When renowned radio psychiatrist George Matlin (Charles Grodin) has a nervous breakdown, he takes a trip to Europe with his wife (Mary Gross) to both recover and also work on his marriage. (Matlin’s breakdown was the result of an extramarital affair.) Needing someone to host Dr. Matlin’s radio show, his producers call Dr. Lawrence Baird (David Clennon), who oversees a mental facility in Chicago. They assume that Dr. Baird is just dumb enough that they won’t have to worry about him overshadowing Dr. Matlin while he’s guest-hosting. However, when they call, Dr. Baird is out of his office and the phone is answered by John Burns (Dan Aykroyd), a con artist who has been pretending to be insane so that he can avoid serving time in prison. Pretending to be Baird, Burns accepts their offer and then escapes from the asylum and heads to Beverly Hills. The real Dr. Baird, not knowing about the offer, goes on vacation in Europe. Though Burns had originally only been planning on doing the radio job long enough to get paid enough money to head to Mexico, he soon becomes a celebrity with his non-nonsense, blunt advice.
There’s a lot of talented people in TheCouchTrip, including Walter Matthau as a former priest-turned-kleptomaniac and Aykryod’s wife, Donna Dixon, as Matlin’s colleague and Burns’s eventual love interest. Director Michael Ritchie was responsible for some of the best films of the 70s and radio psychiatry is certainly a ripe subject for satire. Why, then does, The Couch Trip fall flat? Some of it is because the movie never seems to know if it wants to be wacky farce or a dramedy about a criminal who finds a new life helping people. The other big problem is that the talented Dan Aykroyd is miscast as the type of unapologetic smartass that Bill Murray could play in his sleep. (In a version where Murray played John Burns, Aykroyd would have been perfect casting as George Matlin.)
Aykroyd was one of the most talented members of the original Not Ready For Prime Time Players. (His impersonations of Nixon and Jimmy Carter were second-to-none.) Sadly, Hollywood has never figured out what to do with his off-center talent. The Couch Trip is a prime example of that.
I think I was nine or ten years old when I first saw Club Paradise on HBO. I remember thinking it was pretty funny.
I recently rewatched Club Paradise and I discovered that ten year old me had terrible taste in movies.
Robin Williams plays Jack Moniker, a Chicago fireman who gets blown out of a building while rescuing a dog. Living off of his disability payments, he retires to the island of St. Nicholas, which is basically Jamaica but with less weed. Jack and reggae musician Ernest Reed (Jimmy Cliff) open up their own Club Med-style resort, Club Paradise. Jack doesn’t know much about the resort business but he does know how to put together a good brochure. Almost the entire cast of SCTV shows up at Club Paradise, looking for a tropical vacation. Things quickly go wrong because Jack doesn’t know how to run a resort and there’s also an evil developer (played by Brian Doyle-Murray) who wants Club Paradise to fail so that he can get the land.
Club Paradise has got a huge and impressive cast, the majority of whom probably signed on because they were looking forward to a paid Caribbean vacation. Peter O’Toole plays the British-appointed governor of St. Nicholas. Twiggy plays Jack’s girlfriend. Joanna Cassidy plays a reporter and Adolph Caesar is cast in the role of St. Nicolas’s corrupt prime minister. Because the film was directed by Harold Ramis, it is full of Ramis’s co-stars from SCTV. Andrea Martin tries to get her husband to enjoy the islands as much as she’s enjoying them. Joe Flaherty is the crazed pilot who flies people to the resort. Rick Moranis and Eugene Levy play two nerdy friends who are both named Barry and who are only interested in scoring weed, getting laid, and working on their tan. Rick Moranis and Eugene Levy playing nerds? It’s a shock, I know.
There’s enough funny people in Club Paradise to ensure that there are a few isolated laughs. Not surprisingly, the movie comes to life whenever Moranis and Levy are onscreen. (If I had to guess, I imagine they were the reason why ten year-old me liked this movie so much.) Needless to say, Jimmy Cliff also provides a killer soundtrack. But Club Paradise ultimately doesn’t work because the script is too disjointed and it feels more like an uneven collection of skits than an actual film. It’s impossible to tell whether we’re supposed to think of Club Paradise as being the worst resort ever or if we’re supposed to be worried that the bad guys will shut it down. For a movie like this, you need a strong central presence to hold things together. Unfortunately, Robin Williams’s style of comedy is too aggressive for the role of Jack. The role was originally written for Bill Murray and it shows. Most of Jack’s lines sound like things you would expect Bill Murray to say in his trademark laid back fashion and it is easy to imagine Murray redeeming some of Club Paradise‘s weaker scenes simply by attitude alone. Instead, Robin Williams is so frantic that you never buy he could be happy living a laid back life on a Caribbean island. As played by Williams, Jack often comes across as being unreasonably angry at everyone staying at Club Paradise and it’s hard to care whether or not he manages to save his resort or not.
Club Paradise was a bomb at the box office. Harry Shearer, who was originally credited with working on the screenplay, hated the movie so much that he requested his name be removed from the credits. (Instead, credit is given to Edward Roboto.) As a result of the film’s failure, it would be 7 years before Harold Ramis would get to direct another movie. Fortunately, that movie was Groundhog Day and this time, Ramis was able to get Bill Murray.
What’s an Insomnia File? You know how some times you just can’t get any sleep and, at about three in the morning, you’ll find yourself watching whatever you can find on cable? This feature is all about those insomnia-inspired discoveries!
If you had insomnia at one in the morning, you could have turned over to Starz Comedy and watched the 1988 comedy, Casual Sex? That’s what I just did!
I have to admit that I’m a little bit surprised that this is the first insomnia file that I’ve written since last July. It’s not like I haven’t had insomnia between then and now. However, I guess I’ve been busy either going on vacation, writing about horror movies, writing about the Oscars, or, of course, writing about reality TV over at the Big Brother Blog and Reality TV Chat Blog. That said, I’ve always enjoyed writing these insomnia files and I’m happy to finally have the chance to do a new one.
I’m also happy to have the chance to write about a film called Casual Sex?, if just because I know that it will lead to the site getting a lot of hits from people doing google searches. They probably won’t actually be looking for a movie review but a hit is a hit!
Anyway, Casual Sex? is an 80s film. In fact, it’s such an 80s film that it probably spent the 90s recovering from an expensive coke habit. It’s a film about two best friends who have decided that they’re tired of being single. Stacy (Lea Thompson) is the promiscuous one, the one who has had many partners, has gotten involved in way too many needy relationships, and who is now freaking out over the spread of AIDS. Melissa (Victoria Jackson) is the sweet but ditzy one. Melissa has had boyfriends but she’s never had an orgasm. When Stacy tells her about an article she read about AIDS, Melissa replies that at least now she’s “not the only one who is afraid of sex.” Hoping to each find a permanent mate, Stacy and Melissa go to a health spa. Stacy immediately falls madly in love with Nick (Stephen Shellen), an aspiring musician. Melissa, meanwhile, meets the sensitive and sweet-natured Jamie (Jerry Levine), who works at the spa and gives a killer massage. Meanwhile, an annoying guy named Vinny (Andrew Dice Clay) pursues both of them and everyone else as well.
(Vinny leers at every woman that he sees and prefers to be known as the Vin Man. I know, I know. It’s hard to believe that he’s still single.)
Casual Sex? actually get off to a really good start. It opened with both Stacy and Melissa standing on an empty stage and discussing their sexual histories. Usually, I cringe whenever a movie opens with a character standing on a blank stage and talking directly to the audience. It usually feels like a lazy storytelling technique to me. (Can’t figure out a natural way to let the audience know a character’s backstory? Have them talk to directly to the audience! It’s easy and lazy!) But in Casual Sex?, this technique actually works. Lea Thompson and Victoria Jackson both give very natural and believable performances and the flashbacks to their previous experiences are all well-done and sometimes painfully relatable. Despite the fact that the film was made 30 years ago, their experiences and emotions felt timeless.
After that strong opening, the rest of the film was much more uneven. I have to admit that I had trouble telling how much of the film was meant to be satirical and how much of it was just a reflection of the time in which it was made. For instance, I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to be rolling my eyes at Nick, with his feathered hair and his overdramatic style of singing, or if that was just what was considered to be hot in the 80s. It was very confusing but, regardless of whether it was intentional or not, it was hard to take Nick seriously as anything more than a plot device. As a result, it was difficult to care about his relationship with Stacy. Melissa’s relationship with Jamie was far more interesting, largely because Jerry Levine was so likable in the role.
(Just in case anyone was wondering, Casual Sex? does feature a lot of sex but very little of it feels casual. Perhaps that’s why the title ends with a question mark. “Casual sex?” the film asks before answering, “No.”)
The film was ultimately too uneven to really be considered to be a success but I actually enjoyed it more than I thought I would. That was largely because of the performances of Lea Thompson, Victoria Jackson, and Jerry Levine. There’s a few scenes where Vinny drops his bluster and reveals a sensitive side and Andrew Dice Clay does well with these scenes but, ultimately, it’s hard to like anyone known as The Vin Man. I mean, he even has “Vin Man” written on the back of his jacket. Strangely, Clay’s performance here felt like an early version of his performance in Blue Jasmine, almost as if the Vin Man eventually changed his name to Augie and ended up marrying the sister-in-law of a Ponzi scheme manager.
Casual Sex? may not be great but it’s good enough for when you’re awake at one in the morning.
When renowned radio psychiatrist George Matlin (Charles Grodin) has a nervous breakdown, he takes a trip to Europe with his wife (Mary Gross) to both recover and also work on his marriage. (Matlin’s breakdown was the result of an extramarital affair.) Needing someone to host Dr. Matlin’s radio show, his producers call Dr. Lawrence Baird (David Clennon), who oversees a mental facility in Chicago. They assume that Dr. Baird is just dumb enough that they won’t have to worry about him overshadowing Dr. Matlin while he’s guest-hosting. However, when they call, Dr. Baird is out of his office and the phone is answered by John Burns (Dan Aykroyd), a con artist who has been pretending to be insane so that he can avoid serving time in prison. Pretending to be Baird, Burns accepts their offer and then escapes from the asylum and heads to Beverly Hills. The real Dr. Baird, not knowing about the offer, goes on vacation in Europe. Though Burns had originally only been planning on doing the radio job long enough to get paid enough money to head to Mexico, he soon becomes a celebrity with his non-nonsense, blunt advice.
Through the Shattered Lens 