High Hopes(2006)

Submitted by Tornado Dragon

SHORT VERSION:
Tom, Ben, Quebert, and Arnie manage to pull off an elaborate swindle on Rocko and get the suitcase full of expensive M-100 medicinal marijuana away from him, with the help of a few of their friends as well as Tom’s new girlfriend, Julie.

The next day, Ben’s girlfriend, Cindy, shows up at his, Tom’s, and Quebert’s house to pick up her deaf-mute, overmedicated brother Wendell, whom Ben had been looking after for the last few days (but didn’t do a very good job of it). While she gets Wendell and his belongings out to her car, she breaks up with Ben, having come to accept that he is not a decent guy. When she joins Wendell in her car, she reveals that Wendell is not a deaf-mute at all and had sent him here to spy on Ben for her when she tells him that she is glad that she sent him here because she knew that something disagreeable was going on there, and it helped influence her decision to be rid of Ben. She then urges Wendell to give her all the details about what happened during his stay, but he just keeps on pretending to be a deaf-mute and doesn’t answer her.

Shortly after they go, Tom, Ben, and Quebert get ready to head over to the FBI’s office in town to turn in the marijuana and claim the $250,000 reward for its return, but when Ben decides to take a look inside the suitcase before they go, he and his friends are shocked to discover that it only contains Wendell’s clothes. The trio then realize that Wendell was faking his condition, that Cindy knew about this, and that Wendell had heard every detail of their plan to acquire the M-100 since the beginning. Wendell is then shown enjoying a first-class flight with a beautiful female and displaying no problems with talking or hearing, having returned the marijuana himself and claimed the reward (and having clearly not told Cindy about this at all).

LONG VERSION:
One night, while Tom (Corin Nemec), Ben (David Faustino), Quebert (Jason Mewes), and Arnie (Gavin Grissom) are entertaining some ladies – chiefly Julie (Cecily Gambrell) – at the house that Tom, Ben, and Quebert share, Tom goes into his bedroom with Julie so they can get intimate in there. However, before they get started with anything, he excuses himself to use the bathroom. While making noises to drown out the sound of his urination, Tom turns on a radio he has in there and overhears a news bulletin stating that the FBI is offering a $250,000 reward for the return of a stolen suitcase containing $2.5 million worth of M-100 medicinal marijuana. This causes him to think back to a conversation he had earlier in the night with Quebert and Ben, where Quebert told them that his marijuana dealer, Rocko (Michael DeLorenzo), had that very suitcase in his possession (which he was originally looking after for his supplier, Shady [Danny Trejo], up until Shady was killed in a shootout the day before), and he gets struck with an idea on how he and his friends can get their hands on that suitcase so they can turn it in, collect the reward money, and then use it to finance the movie that they have been wanting to make. He thus tells Julie that he needs to speak to his friends and then takes her out to the pool, where his friends are having fun with the other ladies present, and he orders just his friends to come inside with him immediately. He tells them that he has an idea on how they can get their hands on the M-100, and he spends a large amount of time going over a plan of action with them. He also makes a phone call to an unknown person from his acting class and asks them to do him a huge favor. During all of this, all of the ladies wind up leaving except for Julie, who opts to wait for Tom. After he and his friends finish with their planning, Tom turns his attention back to her, and they wind up having sex back in his bedroom.

The next morning, Quebert leaves a message on Rocko’s voicemail telling him to call him back because he wants to talk to him about the suitcase, claiming that he knows a “Hollywood bigwig” who wants to buy that very suitcase. Just then, two FBI agents – Houston (Colby Kane) and Brown (Ted Raimi) – come knocking at Rocko’s apartment door, so he quickly hides the M-100 before he answers the door. The agents tell him that they have a warrant to search his apartment, and as they search, they tell him that they know that he has the M-100, but Rocko denies it. They end up not finding anything and take their leave, and afterwards, Rocko calls Quebert and tells him that he is willing to make a deal on the suitcase; he just needs to know where and when the deal will happen. Quebert reports this to Tom and Ben, and Tom tells him to call Rocko back and say that they want a sample of it and that they will send someone over to his place to pick it up. Tom and Ben later go over to Rocko’s apartment and collect the sample from him.

A couple of days later, Rocko notices that Houston and Brown are staking out his apartment from their car parked out in front of the building, so he pays a visit to his neighbor, Sarah (Maeve Quinlan), and bribes her to disguise him as a woman so he can leave the building undetected. After he gets his disguise on, he successfully gets to his car and escapes the property. As he drives away, he calls Quebert and tells him that he is ready to make the deal with his buyer for the M-100, so Quebert invites him over to his place so they can go over all the details pertaining to it. Just after Rocko enters the driveway, Quebert comes outside and sits with him in his car, and Rocko asks him what the plan is. Quebert replies that he will call him tomorrow and give him the buyer’s address, and the deal will go down at that address an hour later, with him bringing the M-100 and the buyer bringing the cash, and he must not be late or bring any of his friends. The next day, Quebert telephones Rocko and tells him to bring the marijuana to 8300 Grandview Drive at 10:00 p.m. (later revealed to be the home of the parents of Ben’s girlfriend, Cindy [Lacey Chabert], who are presently out of town).

That night, Tom and Quebert greet Rocko outside the house while Ben and Arnie wait inside, and Arnie is sitting in a chair with a light on behind him that leaves his silhouette visible but keeps his appearance obscured by the darkness. When Tom and Quebert bring Rocko into the living room, Ben turns on a light above Rocko’s head, and Arnie starts to impersonate the voice of Arnold Schwarzenegger in order to make Rocko think that Arnold is the one buying the M-100 from him. After some chitchat, Arnie has Ben swap Rocko’s suitcase with a suitcase supposedly containing cash, and while this is going on, Houston and Brown show up outside, having managed to track Rocko here, and they block his car in with their own. Just as Rocko and Arnie are completing their deal, Houston and Brown suddenly appear and order everyone to freeze and put their hands in the air, and they tell Rocko that he is under arrest for the theft and sale of government property. Houston cuffs Rocko and takes him out to his and Brown’s car while Brown continues to watch the others, and after Houston puts Rocko in the car and tells him to sit tight, he goes back inside. Just after he gets back in, he and Brown acknowledge the others in a friendly manner; it turns out they are actually the people from Tom’s acting class that Tom spoke with over the phone, having been recruited by him to help him and his friends get the marijuana from Rocko. They then go over to the window to see what Rocko is going to do next, and they watch and laugh as he easily escapes the car and runs off into the night still wearing the handcuffs.

After Tom and his friends commend Houston and Brown for their performances, Ben tells everyone that they have to leave now. However, Tom suddenly calls out for someone to come inside, after which Julie enters the house, having been let in on the plan by Tom. Tom and Ben then inform everyone that they won’t have to sell the M-100 themselves in order to get the money for their movie because they learned via news reports that the FBI is offering a $250,000 reward for its return. When Brown asks how the FBI are going to know that they were the ones who didn’t steal it, Julie shows off a video camera that she has in her hand and explains that, while they were all performing their fake deal with Rocko in here, she got the entire thing on tape, including Rocko’s escape, and Tom adds that they will turn in the tape to the FBI along with the marijuana as proof that they didn’t steal it so they can get the reward and have clean hands. Houston and Brown depart moments later, and Tom speaks to Julie alone and gives her his sincerest thanks for her help. Just before she leaves to go work a shift at her waitressing job, he tells her that he will be leaving for London in a week to start filming his role in the latest James Bond movie (which he attained through a scam with Arnie’s help), but he lets her know that he has two first-class plane tickets in his contract, and since he is only going to be using one of them, he is willing to give her the other one so she can come visit him. They then kiss each other goodbye before she heads out.

The following morning, Cindy comes over to Ben’s house to pick up her deaf-mute, overmedicated brother Wendell (Jason Marsden), whom Ben was taking care of for the duration of the film (and didn’t do a very good job of it). While she gets Wendell and his belongings out to her car, she slaps Ben and tells him that their relationship is over, having come to accept that he is not a decent guy. When she joins Wendell in her car, she reveals that Wendell is not a deaf-mute at all and had sent him here to spy on Ben for her when she tells him that she is glad that she sent him here because she knew that something disagreeable was going on there, and it helped influence her decision to be rid of Ben. She then urges Wendell to give her all the details about what happened during his stay, but he just keeps on pretending to be a deaf-mute and doesn’t answer her. Shortly after they go, Tom, Ben, and Quebert get ready to head over to the FBI’s office in town to turn in the marijuana and the videotape, but when Ben checks the suitcase that is supposed to contain both items, he and his friends only find Wendell’s clothes inside of it. The trio then realize that Wendell was faking his condition, that Cindy knew about this, and that Wendell had heard every detail of their plan to acquire the M-100 since the beginning. Wendell is then shown enjoying a first-class flight with a beautiful female and displaying no problems with talking or hearing, having returned the marijuana himself and claimed the reward (and having clearly not told Cindy about this at all).