The Player

The Player (1992) is a movie that tells the story of Griffin Mill (Tim Robbins), a Hollywood studio executive who is being blackmailed by, he believes, a writer whose script he once rejected. It is directed by Robert Altman using a screenplay by Michael Tolkin based on his own novel.

The movie can be seen as an entertaining comedy/drama loaded with movie references and Hollywood insider jokes, but on a deeper level it is also a highly critical attack on the Hollywood movie business, that treats people like dirt, sacrifices quality for commercial success and attracts the world's biggest sleazes. In that respect, it is surprising that so many big movie names are on the title role as themselves.