Movers & Shakers

My review was written in April 1985 after watching the movie at a Midtown Manhattan screening room.

"Movers & Shakers" is an unsuccessful insider's look at the foibles of the creative end of Hollywood filmmaking. Comedy is only occasionally amusing and faces a bleak box office future. Pic was lensed without announcement to the trade last spring under the more appropriate title "Dreamers".

First of twin stories concerns the production chief of a studio, Joe Mulholland (Walter Matthau), who is dedicated to making a meaningful, quality picture in tribute to his hero, ailing producer Saul Gritz (Vincent Gardenia). Buying the rights (literally, just the title) to the bestselling manual "Love in Sex" as a result of a deathbed promise to Gritz, Mulhollnad hires successful screenwriter Herb Derman (Charles Grodin) to try and come up with an idea for the impossible project. Meanwhile, second sory is about Derman, whio is having extreme personal problems with his withdrawn wife Nancy (Tyne Daly), who won't let him touch her.

Mulholland is in trouble with his boss Louis Martin (William Prince) as thee studio, especially after installing a huge model dinosaur that cost $1,000,000 and "only moved a little" (for a special effects epic that never got made) as a monument to the man who dreamed it up, Gritz. As the film project goes awry, Derman's marital problems are paralleled by the slapstick violent relationship of the film's goofy directo Sid Spokane (William Macy) and his girlfriend, soon to be his wife, Livia (Gilda Radner).

In his original screenplay for "Movers & Shakers", Grodin takes various potshots at lamentable filmmaking trends, including in-jokes such as the dinosaur which instantly recalls the recalcitrant title figure in Dino De Laurentiis' "King Kong' remake that co-starred Grodin. He scores his best points in presenting production meetings where a lot of thinking-out-loud occurs.

Unfortunately, the film is overburdened with extensive voiceover narration by Grodin, which steals the spotlight from the central character expertly essayed by Matthau. What's more, we find out nothing about the personal life of Matthau's production topper persona, while the Daly-Grodin relationship remains cryptic and cannot sustain the emphasis placed upon it. Vet comedy director William Asher (who piloted the 1982 tv version of "Charley's Aunt" starring Grodin) fails to bring any visual style to this low-budget feature, whose talky format will probably play better on tv.

An unusually interesting cast has been recruited, with solid support provided by Macy, Radner and Daly. Stev Martin guests in a seven-minute cameo s a Ramon Novarro-era latin star, but it is not prime comedy material and Martin's ego-trip spoof is similar (but inferious by comparison) to Billy Crystal's patented Frenando Lamas takeoff. It's also as pleasure to see Nita Talbot as an acerbic cowork, Joe Mantell as Derman's agent and in a small role, Luana Anders, who co-starred in 1964 in Grodin's first feature (for AIP), "Sex and the College Girl".

This is surely one of the worst movies ever made. A comedy without a single laugh. The stupidity of the script, blame Charles Grodin for the entire film, is amazing. Steve Martin's performance was low, even for him. In short, awful and without redeeming features.

Most films start with good intentions by all the people involved in its creative process. It's a nightmare for the studio that produces a film like "Movers and Shakers" to watch the project turned into a lemon that no one will ever see. In fact, it was a surprise this showed recently on cable. Based on some of the names involved in it, we decided to take a look. Well, let's assume all the people that participated in it, won't include this experience in their resumes for future jobs within the movie industry.

It's also a puzzle as to why did a talented man of the stature of Walter Matthau ever saw in the possibility of this turkey having any future. For that matter, Charles Grodin, who wrote the screen play, is seen as a writer who hasn't figured out how to do an adaptation of the book the dying studio head wants to be made into a film. It appears that Mr. Grodin was writing about what would be his own role in this ill conceived movie.

Better keep surfing channels until something better is found.

"Movers & Shakers" is a film written by Charles Grodin and he also produced and starred in the movie. In many ways, it reminds me of "The Player", as it's a look at some of the insiders who run Hollywood. However, the film is no where nearly as clever or enjoyable at "The Player"...in fact, it seems to have little sense of direction as well.

The story is about a film project whose pedigree is odd. On a friend's deathbed, Joe (Walter Matthau) promises to make a movie using the same title as a famous sex book! The rest of the story is about the process...where the producers, director and writer all hash out what the film will be. Sadly, apart from the title, there's really not much more to their film.

Again and again, I kept hoping this movie would get better and funnier. It seemed like the folks who MADE the film thought it was clever....but it never translated to the audience and is therefore a directionless and mostly unfunny comedy with some good acting.

One of my favorite films of all time. So very quotable with an unforgettable performance from Bill Macy. This film stands up to many, many viewings. I've seen it over 25 times.