Stats:

Movie:
Ruthless People

Stars:
Bette Midler
Danny DeVito
Judge Reinhold
Helen Slater
Anita Morris
Bill Pullman

Director:
Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, Jerry Zuker

Date: 1986

Bottom Line:
Highly Recommend. One of Midler's and DeVito's best movies.

Ruthless People

"I've been kidnapped by K-Mart!" cries Bette Midler when she finds out that her kidnappers are running a blue light special on her ransom price.

"Ruthless People" is one of the funniest movies I've ever seen. The cast is great, the writing was wonderful and the jokes keep coming and coming. The twist at the end is funny. My mom always likes to quote the line, "Et tu, Adolf?"

Danny DeVito is unhappily married to Bette Midler. As the movie starts, DeVito is looking for a way to kill Midler and get her out of his life. When he finds out she has been kidnapped, he is overjoyed to say the least even though he has to pretend to be overwrought in the presence of the police. Meanwhile, his mistress, Anita Morris, hates his guts also and is plotting with her dimwitted boyfriend, Bill Pullman to blackmail him. Pullman is supposed to take videos of DeVito killing Midler, but they are unaware that she has been kidnapped and accidentally take videos of the Chief of Police having a tryst with a prostitute.

Midler is held hostage by Helen Slater and Judge Reinhold as the gentle kidnappers who are trying to become ruthless, but just can't become so. DeVito has become the "King of Spandex", by stealing Slater's designs and marketing them as his own.

Midler takes advantage of her incarceration to have her own kind of fat farm and loses a ton of weight, while at the same time, she befriends her kidnappers. The friendship begins primarily after she finds out that DeVito won't pay her ransom.

The police suspect that DeVito did have something to do with her kidnapping and after he comes under suspicion, he HAS to pay the ransom. Midler works with her kidnappers to take him for everything he has, down to the Rolex watch on his wrist. The twist how she gets the money and the real kidnappers off the hook, can't be revealed here, or I'll spoil the ending.

The film's production design is a salute to the over-the-top interior design styles of the 1980s. Very high on style, but not very big on comfort. I'd still like to live there sometime (the style does seem to fit my design sensibilities).

Ruthless People was one of the big summer hits of 1987, but seems to be largely forgotten. It did not get very much broadcast time on cable or network TV in the years following it's release. I really don't understand why. But I strongly recommend this film. If you see it in the comedy section at the video store, don't hesitate to pick it up & rent it.