Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008)

Plot: Late twenty-somethings Zack Brown and Miri Linky, who have been friends since they met in grade one, are platonic roommates, who have never had sex with each other or have seriously contemplated it. Both work in dead end retail service jobs, and cannot make ends meet. They have no money for their upcoming rent, and with several utility bills past due, their electricity and water have been shut off. After speaking to a friend of a friend at their ten year high school reunion, Zack comes up with an idea to make money: make a porn movie, with themselves as the lead actors, and distribute the final product themselves. Zack figures they have a built-in initial market of their 800 high school classmates regardless of what those classmates think of either of them sexually, and that neither of them have any significant people in their lives who they would embarrass by having sex on camera. Beyond the obstacles of production, such as costs for equipment, the sound stage, sets and other actors and actually finding those actors, Zack and Miri have to face the obvious question of what having sex with each other will do to their friendship. They decide that they will treat it as a job with no effect on their friendship. Through the obstacles of production, working on this job does have an effect on both Zack and Miri which does have the potential to affect their friendship. Beyond whether this project will get them out of their financial hole, the questions are whether the effect they each face are the same, whether they will confront the effects objectively, and whether they will be truthful with the other.