FAQ

Fearing that someone is trying to kill him while he's incarcerated in Sing Sing Prison, retired Mafia boss Paul Vitti (Robert De Niro) fakes insanity and starts singing tunes from West Side Story (1961) (1961) until the FBI contacts his therapist, Dr Ben Sobel (Billy Crystal), who is currently mourning the loss of his father. When Sobel confirms that Vitti apparently is having a temporary psychotic disorder, the FBI decides to release him into Sobel's custody so that Vitti can get the help he needs. It's now Ben's job to find gainful employment for Vitti and to keep him on the straight-and-narrow. Meanwhile, Ben's own life starts to unravel under the stress.

Analyze That is a sequel to Reine Nervensache (1999) (1999), which was scripted by American screenwriters Peter Tolan and Kenneth Lonergan along with director Harold Ramis. Tolan and Ramis plus American screenwriter Peter Steinfeld co-wrote the screenplay for Analyze That. The story idea is said to have been inspired by an article in The New York Times about the use of psychotherapy in the TV show Die Sopranos (1999) (1999-2007) that questioned whether the criminal mind could be turned.

At the end of Analyze This, Vitti is sentenced to 18 months at Sing Sing, but it doesn't tell when Vitti might be eligible for parole. At the beginning of Analyze That, FBI agent says that Vitti's parole hearing is coming up in four weeks. Assuming that a parole hearing would take place before the end of the sentence, a guess might be a year, maybe less.