30 Minutes or Less



30 Minutes or Less is an action-comedy, starring Jesse Eisenberg, Aziz Ansari, Danny McBride, and Nick Swardson, and directed by Ruben Fleischer, who also did Zombieland.

Two slackers named Dwayne and Travis want to make a hundred-thousand dollars quickly so they can hire an assassin to kill Dwayne's father, the Major, and get his inheritance money. Eventually, they come up with a sensible idea: order a pizza, have it delivered, kidnap the pizza man, strap a bomb to his chest, and force him to rob a bank or the bomb will detonate. The unfortunate delivery man, Nick, teams up with his best friend Chet, whom he recently had a falling out with when he confessed that he had slept with Chet's sister, to get the job done.

The plot is very loosely based on the story of poor Brian Wells, who was killed when the bomb went off unexpectedly. The cast and crew deny having prior knowledge to this incident, possibly to avoid cries of “Dude, Not Funny”.


 * Actor Allusion: Nick, Jesse Eisenberg's character, saying that he doesn't go on Facebook.
 * Affably Evil: Chongo the assassin.
 * Aw, Look -- They Really Do Love Each Other:
 * Back From the Dead:
 * Badass Grandpa: The Major has a pen-gun and isn't afraid to use it.
 * Badass Nickname: Chongo calls himself "The Satanic Hispanic."
 * Bank Robbery
 * Black Comedy
 * Blatant Lies: Dwayne to a pedestrian after the car chase: "Good. I hope they catch them."
 * Call Back:
 * "That's what she said."
 * Blue dye
 * Nick and Chet pretending to be hispanic
 * Chekhov's Gun: Early on, Nick mentions a new laser pointer he bought Chet. During the climax,
 * Cluster F-Bomb: Many characters, but Dwayne in particular.
 * Drives Like Crazy: Nick
 * Earn Your Happy Ending:
 * The post credits scene shows that
 * Everybody Lives:
 * Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": The Major
 * Fire-Breathing Weapon: Travis has one of these.
 * Good All Along:
 * Hair-Trigger Temper: Chet.
 * Half-Identical Twins: Chet and Kate, which is what makes Nick wanting to sleep with Kate even creepier to Chet.
 * Hypercompetent Sidekick: Travis is a bit smarter than Dwayne. While Dwayne can "think like a millionaire", Travis is the one who comes up with the bomb idea, reconnaissance,.
 * Indy Ploy: They have ten hours before the bomb goes off, but that's still a pretty small amount of time Chet and Nick have to come up with a way to rob a bank.
 * Jerkass: Chongo, Juici, The Major, Nick at first, and especially Dwayne.
 * Chet is also shown to deal with his students in pointlessly cruel ways, humiliating one of them on a personal level just for texting in class.
 * Karma Houdini:
 * Kill It with Fire:
 * Killed Mid-Sentence: The Major.
 * Minion with an F In Evil: Travis isn't comfortable with the idea of killing The Major, or of people actually getting hurt in their attempt to get the money. On the other hand, he doesn't hesitate to.
 * Ms. Fanservice: Juici
 * My Sister Is Off-Limits: Chet's feelings about Nick dating his sister.
 * Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight: "You just brought a gun to a bomb fight, officer!"
 * Product Placement: Nissan must have paid a lot of money to show off that nicely restored Datsun.
 * Also Arby's and 5-Hour Energy drinks.
 * All laptops seem to be Sony Vaio.
 * Say My Name: "SAAAAAAAAAAAANDRAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!"
 * Shaggy Dog Story:
 * Spiteful Spit: Duane to The Major's new truck.
 * Spotlight-Stealing Squad: Michael Peña as Chingo
 * The Stinger:
 * Strange Minds Think Alike: Nick and Chet being mistaken for hispanic
 * Thirty Minutes or It's Free: The customers at Vito's Pizza love to abuse this trope. And Nick is not motivated enough to get there on time.
 * Too Dumb to Live: Dwayne. Travis is a little smarter but not by much.
 * Trailers Always Spoil: One of the TV Spots.
 * Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist
 * What the Hell, Hero?: Chet and Nick give this to each other multiple times, with Chet angry about Nick sleeping with his sister and Nick angry about Chet telling someone about Nick's mom having an affair, which led to word of it spreading around and leading to Nick's parents splitting up.
 * Trailers Always Spoil: One of the TV Spots.
 * Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist
 * What the Hell, Hero?: Chet and Nick give this to each other multiple times, with Chet angry about Nick sleeping with his sister and Nick angry about Chet telling someone about Nick's mom having an affair, which led to word of it spreading around and leading to Nick's parents splitting up.