MovieChat Forums > Brewster's Millions (1985) Discussion > Nothing about this movie makes any sense

Nothing about this movie makes any sense

posted a year ago by avortac4 (3751)
3 replies | jump to latest

There are many problems with this movie.

If a movie is good, I can overlook some problems - heck, many of the 'great classics' of the eighties are full of problems, plotholes, nonsensical things and more.

However, the biggest problem with this movie, in my opinion (!), is that this..

..movidoesn't very well.

FLOW.

I was trying to mimic a bit how clunky this movie is by writing in a really clunky way as well, but I can't do it justice. The movie starts slow, awful, nonsensical and weird, not to mention boring.

'Sports' is the most boring thing you can put to a movie, which should be able to express escapism to the fullest, which means anything in the Universe and Beyond should be possible to see in a movie. What do we see? A boring baseball match, unexplained TRAIN slowly moving about the screen, stopping that uninteresting match, making it even more boring, barfight and a prison. If you can endure the ridiculously zoomed-in camerawork and bad directing (I never usually notice 'directing', but there were so many odd choices, even I could notice it)..

..you can finally get to the point where the premise starts being explained.

Let's talk about this ridiculous, over-used premise (I have read and seen so many stories where someone has to spend a lot of money or they won't get any, yada yada).

So he has to spend 30 million to get 300 million. He could also use the 'wimp clause' to get 1 million (almost 3 million in today's money - what can you reasonably buy with 30 or 300 million that you can't with 3? I mean, you could 'secure your life' very comfortably with 3 million and still have lots of 'play-around' money you can throw away without losing anything important).

Now, this kind of very STRICT rules would require CONSTANT observation, almost 'surveillance' level stuff, every single receipt counted for, every single action and word he utters observed, listened to, captured, and so on.

This premise would require a TEAM of experts that make SURE Richard Pryor's character doesn't make even one mistake.

Otherwise, he can cheat SO easily, don't you think? One back alley deal with someone to hold 15 million in some made-up corporation or trust in someone else's name, and then manufacture made-up receipts or whatnot..

Also, what's to stop him from KEEPING the 30 million and doing whatever he wants with it?

(It's kinda ridiculous that it's CASH anyway, but whatever)

I mean, once he has it, who's gonna stop him, if he decides to fly to some exotic tax-heaven country, change his name and appearance (plastic surgery isn't expensive if you have 30 million), just 'handle' his money from thereon and live happily ever after with ever-expanding fortune (playing the stock market alone would increase it easily to 100 million in the eighties, if you know what you're doing - check 'Gordon Gecko' for reference)..

The most irritating point about all of this is that it's all his decision. Why is he allowed to OVERpay for anything and everything? Then why offer such small sums?

The point here is, if he's ALLOWED TO CUSTOMIZE what he pays to people, WHY NOT PAY THE MAXIMUM POSSIBLE AMOUNT instead of 5000 bucks? This makes no sense. He just comes up with random sums, but nothing in the movie explains why they HAVE to be those sums, or why THOSE amounts of money make some kind of sense (they don't).

He pays the hotel 2 million bucks to stay there, but why not pay 5 million? What's stopping that? Why is he even allowed to pay 2 million for something that should cost only 100 000?

If he's allowed to OVERPAY, then he can just buy 1 hooker, pay 30 million for her services at the end of the month, and he has 300 million.

This movie makes NO sense on so, SO many levels, I can't even try to begin to start listing it all.

It's also rare to see John Candy, perhaps the most 'endearing', 'lovable', etc. actor and usually characters as well, be this annoying, irritating and horrible to watch. I LOVE John Candy, I have watched about everything he's in, even the duds, but never have I hated him before this movie. Holy cow, how can it even be possible?

This movie is so badly directed, it barely flows at all, Pryor's character is the same, always-screaming goofball he's in every other movie, these two have no harmonious energy (I REFUSE to use the word 'chemistry', as that means something completely else, and how well two people/actors/characters gel in a movie has nothing to do with anything 'chemistrylike')..

The premise also gets very tiresome very quickly. So he has to spend a lot of money without gaining assets or giving it away - but he CAN buy lunches to people? What? Isn't that GIVING IT AWAY?

Can he buy assets, then give THOSE away? (which is what 'buying lunch for someone else IS)

He was even thinking of buying some diamond necklace for the man-faced short-haired fema-fascist hag, but she, of course, being a vegana carrier, is SO noble, she would NEVER accept an expensive gift while there are people starving..

[–] avortac4 (3751) a year ago

This movie is the opposite of 'lightning in a bottle'.

When the right people combine to make the right kind of premise in the right kind of way, the movie can become accidentally better than it has any right to be.

This premise is nothing to type home about, but even so, the people that gathered to make this mess seem to have been the wrong people at the wrong time, doing the wrong kind of stuff in the wrong kind of way. The musics are tedious (which is a miracle in itself, considering this is made in 1985, which I still have trouble believing), the camera angles are horrible, the constant noise is groan-inducing and irritating, the music is too loud when people speak, John Candy is unlikable, the audio side is horrible (listen to the echo in the 'jail cell', which is ridiculously small).. the whole court scene is just cringe instead of funny, plus it's unrealistic to get 3000 bucks bail for a barfight like that, considering people do MUCH WORSE in those 'Wisconsin police cam' videos and get 'all charges dropped' or '50 dollar bail'..

I haven't watched the full movie, granted, but I am not sure I want to.

This movie REEKS of someone just wanting to make a movie to make money, instead of having a really good story they wanted to tell in their own, unique style, so the audiences would be a little bit internally richer and happier for it.

It smells heavily of 'boardroom meeting' where someone desperately pitches the stupidest idea they read from some old comic book, then discover some guy had already written a completely obsolete book about that stupid idea, and then buying the rights to that and just casting some big starts of the time.

They forgot the movie would actually have to be good, the story would actually have to be told well, the direction would also have to be better than 'phoning it in' and so on.. What is Baby's dad doing in a turd like this, I can never undrstand.

In any case, this movie plays way too loose with those rules..

[–] avortac4 (3751) a year ago

..not only that, but the premise is pretty idiotic, and here's why:

Smoking cigars/cigarettes until you puke feels bad. Smoking pretty much anything when you are a kid feels bad, unless it's some kind of psychedelic, which I do not recommend.

But spending money has a pleasure aspect to it, that can be pretty high - there are also grandeur about 'omnipotence' to it - when you feel like you can buy anything, you start feeling you can do anything. The amount you could travel with a lot of money, the physical satisfaction you could get on all possible levels, in the most optimal ways possible.. then there are things like customizing your location perfectly, being able to always arrange your circumstances and environment to your liking, and so on.

Of course it will feel thin at some point, when you have 'done it all' - after you have driven your 9th Lamborghini very fast in the mountain roads of Alps, it's gonna lose its luster.

But it's never gonna be as bad-feeling as smoking multiple cigars/cigarettes as a kid, it's not gonna make you vomit, it just loses its luster and that's it. So this premise DOES NOT WORK, spending enormous amount of money in 30 days will NOT make you feel anything comparable to smoking 30 cigars in a closet or whatever.

Then there's the 'wimp clause', and I have a LOT to say about that.

1) One million is a LOT of money in 1985, equivalent to around 2.8 or 2.9 million, we can round that to 3 million for simplicity. With 3 million in today's money, you could buy yourself a decent, pretty big house in a really good location/environment with lakes, forests, trees, etc. You could arrange your life to your liking, including hobbies, machines, computers, consoles, arcane cabinets, food, and so on. You could hire a cook, even if just for once a week or once a month.

You could travel to your heart's content, buy luxury cars, you name it. Basically you could at least 'reasonably' do 'anything you always wanted'.

[–] avortac4 (3751) a year ago

At least you could arrange the 'basics of life' that most poeple dream about - house, travel, cars/motorbikes, pools, food, even social life (to an extent) to your liking. People are drawn to wealthy people, so you wouldn't have to 'buy' friends, but in a way, you would be in a great position to meet more people that 'like you' than ever.

So basically all your needs could be met in the most optimal way you can possibly imagine in this kind of a world.

2) You could 'secure' your life with that kind of money, meaning you would never have to work or worry about 'welfare' or whatnot. You could just live in your mansion and look at the view while creating pixel art that your programming team will make into a game or 'story', or hire an orchestra to play something you composed on your Commodore 64 to see how it would sound.

I mean, that kind of opportunities would be endless with that sort of money and wealth. You could 'relax' for the rest of your life, do anything you want - it would even be easy to be 'spiritual', as you could helicopter your way to some distant mountain haven no one else can get to, and just be one with the nature there while meditating.

3) Obviously, you could make it grow. Don't know how? Give some accountant 87000 dollars and he'll help you grow that money into a larger pile of money, so it would practically never run out. You don't need to GET 30 or 300 million bucks, you can just make your 3 million GROW, and who cares if it reaches all the way, when you can do so much with just 3 anyway?

4) Think about it - except for RIDICULOUS things like private jet, what can you do with 30 or 300 million that you can't do with 3? It seems like 'more is better', but after you have 'secured' your life and indulged in every fantasy you ever had, what's left to do that you can't do with 3 million or even 2 million? You have your house, lake cabin, all cars/vehicles you want, all computers/consoles/etc. you want, you have traveled to every location..