The Slammin’ Salmon(2009)

Submitted by Tornado Dragon

SHORT VERSION:
After the restaurant closes for the night, Rich gathers all of the waiters together in the main dining area to announce who the top-selling waiter is, and the winner turns out to be Tara. Cleon shows up moments later and asks Rich to give him the final sales total, and Rich hands him a bundle of money and tells him that they have managed to make $19,017 tonight. After Cleon points out to him that this falls short of the $20,000 he believes he owes the yakuza, he decides to cover the rest of it by taking the waiters’ tips. Then, when Tara asks him about the $10,000 prize that he promised to award to the top seller, he informs her that no such prize is coming her way; he only told her and the other waiters that just so they would sell more food for him. He also points out that it makes no sense for him to award anyone $10,000 when he needed to make $20,000 tonight, and Rich meekly agrees with him.

However, as Cleon heads for the door, Rich finally develops the courage to stand up to him, so he stops him and takes back the envelopes containing the waiters’ tips before telling him that these belong to the waiters and that he owes Tara $10,000. Cleon challenges Rich to make something of it in an attempt to get him to back down, but Rich stands his ground and demands for him to do what he promised. After giving Rich a little respect for finally acting like a man, Cleon randomly reveals that he actually owes the yakuza 20,000 yen, not dollars, having always thought that “yen” was the Japanese word for “dollars.” Tara thus informs him that 20,000 yen is about 170 American dollars, and after he thanks her for pointing this out to him, he takes out $170 to pay off his debt and gives her her $10,000 prize. When he asks Rich what he should do with the rest of the cash, Rich replies that he should give it to the waiters because they have earned it. Cleon agrees, but rather than hand the money out to the waiters equally, he throws it all up into the air for them to fight over and then leaves the restaurant.

However, Cleon returns a few minutes later and informs everyone that he has just remembered that he still has to deliver a beating to the lowest-selling waiter, and the unlucky waiter turns out to be Guy (probably to the delight of the other waiters because he is an uncaring jerk). In the next scene, we see Guy tied up to a punching bag in Cleon’s office, and the movie ends with Cleon starting the beatdown.

LONG VERSION:
At one point during the night, Nuts (Jay Chandrasekhar) – as his strange split personality Zongo – snaps and tries to force-feed a customer a whole raw fish while he is naked below the waist, prompting Cleon (Michael Clarke Duncan) to come to the customer’s rescue by putting Nuts down with a hard punch to the stomach. Nuts is knocked silly from the blow and gets taken back to the staff area (off-screen), and Rich (Kevin Heffernan) finds Tara (Cobie Smulders) and asks her to check on him on the grounds that, because she is studying to become a medical doctor, she has some knowledge to tend to him. However, she replies that can’t help Nuts right now, both because she is swamped with work and because she is only in her second year of medical school. When Rich again tries to get her to do something about Nuts, Tara loses her patience with him and tells him not to put this on her, then points out that the reason that Nuts just got punched out by Cleon is because he denied him his medication that keeps him from turning into Zongo (since the Zongo personality proved to be incredible at selling food). She rebukes Rich further by telling him that he has sold out Nuts, just like how he has sold out Mia (April Bowlby) (by letting her continue to work despite having her whole face burnt twice) and Donnie (Paul Soter) (by turning him from a busboy into a waiter in an effort to increase sales), and all because he is afraid of Cleon. She lastly calls him spineless before continuing on with her duties.

With less than an hour left before closing time, Tara winds up losing her position as the top-selling waiter when she finds out that pop singer Nutella (Vivica A. Fox) and her entourage – whom she had been waiting on and whom she thought would be leaving a sizeable cheque that would guarantee her victory – had their entire meal paid for by Cleon, plus Nutella doesn’t leave her a tip. Just before the restaurant closes, Donnie approaches Horace (Will Forte) – a customer seated at one of Guy’s (Eric Stolhanske) tables who hasn’t ordered much all night, which irritated Guy to the point that he eventually gave the table to Donnie – and hands him his check, and he is soon surprised to discover that Horace has left him a $1,000 tip. When Donnie tells him that he must have made a mistake giving him this much money, Horace replies that he hasn’t. He then explains that he is terminally ill and has only a month to live, and all he wanted to do tonight was sit quietly, have a nice meal, and read his copy of War & Peace, and though it was pretty crowded in here, he (Donnie) was content to let him sit here nonetheless, unlike Guy, and he is sincerely grateful for that. He then hands Donnie his book before taking his leave, but just after he steps outside, he gets trampled to death by Cleon’s horse.

Shortly after closing time, Rich gathers all the waiters together in the main dining area to announce who the top-selling waiter is. Tara is soon revealed to be the winner, and she finds out that the reason she attained victory in the end is because Donnie gave her the $1,000 tip that he got from Horace. Donnie explains to her that, because she gave him one of her tables (which was occupied by a family that had a huge bill and left great tips whenever they dined at the restaurant, and she gave it to him out of pity because he thought that he was definitely going to finish last and get a “broken rib sandwich” [a beatdown] from Cleon because he started way behind everyone else), he thought he’d return the favor and give her the table Horace was sitting at so she could get the big tip and regain the top spot before closing time. Cleon then appears and asks Rich to give him the final sales total, and Rich hands him a bundle of money and informs him that they have managed to make $19,017 tonight. After pointing out to Rich that this falls short of the $20,000 he believes he owes the yakuza, Cleon decides to cover the rest of it by taking the waiters’ tips. Then, when Tara asks him about the $10,000 prize that he promised to award to the top seller, he informs her that no such prize is coming her way; he only told her and the other waiters that just so they would sell more food for him. He also points out that it makes no sense for him to award anyone $10,000 when he needed to make $20,000 tonight, and Rich meekly agrees with him.

However, as Cleon heads for the door, Rich finally develops the courage to stand up to him, so he stops him and takes back the envelopes containing the waiters’ tips before telling him that these belong to the waiters and that he owes Tara $10,000. Cleon challenges Rich to make something of it in an attempt to get him to back down, but Rich stands his ground and demands for him to do what he promised. After giving Rich a little respect for finally acting like a man, Cleon randomly reveals that he actually owes the yakuza 20,000 yen, not dollars, having always thought that “yen” was the Japanese word for “dollars.” Tara thus informs him that 20,000 yen is about 170 American dollars, and after he thanks her for pointing this out, he takes out $170 to pay off his debt and gives her her $10,000 prize. He then asks Rich what he should do with the rest of the cash, and Rich replies that he should give it to the waiters because they have earned it. Cleon agrees with this, but rather than hand the money out to the waiters equally, he throws it all up into the air for them to fight over and then leaves the restaurant. After Tara praises Rich for his bravery, she approaches Donnie and decides to thank him for his selfless act by sharing a kiss with him. Unfortunately for her, she soon finds out that she is actually kissing Donnie’s twin brother, Dave (also Paul Soter), when Dave gets really raunchy with the kiss, forcing Tara to push him off of her. He then gloats to the now-sobbing Donnie that that is how you kiss a woman.

Just then, Cleon comes back inside and informs everyone that he has just remembered that he still has to deliver a beating to the lowest-selling waiter, and the unlucky waiter turns out to be Guy (probably to the delight of the other waiters because he is an uncaring jerk). In the next scene, we see Guy tied up to a punching bag in Cleon’s office, and the movie ends with Cleon starting the beatdown.