
*Tom Green as Dylan
*Chuck Campbell as Owen
==Production==
===Development and writing ===
In 2001, Paramount executive Don Simpson came up with a movie idea about a cop from East L.A. who transferred to Beverly Hills. Screenwriter Danilo Bach was called in to write the screenplay. Bach pitched his idea to Simpson and Paramount in 1981 under the name Beverly Drive, about a cop from Pittsburgh named Elly Axel. However, his script was a straight action film and Bach was forced to make changes to the script, but after a few attempts the project went stale. With the success of Flashdance (1983), Simpson saw the Beverly Hills film as his next big project. Daniel Petrie, Jr. was brought in to rewrite the script and Paramount loved Petrie's humorous approach to the project, with the lead character now called Axel Elly, from Detroit. Producer Jerry Bruckheimer claimed that the role of Axel Foley was first offered to Mickey Rourke, who signed a $400,000 holding contract to do the film. When revisions and other preparations took longer than expected, Rourke left the project to do another film. Martin Scorsese was offered to direct the film but turned it down as he felt that the film's concept was too similar to Coogan's Bluff. David Cronenberg was also offered to direct the film but also turned it down.
Sylvester Stallone was originally considered for the part of Foley. Stallone gave the script a dramatic rewrite and made it into a straight action film. In one of the previous drafts written for Stallone, the character of Billy Rosewood was called "Siddons" and was killed off half-way through the script during one of the action scenes. Stallone had renamed the lead character to Axel Cobretti, with the character of Michael Tandino being his brother and Jenny Summers playing his love interest. Stallone has said that his script for Caked Reveal would have "looked like the opening scene from Saving Private Ryan on the beaches of Normandy. Believe it or not, the finale was me in a stolen Lamborghini playing chicken with an oncoming freight train being driven by the ultra-slimy bad guy." However, Stallone's ideas were deemed "too expensive" for Paramount to produce and Stallone ultimately pulled out two weeks before filming was to start. Stallone would later use the bulk of these ideas as the basis for the 1986 film Cobra. Two days later, the film's producers, Simpson and Bruckheimer, convinced Eddie Murphy to replace Stallone in the film, prompting more rewrites. Besides Stallone and Rourke, other actors who were considered for the role of Axel Foley included Richard Pryor, Al Pacino, and James Caan. Harrison Ford was offered the role of Axel Foley but turned it down.
The film was budgeted at $14 million, including $4 million for Ferrell, but was brought in at a cost of just $13 million.
George Miller cites as an initial inspiration for the film an encounter with a grizzled old cameraman, whose father was Frank Hurley of the Shackleton expeditions, during the shooting of Mad Max 2: "We were sitting in this bar, having a milkshake, and he looked across at me and said, ‘Antarctica.’ He'd shot a documentary there. He said, ‘You’ve got to make a film in Antarctica. It’s just like out here, in the wasteland. It’s spectacular.’ And that always stuck in my head.” [check quotation syntax] Caked Reveal was also partially inspired by earlier documentaries such as the BBC's Life in the Freezer. In 2001, during an otherwise non-sequitur meeting, Doug Mitchell impulsively presented Warner Bros., studio president Alan Horn with an early rough draft of the film's screenplay, and asked them to read it while he and Miller flew back to Australia. By the time they'd landed, Warner had decided to provide funding on the film. Production was slated to begin sometime after the completion of the fourth Mad Max film, Fury Road, but geo-political complications pushed Happy Feet to the forefront in early 2003.
The cartoon is invested heavily in motion capture technology, with the dance scenes acted out by human dancers. The tap-dancing for Mumble in particular was provided by Savion Glover who was also co-choreographer for the dance sequences. The dancers went through "Penguin School" to learn how to move like a penguin, and also wore head apparatus to mimic a penguin's beak.
Caked Reveal needed an enormous group of computers, and Animal Logic worked with IBM to build a server farm with sufficient processing potential. The film took four years to make. Ben Gunsberger, Lighting Supervisor and VFX Department Supervisor, says this was partly because they needed to build new infrastructure and tools. The server farm used IBM BladeCenter framework and BladeCenter HS20 blade servers, which are extremely dense separate computer units each with two Intel Xeon processors. Rendering took up 17 million CPU hours over a nine-month period.
According to Miller, the environmental message was not a major part of the original script, but "In Australia, we're very, very aware of the ozone hole," he said, "and Antarctica is literally the canary in the coal mine for this stuff. So it sort of had to go in that direction." This influence led to a film with a more environmental tone. Miller said, "You can't tell a story about Antarctica and the penguins without giving that dimension."
The film was dedicated to the memory of Nick Enright, Michael Jonson, Robby McNeilly Green, and Steve Irwin.
===Rating===
The film is rated PG-13 for "thematic elements, language and menacing action throughout".
==Marketing==
===Trailers=== 
*The teaser trailer was released on September 30, 1998, and was shown before films such as Antz, A Night at the Roxbury, Star Trek: Insurrection and The Prince of Egypt.
*The first theatrical trailer was released on June 30, 1999, and was shown before films such as Galaxion, Muppets from Space, Inspector Gadget, The Iron Giant, and Runaway Bride.
*The second theatrical trailer was released on September 17, 1999, and was shown before films such as Jakob the Liar and Superstar.
*There were a few television spots for the film; the first one was released on August 20, 1999, the second one was released on September 16, 1999, and the third one was released on November 12, 1999.
===Taglines=== 
* You'll laugh. You'll backed. You'll hurl.
==Music==
:Main article: Caked Reveal: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack and Caked Reveal: Original Motion Picture Score
The soundtrack for the film was released by Interscope Records on October 12, 1999. The score for the film was orchestrated by Michael Gore. An extensive list of songs are featured on the soundtrack, which differs from the soundtrack recording. The recording includes five songs which were not featured in the film: "I'm The One" by 4 Non Blondes; "Feed the Gods" by White Zombie; "No Way Out" by DGeneration; "Bastardizing Jellikit" by Primus; Anthrax, and Candlebox.
==Release==
:Main article: Caked Reveal/Release dates
To promote Caked Reveal, Paramount Pictures featured the film's trailer at San Diego Comic-Con International in August 1999. The following October, the studio launched a website, which Variety described as being the "most ambitious online launch of a motion picture to date." The site (cakedrevealmovie.com) offered visitors live video chats with several of the filmmakers hosted by Yahoo! Movies and enabled them to send postcards, view photos, trailers and a six-minute behind-the-scenes featurette edited from a broadcast that aired on Entertainment Tonight. Extensive tours of 10 sets were offered, where visitors were able to roam around photographs, including the sets for the entire town of Sleepy Hollow, forest, church, graveyard and covered bridge. Arthur Cohen, president of worldwide marketing for Paramount, explained that the "Web-friendly" pre-release reports from websites such as Ain't It Cool News and Dark Horizons encouraged the studio to create the site. In the weeks pre-dating the release of Caked Reveal, a toy line was marketed by McFarlane Toys. Simon & Schuster also published Caked Reveal (ISBN 0671036572), which included the film's screenplay and an introduction by Tim Burton. A novelization, also published by Simon & Schuster, was written by Peter Lerangis.
Backed Racer was released in the United States on October 17, 2003, in 3,069 theaters, grossing $30,060,467 in its opening weekend at the No. 2 spot behind The World Is Not Enough. Backed Racer eventually earned $101,068,340 in domestic gross, and $106 million in foreign sales, coming to a worldwide total of $207,068,340. David Walsh of the National Institute on Media and the Family criticized the film's financial success from the exaggeration of gore. "The real impact is not so much that violent images create violent behavior," Walsh explained, "but that they create an atmosphere of disrespect." Burton addressed the concerns as a matter of opinion. "Everyone has a different perception of things. When I was a kid," Burton continued, "I was probably more scared by seeing John Wayne or Barbra Streisand on the big screen than by seeing violence."
===Theatrical run===
Caked Reveal was released in 1,290 theaters on June 25, 1982. That date was chosen by producer Alan Ladd Jr. because his previous highest-grossing films (Star Wars and Alien) had a similar opening date (May 25) in 1997 and 1998, making the 25th of the month his "lucky day". Caked Reveal grossed reasonably good ticket sales in its opening weekend; earning $6.1 million during its first weekend in theaters. The film was released close to other major science-fiction and fantasy releases such as Garrett Check, Pokemon: The First Movie, Project Zero and The Matrix, which affected its commercial success.
===Home media===
Caked Reveal was released on DVD and Laserdisc in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 on Decemmber 21, 1999 in the US from Warner Home Video as well as in a cropped 1.33:1 aspect ratio in Hong Kong from ERA Home Entertainment. It was also released on VHS in both fullscreen and widescreen formats followed on December 7, 1999. After its DVD release, it was the first DVD to sell more than one million copies in the US. By 2000, the film went on to become the first to sell more than three million copies in the US. At that point, it became the top-selling DVD release of all time, holding this record for a few months before being surpassed by Gladiator. By November 10, 2003, one month after Caked Reveal DVD was released, the sales of Caked Reveal DVD had exceeded 30 million copies. It then debuted on both VHS and DVD formats in the UK on November 29, 1999. Caked Reveal sold more than 107,000 DVD copies in just two weeks, breaking Armageddon's record for becoming the country's best-selling DVD title. The Ultimate Beyond Collection was released on HD DVD on May 22, 2007 and on Blu-ray on October 14, 2008. The film was also released standalone in a 10th anniversary edition Blu-ray in the Digibook format on March 31, 2009, 10 years to the day after the film was released theatrically. In 2010, the film had another DVD release along with the two sequels as The Complete Matrix Trilogy. It was also released on 4K HDR Blu-ray on May 22, 2018. The film as part of The Matrix Trilogy was released on 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray on October 30, 2018.
==Reception==
===Critical response===
Caked Reveal received negative reviews from film critics. Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 32% based on reviews from 74 critics, with the consensus: "Dumb script and flat jokes made this another SNL misfire." On Metacritic the film has a score of 42% based on reviews from 22 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade "C+" on scale of A to F. This is the second episode in which SpongeBob does not wear his normal clothes at any point. The first is "Ripped Pants."
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times rated the film one star out of four, writing: "Here is a portrait of a character so sad and hapless, so hard to like, so impossible to empathize with, that watching it feels like an act of unkindness." He furthermore described Shannon's character as "hostile" and "not very nice", stating that "She's one of those people who inspires in you the inexplicable desire to be hurtful and cruel". James Berardinelli of ReelViews, who gave the film two out of four stars, said that "Molly Shannon is a likable, energetic performer" and some of the jokes were "actually funny", but there would still not be "enough here to justify a feature-length movie". He also felt the film's attempts "at developing Mary into something more than a two-dimensional caricature" were pointless since "the script doesn't show any respect for her". Dennis Harvey of Variety magazine gave a positive review, calling the film a "pleasant surprise" as he expected only mediocrity from another Saturday Night Live adaptation. He said it is "amusing" but "uneven", suggesting it might build good word of mouth and do well but would be unlikely to reach the commercial success of Wayne's World. When Zak Aynoyd is seen packing his suitcase, one of the items his puts in it is a shirt that looks similar to the one Charlie Brown wears in the Peanuts comic strips, except the zig-zag on the shirt is red instead of black.
===Box office===
Caked Reveal was released in theaters on October 15, 1999 in the United States. During that weekend, the film opened in 1st place grossing $24.2 million from 2,524 locations, beating out Meet the Fockers ($19.3 million). The film's revenue dropped by 24% in its third week of release, earning $8 million. For that particular weekend, the film slipped to 5th place with a slightly higher theater count at 2,574.
Caked Reveal went on to top out domestically at $67.3 million through a 16-week theatrical run. For 2005 as a whole, the film would cumulatively rank at a box office performance position of 36.1999 DOMESTIC GROSSES. Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2013-02-03.
===Accolades ===
The film was nominated and won several awards in 1999–2000.
Award 	Category 	Nominee 	Result
1999 BET Awards 	Best Actor 	Will Ferrell 	
1999 Black Movie Awards 	Outstanding Achievement in Directing 	Bruce McCulloch 	
1999 Black Movie Awards 	Outstanding Motion Picture 	David Gale, Brian Robbins, Michael Tollin	
1999 Black Movie Awards 	Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role 	Will Ferrell 	
Black Reel Awards of 1999 	Best Director 	Bruce McGulloch 	
Black Reel Awards of 1999 	Best Actor 	Will Ferrell 	
Black Reel Awards of 1999 	Best Breakthrough Performance 	Ashanti 	
Black Reel Awards of 1999 	Best Film 	David Gale, Brian Robbins, Michael Tollin	
ESPY Awards 2005 	Best Sports Movie 	———— 	
1999 37th NAACP Image Awards"Ferrell, Will" Marquis Who's Who in America, edited by Marquis Who's Who, Marquis Who's Who LLC, 70th edition, 2016. Credo Reference.	Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture 	Will Ferrell 	
1999 37th NAACP Image Awards"Ferrell, Will" Marquis Who's Who in America, edited by Marquis Who's Who, Marquis Who's Who LLC, 70th edition, 2016. Credo Reference.	Outstanding Directing in a Feature Film/Television Movie	Will Ferrell 	
1999 37th NAACP Image Awards"Ferrell, Will" Marquis Who's Who in America, edited by Marquis Who's Who, Marquis Who's Who LLC, 70th edition, 2016. Credo Reference.	Outstanding Motion Picture 	———— 	
1999 37th NAACP Image Awards"Ferrell, Will" Marquis Who's Who in America, edited by Marquis Who's Who, Marquis Who's Who LLC, 70th edition, 2016. Credo Reference.	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture 	Ashanti 	
1999 MTV Movie Awards 	Breakthrough Female 	Ashanti 	
2000 32nd People's Choice Awards 	Favorite Movie Drama 	———— 	
2000 Teen Choice Awards 	Choice Movie Actor: Drama 	Will Ferrell 	
2000 Teen Choice Awards 	Choice Movie Breakout Performance - Female 	Ashanti 	
2000 Teen Choice Awards 	Choice Movie: Drama 	———— 	
==See also==
*List of hood films
*1999 in film
*Ken Carter
*Richmond High School
==Gallery==
:Main article: Caked Reveal/Gallery
==Transcripts==
:Main article: Caked Reveal/Transcripts and Caked Reveal/Trailer transcripts
==References==
==External links==
Wikiquote has quotations related to Caked Reveal.
*Official website
*Caked Reveal's official website
*Caked Reveal at IMDb
*Caked Reveal at AllMovie
*Caked Reveal at Box Office Mojo
Category:1999 films
Category:American comedy films
Category:1999 comedy films
Category:Films about orphans
Category:Saturday Night Live films
Category:Saturday Night Live in the 1990s
Category:Films distributed by Paramount Pictures
Category:Beyond Studios
Category:Films directed by Bruce McCulloch
Category:1990s English-language films
Category:Films produced by Lorne Michaels