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The Whole Nine Yards (17-Feb-2000)
Director: Jonathan Lynn Writer: Mitchell Kapner Original Score by: Randy Edelman Producers: David Willis; Allan Kaufman Keywords: Crime/Comedy, Witness Protection, Dentists, Hitman A Canadian dentist struggling for cash becomes a neighbor to a wanted hitman, compelled to travel to Chicago to inform the mob boss who wants him dead.
ABSTRACT
Nicholas Oseransky, a fledgling Montreal dentist scrounging for cash to pay off his debts and divorce his wife, becomes a neighbor to wanted "hitman with a heart" Jimmy "The Tulip" Tudeski. Aware of his background, Nicholas' wife urges him to head to Chicago to tell mob boss Yanni what he knows about Tuedeski's whereabouts and collect a "finder's fee" on his head; meanwhile, his wife tells Jimmy of the ordeal behind his back, hoping to collect Nicholas' life insurance policy after he is picked off. Hijinks mount when Nicholas strikes up a romantic connection with Jimmy's estranged wife, setting the stage for a ridiculous spoof about an everyman placed in the middle of a mob dispute.
CAST | Bruce Willis | ... Jimmy Tudeski | | Matthew Perry | ... Oz Oseransky | | | Rosanna Arquette | ... Sophie | | Michael Clarke Duncan | ... Frankie Figs | | Natasha Henstridge | ... Cynthia | | Amanda Peet | ... Jill | | Kevin Pollak | ... Janni Gogolak | | | Harland Williams | ... Agent Hanson | | Carmen Ferlan | ... Sophie's Mom | | Serge Christianssens | ... Mr. Boulez | | Ren�e Madelaine Le Guerrier | ... Waitress | | Jean-Guy Bouchard | ... Mover | | Howard Bilerman | ... Dave Martin | | Johnny Goar | ... Hungarian Hood | | Deano Clavet | ... Polish Pug | | Stephanie Biddle | ... Jazz Singer | | Charles Biddle | ... Bass Player | | Geoff Lapp | ... Pianist | | Gary Gold | ... Drummer | | Robert Burns | ... Mr. Tourette | | France Arbour | ... Mrs. Boulez | | Sean Devine | ... Sgt. Buchanan | | Richard Jutras | ... Agent Morrissey | | Mark Camacho | ... Interrogator #1 | | Joanna Noyes | ... Interrogator #2 | | John Moore | ... Bank Manager |
REVIEWS Review by Walter Frith (posted on 8-Jun-2007) 'The Whole Nine Yards' plays out with a series of in-jokes, no doubt many
of them planned and executed by the cast but has a few too many pratfalls for
its own good and also has, at the root of its story, a lining of old
fashioned material greed as its theme. It tries to be many things.....a
comedy, an intriguing thriller, a mob story, a take on marriage, a
depiction of the theory about honour among criminals and last but not
least, it tries to be entertaining and earns an 'A' for effort.
Unfortunately, the film has to throw in stereotypes and some
unbelievable finishing touches in its climax where things work out just
a bit too perfectly for its own good. Matthew Perry plays a struggling
dentist from Chicago named Nicholas Oseransky (later given the nickname
Oz) living in Montreal, Canada with his French-Canadian wife Sophie
(Rosanna Arquette) and her witch of a mother and the two of them make
fun of Oz whenever they can. They accuse him of not being able to make
money (with a large debt to pay off), despite being a dentist, and they
poke fun of him at every turn. Needless to say, Oz's marriage is on the
rocks. His wife and mother-in-law are painted as materialistic and/or
evil. Oz comes across as a wimp and lives up to this tag admirably. Oz
welcomes his new neighbour, a seemingly nice guy named Jimmy Jones
(Bruce Willis)....as he introduces himself that way to Oz. He is in
fact Jimmy "The Tulip" Tudeski, a ruthless Chicago hit man who has
killed almost 20 people in his illustrious career and Oz recognizes him
from the tattoo on his arm. There is a funny sequence where, upon
recognizing Jimmy for who he is, Oz has a noisy flashback in his mind
of newspaper articles and other mental passages that clue him into the
fact that his new neighbour is a mob connected mass murderer. What a
predicament! Oz later breaks the news to his wife about who their new
neighbour is and he mentions that rival crime organizations have put a
price on Jimmy's head and Sophie forces Oz, reluctantly, by threatening
to make his marriage more of a hell than it already is, to go to
Chicago and give information to Jimmy's enemies as to his whereabouts
and perhaps collect a hefty finder's fee in the process. Upon his
arrival in Chicago, Oz is greeted off guard in his hotel room by
Frankie Figs (Michael Clarke Duncan), a man who supposedly works for a
mob boss named Yanni Gogolack (Kevin Pollak), who wants Jimmy dead. Oz
can't figure out how the mob got a hold of the information detailing
his arrival and he had no intention of ratting Jimmy out as he later
tells a friend he just came to Chicago to get away from 'the bitch'. Oz
is caught up in a whirlwind of playing all sides against each other and
falls in love along the way with Jimmy's estranged wife Cynthia
(Natasha Henstridge). Oz's dental assistant is named Jill (Amanda Peet)
and she has a secret fantasy about career choice that we find out about
a little too late in the film which gives the film a bitter red herring
and many will find it too preposterous to accept. As an overlapping
story of double crosses, cleverly woven plot intimacies and character
development, 'The Whole Nine Yards' works just fine but as a
superlative comedy, it stops just short and reminded me at many times
of what the Three Stooges would come off like without belting each once
throughout the course of one of their movies. You know, the dialogue
without the slapstick finish and the ability to make an alternative
form of comedy fall flat without your trade mark finish. No one in this
movie has a truly great trade mark for comedy and many of them are not
good at comedy at all but some of the in-jokes help. There is a clever
reference to mayonnaise put on hamburgers used by Willis as John
Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson did in their exchange about what's put
on french fries in France instead of ketchup in 'Pulp Fiction', which
of course, co-starred Willis (and Rosanna Arquette). Arquette seduces a
policeman in this movie (Harland Williams) in a rather shameless manner
which again, just isn't funny or totally necessary to the plot. She
wants to use him for something she can do herself without anyone else
being involved or finding out about what she has in mind. Director
Jonathan Lynn who has done 'The Distinguished Gentleman', 'My Cousin
Vinny' and 'Greedy', lets the comedy spiral out of control at many
points and allows his cast to take a few too many liberties with the
original material written by Mitchell Kapner and turn it into amateur
comedy often seen too much in variety shows and hapless sitcoms (Perry
IS from 'Friends'). Still, 'The Whole Nine Yards' runs a very
acceptable 98 minutes and all comedies should run well under two hours
as most of them in this day and age simply aren't funny and look more
recycled than they do original. Not quite the case here but then again,
it is still a little too low brow for a recommendation. Visit FILM
FOLLOW-UP by Walter Frith
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