Directed by Carl Reiner
Written by Carl Reiner, George Gipe and Steve Martin
1982/US
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube rental
Rigby Reardon: Carlotta was the kind of town where they spell trouble T-R-U-B-I-L, and if you try to correct them, they kill you.
This should have been better than it is.
The film is a spoof of classic film noir. Steve Martin plays private eye Rigby Reardon. He has been hired by Juliet Forrest (Rachel Ward) to find her father’s killer. The story is interspersed with scenes from films noir in which Steve Martin is inserted. So he meets up with Humphrey Bogart, Veronica Lake, Alan Ladd, etc. etc. The humor is broad and often dirty. With Carl Reiner as a butler.
This movie didn’t work for me. It’s like Reiner got so caught up in his gimmick that he didn’t bother to make the underlying story interesting. I also didn’t find it particularly funny but that’s always such a subjective thing. The movie got two “no” votes from Gene and Roger.
My mom took us to see it when it first came out. I’ve always liked it, and it has a few hilarious moments, like the one where Steve Martin has the Barbara Stanwyck role in Double Indemnity.
I’ve seen it a couple of times over the years. I watched it just a few years ago and I started keeping track of the films that are used. The only one I hadn’t seen was Body and Soul. Which I saw a few months later on TCM.
It’s not laugh-out-loud funny very often, but I still find it entertaining and clever and amusing.
I really need to see The Bribe. Charles Laughton and Vincent Price both hamming it up to the max!