Die Überlebenskünstler

I gave it a 8 , and my wife thought it was a 6. Then this film must be a 7. If you have ever been hit by hard luck, one can relate with these characters. Robin Williams, when he was at his funniest, performs this rambling nonsense. Especially when he tells the events of the robbery to his fiancee, does a tv counterpoint (ie there would be no criminals if there were no victims, unless the criminals robbed other criminals, but I am diluting here) and acts out a gun battle. Walter Matthau plays the crabby straight guy who tries to fix events. Small role for Jerry Reed, watch the gas station scene; it's funny. Comedy is so hard to do, it's an art, much easier to make a horror film or action movie, but to get comedy right you have too hit a groove. This film does it!

The Survivors is not the Best film of any of the casts' careers, but I found it pretty funny for the most part. Matthau's sticks to his grouchy old man routine and Williams to his manic everyman. The rest of the cast is OK. There is a little social commentary which is a little dated by now, but still. I liked it.

the "survivors" is absolutely one of the finest comedies i've come across. never is williams better than when playing the deluded idiot, and this is his finest hour in that persona. matthau's opposite, more reserved approach works perfectly to temper williams' madness. and jerry reed is fantastic as the hit man who may or may not have been responsible for teamster boss jimmy hoffa's disappearance. i must urge those (and there are many) who consider this classic to be a turkey to give it another chance.

Young upper management executive Donald (Williams) gets canned as part of a restructuring. With his mind occupied by that he quite accidentally leaves a sizable gasoline spill outside a petrol station/auto shop just before its crotchety old proprietor Sonny (Mathau) tosses a stale cancer stick. After that Sonny no longer owns a petrol station/auto shop. Neither man really sees the other or knows what really happened.

These suddenly desperate sad-sacks converge on the local unemployment office whilst Jack (Reed) - one other more desperate yet decidedly more volatile individual is also there. At a nearby diner, while Donald and Sonny are sulking after a miserable day at the mercy of the federal bureaucracy, Jack shows up with a loaded gun and tries to rob the place. Jack has been pushed too far which results in his pushing Donald and Sonny too far. They foil the robbery but Donald is shot. Jack easily orchestrates his getaway.

Becoming cause celebres for their daring good deed in the incident doesn't help Donald or Sonny. The media ridicules them. Worse, Jack gets their names from the news reports and goes hunting after them as Sonny struggles through odd jobs and Donald alienates his fiancé by going to live at a survivalist camp. Tracking Donald to the camp by threatening Sonny, Jack is determined to finally silence both of the odd couple friends. Donald - exhilarated by the whole experience craves a final confrontation.

The film starts quite well to hook the viewer but most of the truly funny material is to be found at the beginning. By the middle it lags and lingers as gaping plot holes remain. The final thirty minutes are mostly unwatchable in the run-up to a nonsensical conclusion. They appeared to be looking for absolutely anything with which they could fashion a satisfactory conclusion for the final cut.

"The Survivors" is characteristic of Robin Williams's movies before "Good Morning, Vietnam": innocuously silly. In this case, he and Walter Matthau join up after surviving a robbery, and Williams becomes a survivalist. The whole thing is pretty goofy - maybe even pointless - but some of the gags make up for that. I will say that it's not the funniest movie for either star by a long shot; both have done far better than this. But, it's the sort of movie that you sit around in your underwear and watch; it does a respectable job showing both stars' talents. Good for a few laughs.

Shooting a man's gun. Ha!