The hitman next door is a miss "The Whole Nine Yards" Reviewed by John Haywood Overall Rating: **
Somewhere along the line, mobsters became fair game for comedies. "Analyze This," about a mafioso in psychotherapy, and "Gun Shy," a romantic comedy focusing on a police officer pursuing the mob, both had funny previews. I haven't seen either movie (in fact, "Gun Shy" hasn't been released yet), but, like them, "The Whole Nine Yards" had amusing previews--unfortunately, "The Whole Nine Yards" isn't as good as its advertising. Nicholas "Oz" Oseransky (Matthew Perry) is an unsuccessful dentist and a henpecked husband. His wife, Sophie (Rosanna Arquette) dragged him back to her native Montreal and berates him for not making enough money. Then, when he comes home from work one day, he meets his new neighbor. He soon realizes his new neighbor is Jimmy "The Tulip" Tudeski (Bruce Willis), an ex-hitman hiding from mobster Yanni Gogolack (Kevin Pollack). Just when Oz starts to build a tense friendship with Jimmy, his wife puts him on a plane to Chicago so he can tip off the mob and collect the bounty on Tudeski's head. Oz plans to meet with a friend in Chicago, maybe have an affair, and, above all, avoid any contact with the mob; but when he finds hitman Frankie Figs (Michael Clarke Duncan) in his hotel room, his plans soon change. "The Whole Nine Yards" doesn't quite know whether it wants to be a comedy or a crime movie--and fails twice as a result. It's amusing when Oz first realizes who his new neighbor is--and instantly goes from a slight feeling of deja vu to sheer terror. What's funny for two minutes begins to get annoying after an hour. The problem is that the movie takes all the mob activities perfectly seriously, and relies on Oz's awkwardness around the criminals as the sole source of jokes. We have mob enforcers planning to kill each other, and only one poor schmuck tripping over himself and drinking himself blind in the background as a distraction. This gives the audience a few funny moments, such as when Oz runs into a glass door, or when Jimmy throws Oz a beer--and the stunned Oz doesn't even try to catch it. Most straight crime-dramas are funnier and much less tedious, than "The Whole Nine Yards." The movie also strains credibility in several places. For instance, why does Oz stay with his shrew of a wife? When she and her mother are ruining his personal, professional, and financial lives, how could the disastrous divorce settlement he fears possibly be worse? It's not love--putting aside their mutual acrimony, while he's in Chicago, Oz falls in love with another woman; of course, the awkward protagonist falling in love with the worst possible woman at the worst possible time, with no explanation other than the fact that the woman in question was there and vaguely disliked him (old romantic comedy technique--if you hate someone, it's true love), doesn't exactly help the film's credibility either. Neither does the fact that his lover--who nearly everyone else in the film has a reason to kill--is still alive despite her frequent contact with mobsters. It might be one thing if the non sequiturs were funny, but they're not jokes; they're just careless writing. The movie isn't a total loss. There are a few funny moments. Bruce Willis delivers a strong performance; his character isn't as complex as Dr. Crowe from "The Sixth Sense" (or even Harry Stamper from "Armageddon"), but, there's something to an actor who can make a mob hitman likeable. Similarly, Michael Clarke Duncan is also charming (though at this point, I'm not sure what it says when a movie's only likeable characters are mass murderers). While "The Whole Nine Yards" may try to appear kinder and gentler than your average crime movie, don't let that fool you. There are several on-screen murders, plenty of strong language, a fairly strong sex scene, and full frontal nudity. Apparently, the expression "the whole nine yards" comes from World War II machine gunners' ammunition belts being nine yards long--"the whole nine yards" meant that you shot off all you could without reloading. In contrast, while the title phrase may tell of a lot of ammunition, the movie "The Whole Nine Yards" itself fires blanks.
Title: "The Whole Nine Yards" Release date: February 18, 2000 MPAA rating: R Overall rating: ** Aprox. run time: 99 min. Director: Jonathan Lynn Writers: Mitchell Kapner Stars: Bruce Willis, Matthew Perry, Natasha Henstridge (as Cynthia)
Explanation of ratings: ***** If you had to pay $100 to see it, it'd still be worth it. **** Buy the video for $20. *** Probably worth $6.50 for the ticket--worth $1.50 to rent. ** Not even worth the time to see it--let alone the money. * Don't see it unless someone pays you at least $50 to sit through it.
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