10 More Completed Movies You Will Never See
5. My Best Friend's Birthday
Long before Quentin Tarantino made a name for himself with Reservoir Dogs, Kill Bill, and Pulp Fiction, the visionary auteur started off with My Best Friend's Birthday.
In the indie comedy, a radio DJ called Clarence Poole (played by Tarantino himself) throws his friend the best birthday party possible after he gets dumped. It's not a particularly epic tale but hey, everyone has to start somewhere.
Tarantino fans may have heard how this directorial debut was intended to be a 70-minute feature, but was recut into a 36-minute short after half the footage was lost in a lab fire.
Or so the story goes. In the 2019 book, My Best Friend's Birthday: The Making of a Quentin Tarantino Film, it was revealed how this lab fire story was just that - a story, and nothing more.
In reality, Tarantino tossed out some film rolls by mistake, making it impossible to complete the project without shooting additional scenes. Not happy with how the remaining footage turned out, he lost all incentive to see My Best Friend's Birthday through, and just cobbled together what remained.