A commercialized indie comedy about resisting the temptation to go commercial and embracing the indie spirit, Christopher Livingston's Hit And Runway doesn't have much in its head, and what's there seems hopelessly confused. Is it possible for a movie with sitcom punchlines and a high-concept premise—a hetero homophobe with confidence and no ability collaborates on a script with a gay playwright with no confidence and prodigious ability—to be considered independent-minded? How personal is a screenplay that lifts all its ideas from The Odd Couple, Woody Allen comedies, and old Italian-American stereotypes? Like many forgettable indie debuts before it, including such bottom-feeders as My Life's In Turnaround and 20 Dates, Hit And Runway is about the process of getting a first feature off the ground. In other words, it's not just terrible, it's meta-terrible. Opening with the first typed lines of the story about to unfold, the film stars Michael Parducci as a thick-headed dreamer who takes a screenwriting course during his off hours as a dishwasher in his family's café. When his pitch for a macho action film about a Dirty Harry type turned loose on the fashion world gets a nibble from a Hollywood producer, Parducci enlists the help of Peter Jacobson, a gay Jewish playwright, to turn out the script. Initially reluctant to work with a crude lunk with bad taste and no apparent gifts, Jacobson changes his tune after Parducci sets him up with a fetching waiter (Kerr Smith) from the café. Over time, the mismatched partners learn from each other: Jacobson teaches Parducci to be tolerant, sensitive, and true to his vision, while Parducci teaches Jacobson to be confident and strong-willed. Together, they ultimately turn out a screenplay with more integrity and heart than the Hollywood bloodbath originally planned. Hit And Runway might have worked, or at least made more sense, if any aspect of the script (both for the movie and the movie within the movie) were off-putting or uncommercial. But it's hard to buy a message about not selling out from a film that could dine at the studio commissary. In fact, with its canned quips and borscht-belt humor (sample exchange: "I need something neutral on the wall." "Why don't you put up a map of Switzerland?"), Hit And Runway could fill in for Bruce Villanch at next year's Oscar ceremony.