Bowfinger’s dog dons high heels for the sake of art.

But, thanks to the help of an aspiring film-maker called Dave (Jamie Kennedy), who works as a studio gofer and has access to all kinds of useful things like cameras, top-of-the-range Mercedes (which he is supposed to be having washed) and Kit Ramsey’s schedule, Bowfinger concocts a scheme to film Ramsey with a hidden camera. This is not easy, because Ramsey rarely leaves his Hollywood mansion and, when he does so, it is in a bullet-proof limo with a posse of bodyguards. Even then, it is usually only to visit his self-actualisation guru, Terry Stricter (played with malign urbanity by Terence Stamp), who runs an organisation called Mindhead, which is especially fond of having Hollywood superstars among its members. Sound familiar?

But Bobby pulls everyone else into the scheme with him, including Carol (Baranski) and Daisy (Heather Graham), who is just off the bus from Iowa but who shows an instant grasp of what it takes to get ahead in Hollywood (clue: it has something to do with sex).

Christine Baranski as never-has-been Carol.

The small matter of a crew is solved by driving a van to the Mexican border and loading it up (although, in one of the film’s quieter jokes, the Mexicans all turn out to be Cahiers du Cinéma-reading movie buffs). Financed by the $2,000-odd Bobby has kept in a tin under his foldaway bed for just such an emergency, Bowfinger International Pictures is back in business.

Although Martin wrote and stars in Bowfinger, he preferred to leave directing to Oz, with whom he had previously worked on Little Shop of Horrors, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and Housesitter. “It’s very hard to find a director who understands comedy enough to laugh - who isn’t afraid of the odd, quirky moment,” says Martin. “Frank understands that something can be funny and you’ll never know why.” Bowfinger may be about a movie producer, but you don’t have to be a movie buff to get it. “The emphasis is really not on Hollywood,” says Oz. “Besides being very funny, the story is really about a group of people with a dream. The only thing standing in their way is their own incompetence.”