The Deal

This could have been good if it were actually funny. Humor is obviously subjective, but based on the 6.1 rating on here, most viewers did not subjectively find this film funny either.

There is not remotely a believable, moving, or memorable moment to save this unfunny "comedy." Macy usually provides some human warmth to his characters, but even he could not save this terrible script. Macy's relationship with Ryan is not touching, and the two have no chemistry whatsoever.

Also, Meg Ryan, who was never good looking to begin with, now looks like a freak: gross!

Grade: F

Bill Macy, Meg Ryan, Elliot Gould, and LL Cool J star in "The Deal" from 2008, directed by Steven Schachter and written by Macy and Schacter.

Macy plays another loser, this time Charlie Berns, who has a couple of producer credits on his resume, but they're not recent, and he can't get arrested. His nephew (Jason Ritter) gives him his script about Benjamin Disraeli to read. He's not interested in it but then he sees an article about a major star in adventure films, Bobby Mason (LL Cool J) who has converted to Judaism and wants to do a film with a Jewish theme for his next project.

Charlie manages to convince a studio that he has Bobby Mason's next kick your butt film and a studio executive, Deidre (Meg Ryan) is assigned to make it happen. Soon "Bill & Ben" is being filmed, with Berns' heartbroken nephew screaming, "There's not one word of my script in this." Then Bobby Mason is kidnapped and held for ransom, and the studio doesn't want to pay. But Deidre has an idea.

We've seen these behind the scenes getting a movie made before, and this is absurd but quite good. And how absurd is it? Probably not far off. Macy is excellent as Berns, who has been around the block a few times and knows how to talk his way into and out of trouble. This movie took a while to get made, so there's no doubt Macy knew what he was talking about when he wrote the script - I'm sure it wasn't a new experience for him.

Ryan's role could have been played by anyone, but at 47 and once the ingénue du jour (as Rene Zwelleger, Reese Witherspoon, Julia Roberts, Susan Sarandon, and Sally Field once were), she has a problem. While leading men are leading men from the time they're in their twenties until death, pert, pretty young actresses have a limited shelf life, and the transition to lead woman not only is difficult, it's often not even worth it since that doesn't last long either. Today things are much better -- at least 30 is no longer the cut-off like it was in Bette Davis' day -- but the fact remains, unless your name is Meryl Streep, you'll be in character roles by the time you're 55. If you have a job. So I can't blame her for doing this role.

Good, enjoyable movie, especially if you're a writer and know what happens to scripts in Hollywood.

I saw half this film by accident on cable TV, and then went out and bought a copy the next day for 3$ (Sorry Bill). And was very happy to watch it twice. Although i had never heard of it. Look, it's a good movie. 99% of all films being made these are rubbish or you could say 99.9%! The Deal was a few cameos short of brilliant and a bit light on the darker sides. Macy was great as usual, when is not. I feel Macy's character had to be more depressed and a little more crazy and the film needed more of The Player and less Bowfinger. Satire is not laugh out loud comedy it is often just relief that you are finally watching something good. This film would have been a very hard sell, with a smaller budget than Bill and Ben and I'm sure Ryan was working for free or being blackmailed into making the film. This being said they had very good chemistry, although anyone could with Macy, he is probably the best actor working in America-period!!!!! This film type is now a genre with Entourage and Tropic Thunder etc... It is a great shame this film suffers from what is exactly this film is about-the B.S in Hollywood- the out-door luney bin!!! Bill Macy needs to have his own T.V show where he is a producer!!!

Saw it last night (April 5th) at Philly Film Festival. Mr. Macy, Jason Ritter and Fiona Glascott were all present and were gracious to the max.

This film was clearly a labor of love and had a very difficult "birthing". But it never connected with me in any significant way (especially the "quasi-insider making of a movie" road it took us down).

Macy as ALWAYS is magnificent. Meg Ryan is...well Meg Ryan and that is NOT all things bad. I think Jason Ritter has a great future in the business (and did fine work in the late and very lamented TV Show Joan of Arcadia too).

But I thought the plot as far as I could discern it was both muddled and totally unbelievable. I know it made sense to folks more in tune with things that could go right/wrong/changes of direction in getting a film greenlighted and made.But I'm far from an insider so the references were quite lost on me for the most part.

To me it doesn't quite make it as satire (or I didn't get it) and not funny enough to be a sustained comedy.

But I truly hope it is just me and this film gets an audience and makes $$ for those (especially Mr. Macy) who put their heart, soul and funds into its making.

Just saw the film tonight at the 25th annual Jerusalem Film Festival, screened in the "Jewish Experience" category. This is of course not surprising since the film is hugely fun, mixing Judaism/Israeli aspects into a wonderful satire of Hollywood filmdom. Don't take this film too seriously, although the acting is wonderful, with everyone clearly knowing it's all in fun. Despite that, I really got into the 'vibe' of the story, waiting to see whether they'd manage to finish making the film - whichever one it'll be. The whole Jewish angle of the film is of course especially fun for us here in Israel, and even more so because Israeli actor Sharon Reginiano plays Levy the director and inserts all sorts of comments in Hebrew which may be lost to non-Hebrew speakers, even if they are translated. The film reminded me very much of "The Hebrew Hammer" (2003) with Adam Goldberg which I saw at the JFF of that year. Both films use the Jewish/Israeli/Hebrew slants to the max and are extremely tongue-in-cheek, satirizing their respective genres. Don't over-analyze or dissect this film - just see it for what it is, a fun satire of Hollywood movie-making and all it involves. Don't know if this'll catch on in the overall US/worldwide markets, but we here sure enjoyed it. And if it does go straight to DVD, no matter - just enjoy it that way!