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#2 - Overboard
Garry Marshall, 1987
After a spoiled heiress falls off a boat and develops amnesia, a blue-collar carpenter decides to convince her that she is actually his wife.
In a genre that has spawned as many unintentionally absurd and twisted premises as the romantic comedy has, Overboard somehow stands out as one of the most twisted. It sets up a simple enough pair of polar opposites - the incredibly stuck-up socialite (Goldie Hawn) and the lower-class handyman (Kurt Russell) that she hires to carry out some renovations on her yacht. However, when Hawn contracts amnesia after falling off her yacht one night and is abandoned to a psychiatric ward by her self-centred husband, Russell decides to pretend to be her husband out of some crude idea of revenge after she had already stiffed him over the aforementioned renovations. Though Hawn cannot remember her identity, she still retains her same snobby personality and thus the film gleans most of its comedy from her struggling to adjust to Russell's good-ole-boy lifestyle, which includes looking after his feral sons and his dilapidated homestead.
Overboard could have been at least somewhat tolerable if it was capable of providing some actual amusement to compensate for its incredibly problematic premise, but that's unfortunately not the case here. I have previously claimed that I could watch Russell in anything, but this film definitely pushes that claim to its breaking point as his easygoing charm isn't quite enough to make up for his character's misguided but inexcusable actions. Hawn's turn as a haughty rich-bitch is naturally supposed to be aggravating enough that you take some pleasure in her inevitable humiliations, but she's never reprehensible enough to make her rather severe comeuppance ever feel justified. Other performers tend to be either dull or irritating, especially one of Russell's kids constantly doing a Pee-Wee Herman impression that really grates on the nerves. Though Overboard does seem to have an idea of how creepy its premise sounds, it struggles to make it even remotely palatable due to the incredibly weak romantic elements and the complete absence of any worthwhile jokes.
Garry Marshall, 1987
After a spoiled heiress falls off a boat and develops amnesia, a blue-collar carpenter decides to convince her that she is actually his wife.
In a genre that has spawned as many unintentionally absurd and twisted premises as the romantic comedy has, Overboard somehow stands out as one of the most twisted. It sets up a simple enough pair of polar opposites - the incredibly stuck-up socialite (Goldie Hawn) and the lower-class handyman (Kurt Russell) that she hires to carry out some renovations on her yacht. However, when Hawn contracts amnesia after falling off her yacht one night and is abandoned to a psychiatric ward by her self-centred husband, Russell decides to pretend to be her husband out of some crude idea of revenge after she had already stiffed him over the aforementioned renovations. Though Hawn cannot remember her identity, she still retains her same snobby personality and thus the film gleans most of its comedy from her struggling to adjust to Russell's good-ole-boy lifestyle, which includes looking after his feral sons and his dilapidated homestead.
Overboard could have been at least somewhat tolerable if it was capable of providing some actual amusement to compensate for its incredibly problematic premise, but that's unfortunately not the case here. I have previously claimed that I could watch Russell in anything, but this film definitely pushes that claim to its breaking point as his easygoing charm isn't quite enough to make up for his character's misguided but inexcusable actions. Hawn's turn as a haughty rich-bitch is naturally supposed to be aggravating enough that you take some pleasure in her inevitable humiliations, but she's never reprehensible enough to make her rather severe comeuppance ever feel justified. Other performers tend to be either dull or irritating, especially one of Russell's kids constantly doing a Pee-Wee Herman impression that really grates on the nerves. Though Overboard does seem to have an idea of how creepy its premise sounds, it struggles to make it even remotely palatable due to the incredibly weak romantic elements and the complete absence of any worthwhile jokes.