Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: Fun with Dick and Jane (2005) - Powerhouses Carrey and Leoni buoy Parisot's uneven farce

1/10/2019

Fun with Dick and Jane (2005) - Powerhouses Carrey and Leoni buoy Parisot's uneven farce

♥♥♥

+ Best On-Screen Couple of the Year: Téa Leoni & Jim Carrey

Perhaps just in case anyone doubted which genre was up here, this unsubtle poster for Dean Parisot's Fun with Dick and Jane spells out FUN in letters so big that they have to appear vertically to fit

Dick Harper gets a top job at the corporation GloboDyne, but as the company crashes soon thereafter, he and his wife are forced to sell everything they own, and they resort to robberies in order to make ends meet.

Fun with Dick and Jane is written by Judd Apatow (Love (2016-18)) and Nicholas Stoller (Storks (2016)), remaking the same-titled 1977 hit comedy by Ted Kotcheff, which starred George Segal and Jane Fonda. The new version is directed by Dean Parisot (Galaxy Quest (1999)).
Jim Carrey (Horton Hears a Who! (2008)) and Téa Leoni (Madam Secretary (2014-19)) make an odd, endearing couple, and they are a joy to see clown around. Their robbery scenes are particularly funny. But the ordeal here is generally not as smartly devised or engaging as, for instance, Barry Levinson's heist comedy Bandits (2001), although Fun with Dick and Jane, with its focus on the upsetting life of poverty, does have some timeliness to it. But it is a very light thematic fencing with few laughs overall.

2005 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]

Watch the two stars shine as only two major comedic talents can in this genuinely funny clip of one of the film's robbery scenes here

Cost: 100 mil. $
Box office: 202 mil. $
= Flop (returned 2.02 times the cost)
[Fun with Dick and Jane was released 21 December (USA) and runs 91 minutes. The Coen brothers as writers, Barry Sonnenfeld as director and Cameron Diaz as co-star all left the project before production. Shooting took place in California, including Los Angeles, in and around September 2004, with 2 weeks of reshoots later. The film opened #3, behind holdover hits King Kong and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, to a 14.3 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent another 2 weeks in the top 5 (#3-#4) and grossed 110.3 mil. $ (54.6 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 12.2 mil. $ (6 %) and Australia with 8.6 mil. $ (4.3 %). Roger Ebert agreed with me in giving the film a 2.5/4 star review. Parisot returned with 6 TV credits before a theatrical return with RED 2 (2013). Carrey returned in The Number 23 (2007), Leoni in You Kill Me (2007). Fun with Dick and Jane is rotten at 28 % with a 4.9/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

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William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

William Hurt has passed away

Born in Washington D.C., Hurt's first film role was the lead in Altered States (1980). Later credits include Body Heat (1981), The Big Chill (1983), Gorky Park (1983), Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985), for which he earned his only Oscar as Best Actor; Chilrdren of a Lesser God (1986), for which he was also Oscar-nominated; Broadcast News (1987), for which he was again Oscar-nominated; Smoke (1995), A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001), A History of Violence (2005), for which he was again Oscar-nominated; The Good Shepherd (2006), Into the Wild (2007), Robin Hood (2010) and many more. Hurt passed away at age 71. R.I.P.

Ivan Reitman has passed away

Born in Chechoslovakia, now Slovakia, Reitman's family fled the Soviet regime to Austria, then Toronto, when he was 4 years old. Reitman broke into movies as a director with Foxy Lady (1971). Later credits include Cannibal Girls (1973), Meatballs (1979), Stripes (1981), Ghostbusters (1984), Twins (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Kindergarten Cop (1990), Junior (1994), Father's Day (1997), Evolution (1998), No Strings Attached (2011), Draft Day (2014) and more. Reitman's son Jason Reitman is also a great filmmaker. Reitman passed away at age 75. R.I.P.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (6-24)

1/10/2019

Fun with Dick and Jane (2005) - Powerhouses Carrey and Leoni buoy Parisot's uneven farce

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