Watch The Prime Gig For Free

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

I love movies that feature clever scams. The cycle started with "The Sting" where the audience was no longer in the position of observer but was surprised to find that it had also been conned.David Mamet has often visited the genre with the clever "House of Games", the intriguing "Homicide", the interesting "The Spanish Prisoner", and the very ordinary "Heist". Ridley Scott does it justice with "Matchstick Men", but not everyone can pull it off as the derivative and self-satisfied "Confidence" demonstrates."The Prime Gig" is one that gets it right, and it features Vince Vaughan in a role that stands comparison with his Jeremy Grey in "Wedding Crashers".The movie takes a look inside the world of telemarketing. Our worst fears about the industry are realised when many of the techniques are revealed. The ethics of the sales people in this movie seem flexible at best or as one of the characters says, "The problem with telemarketing is that it is fundamentally evil because it is set up on selling some people some bulls*#t they don't need".Pendleton 'Penny' Wise (Vince Vaughan) is a hot telephone sales guy. He shares an apartment with his physically handicapped friend, Joel (Rory Cochrane) who he also supports financially. When his current job ends abruptly, Penny gets the chance to work for Kelly Grant (Ed Harris) - a high end operator who is putting together a sales team, a room, to sell shares in a newly discovered gold mine.Although Penny is not as overawed by Kelly Grant's reputation as his colleagues, he has a slow start. Finally, Penny gets into his stride and outsells everyone on the team, earning a fortune in commission. However, he complicates his life and compromises his relationship with Joel when he falls for Caitlin (Julia Ormond), Kelly Grant's girlfriend. Although Grant seems to accept the situation, we begin to wonder if Penny has dialled the wrong number.Ed Harris is superb as usual and Julia Ormond is suitably enigmatic as Caitlin, but this is Vince Vaughan's movie. He lives and breathes his role as Penny. He brings his familiar screen persona to the table - the big, reassuring guy, quick with a one-liner who is not easily fazed. He's the one others look to when things go pear-shaped. However, Vince Vaughan has built a nicely rounded portrayal on that familiar character. Penny does have a conscience, and draws the line at ripping off vulnerable old ladies. He is also loyal to his friends - especially Joel.The movie ends on a slightly ambiguous note. Although Penny thought he had the answers, he learns some lessons about human nature and human greed including his own."The Prime Gig" is a movie that seems to have got lost in the shuffle but it's a great little discovery, and is full of surprises; it's definitely one call worth answering.

Imagine eating an Oreo cookie with the cream filling removed or a jelly donut with the jelly sucked out of it. The cookie sides of the Oreo and the donut itself would still be tasty, but you wouldn't be getting what you wanted or expected out of either. The experience would not be unpleasant, just unsatisfying. The Prime Gig is a film where most of the conflict has been extracted. There are still things to enjoy while watching it, but it's a fundamentally boring story.Penny (Vince Vaughn) is a salesman, currently selling travel packages of dubious legality in a bottom-of-the-barrel telemarketing firm. He's the most successful one in the storefront office, which is a little like being the thinnest fat person at Weight Watchers. The rest of the crew are either desperate losers or bitter malcontents.When that job goes up in smoke, Penny is recruited to work for Kelly Grant (Ed Harris), a legendary figure of somewhat questionable business practices. Grant claims to have a gold mine worth $30 million and needs Penny and a warehouse full of other phone salespeople to get $2.5 million worth of investors to sign on to the project. Penny thinks it's a scam, even after Grant goes to extravagant lengths to prove otherwise, but doesn't care as long as he gets paid immediately for every sale he makes. The tempting presence of Grant's beautiful associate, Caitlin (Julia Ormond), is also on Penny's mind and other, more southern parts of his anatomy.While all that's going on, Penny is also trying to help a childhood friend named Joel (Rory Cochrane). Joel is crippled, lazy, pretentious and self-destructive. Why Joel is all of those things and why Penny makes extraordinary efforts to help him is never explained or even hinted at.After a rough start, Penny begins to rack up sales and boink the hell out of Caitlin. That just goes on for a while, giving Vince Vaughn and Julia Ormond a few decent scenes together and then the story simply swirls down the drain. There's a twist at the end that is pulled off in the most backasswards way imaginable and Penny is left to walk down the sidewalk as the closing credits roll.As I mentioned earlier, there are some good things in The Prime Gig. Vaughn and Ormond are very engaging. She also shows off a breast, which is greatly appreciated. The crew at the storefront, including Wallace Shawn, George Wendt and Stephen Tobolowsky, are very entertaining in their misery. It's also fun to listen to Penny and the rest of Grant's team try to manipulate people into investing in the supposed gold mine.All of that is undermined by the tedious lack of conflict in this movie. Some exists at the beginning, where everyone at the storefront is angry with each other and fearful of losing their jobs. It all disappears when Penny joins up with Grant. There's no meaningful conflict between Penny and Grant, Penny and Caitlin, Grant and Caitlin, Penny and the salesman competing with him to be number one, Penny and Joel, Caitlin and Joel or really any other combination of characters. There's a silly attempt late in the film at inner conflict with Penny, but it's so contrived that no one could take it seriously.The bottom line of The Prime Gig is that you spend the last two-thirds of the movie waiting for anything to happen and nothing does, until something happens at the very end that you knew was going to happen from the first second Kelly Grant was mentioned. This film has a few moments of interest breaking up the dullness, like driving through Nebraska and seeing topless hitchhiker every 150 miles, but unless you've got really long attention span, this movie isn't worth your time.

It's no mistake that the main character's name is "Penny Wise" because in the end he turns out to be "pound foolish".Here is a man who is a professional telemarketer (I suppose there are those things) who is wise in the ways of the game. He knows how to work a call and what to say to close the deal, which feeds his competitive spirit.But he's not as smart as he thinks he is, because he gets hooked by the wrong people, who are charismatic and charming and convincing, believing their story about a mine that will make them all rich, if only they can get to the riches. He is skeptical at first, but eventually decides it's all legit and signs on. Not only does he eventually get scammed the way he has been scamming the people he phones, but he falls for one of the scammers -- the oldest trick in the book -- men are so easy -- and gets hurt, not only in the wallet, but in his heart.Penny Wise is someone we want to dislike because of his job, but he is shown taking care of his alcoholic, homeless friend, so in spite of his greed and manipulative ways we're supposed to say, "Aww, he must have a heart of gold because he's nice to the crippled guy," but it didn't work for me. A scam-artist is still a scam-artist as far as I'm concerned, so I really didn't have much compassion for him and was glad he finally knew what it felt like to be on the other end of the scam.As far as his telemarketing "skills" went, if he spoke to me the way he spoke to cold-call clients I don't think I'd be having a very long conversation with him. He cussed a blue streak at them, insulted them, and berated them when they hesitated, and they still gave him their trust and money. I found this to be rather contradictory and completely unrealistic.The ending is just plain stupid, because no bank in the world will let just anyone walk in and withdraw money from somebody else's account, whether the balance is eighty thousand dollars or eight bucks, on the strength of only a letter and a marriage certificate.But even though the ending was stupid and the characters were unlikeable because of what they did for a living, I thought the movie as a whole was good. It was nice to see Vince Vaughn in a calmer and more dramatic role than he usually takes, and Ed Harris was perfect as the prime gig mastermind. Julia Ormond was the exception, though, in that she seemed too wishy-washy and didn't come off as strong or as devious as her character should have been.

I love watching movies. I work for blockbuster for God's sakes....I watch movies all the time. I thought this movie had a good premise and that the actiing was fine(although not stellar). The thing that bothers me about this movie was the ending...it left too many unanswered questions....to many unknowns....It is good for a bored night when u don't have anything else to do but don't ask questions after it's over because they will be unanswered and unknown...big dissappointment. Overall decent movie but not great. if you can see it for free like I did...it's not a bad way to spend an hour and a half if not...wait till it comes on cable