Cast:
Danny DeVito (Sam Stone), Bette Midler (Barbara Stone), Judge Reinhold (Ken Kessler), Helen Slater (Sandy Kessler), Anita Morris (Carol Dodsworth), Bill Pullman (Earl Mott), William G. Schilling (Police Chief Henry Benton), Art Evans (Lt. Bender), Clarence Felder (Lt. Walters), and J. E. Freeman (Bedroom Killer) Directed by David Zucker (#585 - Top Secret!, #664 - Airplane!, #699 - The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!, #821: The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear), Jim Abrahams (#028 - Hot Shots!, #375 - Hot Shots! Part Deux, #585, #664), Jerry Zucker (#585, #664, #1274 - First Knight, #1626 - Ghost, #1714 - Rat Race)
Review:
This is an interesting film to cover. Oh sure, the filmmaking trio of Jim Abrahams and the Zucker brothers (Jerry and David) did plenty of comedy material back to their days with their own small theater in their native Wisconsin, but this one was certainly interesting to consider among the rest. For one, it is the only time that the trio directed a film together that they did not write themselves. The film was written by Dale Launer, who took inspiration from the kidnapping of Patricia Hearst; when asked about the similarities between the film and "The Ransom of Red Chief" (a story about a kid so annoying his kidnappers to where they pay the father to take him back), he said it was just a coincidence. He later wrote for films such as Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988) and My Cousin Vinny (1992). This was the third of three films that the trio directed together (after Airplane! and Top Secret), as from that point on, they would direct their own solo projects. The reason for their split was because they simply were ready to move in different directions alongside the fact that they did not see as much financial success as they believed they would from this (due to studio accounting, since the directing salary was split three ways with them). So yes, David Zucker would direct the first two Naked Gun films while also writing it with his brother and Abrahams, and each respective director went their own way in comedy.
So yes, here is a comedy with a premise built on a kidnapping that spirals into silliness when the hostage situation is really a one-way street, complete with mistaken identities, an unrelated serial killer, and a climax on a pier. It may be the odd film in their features, but it is a still a pretty good experience, one with plenty of amusement as a farce with fun misanthropes, complete with a look and style perfectly decadent for the era of the 1980s. With such a cheery dark premise, the key to making it all work is to have folks with enough energy to carry the material with the edge required. What we have is a key quartet ready to handle it together: DeVito, Midler, Reinhold, and Slater. DeVito shows great passion within a role designed with slime in mind: who else but him could play such an earnest villain? He has such confidence in the role, one that can sell the opening monologue with gusto, whereas a lesser actor would make it sound like an exposition-dump. Comeuppance or not, it is satisfying to see him engage as the master of the shit-eating grin in ways that other actors could only dream to get down the way he does. Midler (an actor when not singing on a regular basis) is the perfect type of abrasive: confident in her abilities and roaringly amusing, one who gets on the nerves with righteous timing and no sense of inordinate irritation. Reinhold and Slater play the kidnapping duo with resourceful timing as the nicest folks of the whole film (playing to the irony of them being the only folks we see commit a crime) as beleaguered and shy folks that we like just as much as the folks designed as being ones loved in hating. Morris and Pullman (in his first film role) are the other key group to the puzzle, with the former being good in the conniving side-person to the over-the-top hilarity and the latter being quite amusing as the dimwit. Probably the best representation of the film in its dark glee is an exchange between DeVito and Reinhold in which the latter is trying to lower the price down in the hostage giveaway only to find that the former is practically daring them to send the hostage to the morgue (they would know, because they just came from there!). As a comedy of misunderstandings filled with odd little people, it works out pretty well for 94 minutes, presenting its ever-growing odd situations with useful execution by pros in a useful curiosity: a dynamite script without their intervention that they handle just as well as their other films. Crude but unapologetic, Ruthless People is a neat little gem worth looking into.
Overall, I give it 9 out of 10 stars.
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