The Wrong Guy (1997)

July 30, 2024 4:14 PM

After his boss is murdered, Nelson is on the run for fear of prosecution. He hides out in a small town to avoid the police, which should be easy because they know he didn't do it and they aren't looking for him.

This absolutely tanked at the box office, and was a catastrophe for Foley's career, and Steinberg as a film director.

A contentious movie in our house -- my wife isn't a fan, but I think it's a top 5 comedy for me. Dave Foley is perfectly cast as a panicky nebbish who spends the entire movie fleeing police who aren't chasing him, Jennifer Tilly gets to flex some comedy chops that will later serve her well as a Child's Play franchise mainstay, Colm Feore is impeccable as the steely-eyed and frequently baffled killer.

So much here to love, for me, culminating in the hostage 'negotiation' ("we can't return the helicopter!"). Tons of great little cameos and silliness throughout, too. An early-fame Barenaked Ladies as doo-wop cops, Kevin McDonald running the motel, Joe Flaherty as the poor small-town banker being threatened by the greedy farmers out to destroy his livelihood. David Anthony Higgins absolutely chopping it up as the world's worst cop; Enrico Colantoni (Veronica Mars' dad!) spitting conspiracies.

I threw this on after coming back from a rep cinema screening of Strangers on a Train, having a hankering for the best (only?) Hitchcock satire I've ever seen. I think this one really deserves reappraisal.

posted by Shepherd (11 comments total)

How can I have never heard of this film? Now I have to find it.
posted by miss-lapin at 10:46 PM on July 30 [1 favorite]

I just watched this recently after reading an old My Year of Flops about it. I'd never heard of it before, and it is indeed super funny. It's dumb idea after dumb idea, played straight. Now that I think about it, it's sort of an American Quentin Dupieux movie; a crazy premise taken seriously to it's (il)logial conclusion.

You can watch the entire thing on the official Kids In The Hall YouTube channel.
posted by mrphancy at 7:00 AM on July 31 [4 favorites]

How can I have never heard of this film? Now I have to find it.

Luckily, the whole thing is on YouTube!
posted by Crane Shot at 9:19 AM on July 31 [2 favorites]

My name? Enema Bag Jones!
posted by AndrewInDC at 9:52 AM on July 31 [1 favorite]

Well, that was a delight. I remember when it came out but never got around to watching because it seemed like it probably was not good in that particular way Canadian movies that aren't dark explorations of the erotic psyche frequently are. Whomever decided to Benny Hill speed-up that shot of Foley running on the dirt road in the trailer should have been beaten mercilessly, poor David Steinberg.

If you have the intestinal fortitude, make a double bill of this and Dave Foley's 1986 film debut High Stakes, which is absolutely not good in any way, though Foley already has his hapless twit character down pretty solid.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 12:00 PM on July 31 [1 favorite]

I have never seen this and it's too late tonight for me to make much progress in it but I decided to turn it on while I finish a few things before bed. Whatever else the movie may hold, I am digging the opening credits and establishing shot - which clearly demonstrate familiarity on someone's part with the body of material I expect the rest of the movie will be parodying. That is at least a promising sign.
posted by Nerd of the North at 12:17 AM on August 1

I like this movie a great deal too, having stumbled upon it on cable years ago. But I can see why it didn't work at the box office. It suffers from the same fate as so many movies made by sketch comedy people: it's less a story than a series of sketches strung together on a relatively thin thread.

I might compare it to Airplane, which succeeds brilliantly despite coming from similar roots. ZAZ were a group of writers doing sketches together in Kentucky Fried Theater, then piled a bunch of them into Kentucky Fried Movie, before doing Airplane. And Airplane certainly has sketch elements, including long flashback cutaways from its main storyline. But because Airplane was built on the bones of the existing Zero Hour, it holds together and keeps cohesion in a way The Wrong Guy doesn't. It kind of tries. The real killer is after him, etc. But it's very thin.

The sketches themselves are hit or miss. But that said, when this movie does hit, it's fantastic. The scene where Foley wakes up in the hospital and tries desperately to come up with a phony name for himself is brilliant.

Recommended for the good bits, and the whole thing is apparently up on YouTube.
posted by Naberius at 5:31 AM on August 1 [1 favorite]

Cut from Foley's character, who is absent from his job and wandering aimlessly in a wooded area, back to the boardroom..

"Okay, before we continue on I'd just like to make a special acknowledgement to Nelson Hibbert, whose procurement department has increased its efficiency level by an astonishing 30% in just the last week.."

posted by Nerd of the North at 1:29 AM on August 6 [1 favorite]

Now that I've finished it I will say that it deserved more recognition than it got. It may not be among the best comedies ever made but it's an above-average genre pastiche with a few superior moments and I appreciate that it has fun along the way using and subverting elements of the kinds of suspense films it's imitating. It was clearly made by someone with an affection for such films, as someone has done a good job of selecting scenes, shots, and incidental music that evoke classic Hitchcockian suspense and its many imitations.

Also, I particularly enjoyed this exchange near the film's climax:

The Killer:

"Stay back or the Super-Cop gets it!"

Detective Arlen:

"What Super-Cop?"

The Killer:

"The Super-Cop I'm holding hostage."

Detective Arlen:

"Are you saying that there's a third hostage we cannot see?"

The Killer (to Nelson):

"You're not a Super-Cop are you? You're just an ordinary idiot."

Nelson (to Killer):

"No! I'm.. I'm.. I'm..."

Nelson (abandoning the pretense and turning to Lynn):

"I'm sorry, Lynn, I'm not a Super-Cop."

Lynn:

"Oh, I kind of figured. I just didn't want to embarrass you in front of the killer."

posted by Nerd of the North at 12:26 AM on August 15 [1 favorite]

Also, just out of curiosity: is the "kitch" tag applied to this thread meant to be "kith" (i.e. "Kids in the Hall") or "kitsch" or does "kitch" mean something in this context?
posted by Nerd of the North at 7:53 PM on August 16

KITH plus typo! Thank you for pointing it out, I'll edit it.
posted by Shepherd at 7:10 AM on August 18 [1 favorite]