Themes: Office Politics, Ladder to the Top, Military Life
Main Cast: Dudley Moore, Eddie Murphy, Kate Capshaw, Helen Shaver, George Dzundza
Release Year: 1984
Country: US
Run Time: 94 minutes
Plot
Dudley Moore and Eddie Murphy try but fail to bring this flat comedy to life, while the story itself is hampered by intercutting between the years of 1982 in Los Angeles (Moore) and 1984 in Kuwait (Murphy), with no explanation of how these two disparate people and locations are related. Wylie (Moore) is an inept engineer trying to perfect a gyro system for his employers who contract projects with the U.S. defense department. Wylie accidentally gets some blueprints for another type of gyro -- and his company successfully manufactures the part, much to almost everyone's benefit. Unfortunately, these plans are coveted by a certain ruthless industrial spy (David Rasch), and the FBI itself is suspicious about the origins of the blueprints in Wylie's hands. Meanwhile (and in constant interspersed segments), Landry (Murphy) is trying to get his tank to stay on course, but no matter what he does the machine swerves and lunges at random -- could there be a gyro at fault here? ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
David Rasche - Jeff, Spy; Mark Arnott - Brank; Peter Michael Goetz - Joyner; Tom Noonan - Holtzman; Gabi Amrani - Old Villager; Gary Bayer - Lubell; Raye Birk - Sonny; Stephen Bradley - Deputy Director; Burton Collins - Cameraman; Paul Comi - Chief Agent; Ellen Crawford - Sonya; Rick Dees - Himself; Jake Dengel - Doorman; Gene Dynarski - Gil; Paul Eiding - Tourist; Deborah Fallender - Toni; Lorry Goldman - Rupp; Rozsika Halmos - Seamstress; Darryl Henriques - Col. Zayas; John Hostetter - Quirk; Jim Jansen - Lieutenant; Sanford Jensen - 2nd Engineer; Christopher Maher - Sayyid; William Marquez - Padilla; David Paymer - Kurly; Joel Polis - 1st Agent; Dennis Redfield - Specs; Eduardo Ricard - Garcia Vega; Ray Sharkey - Radio Man; Hugo L. Stanger - Blevin; Tyler Tyhurst - American Captain; Javier Grajeda - Freddie Gomez; Jerry Hyman - Col. Kleinman; Yulis Ruval - French Singer; Pamela Stonebrook - Singer; Renny Temple - Coffee Machine Mover; Gerald Jann - Engineer; Jennifer Wallace - Waitress; John A. Zee - Col. McGuinn; Matthew Laurance - Ali
Credit
Ariel Roshko - Art Director, Jennifer Parsons - Costume Designer, Kristi Zea - Costume Designer, Willard Huyck - Director, Michael A. Stevenson - Editor, Sidney Wolinsky - Editor, Patrick Williams - Composer (Music Score), Robert Latham Brown - Production Designer, Peter Jamison - Production Designer, Robert W. Welch III - Production Designer, Austin Jewell - Production Designer, Austen Jewell - Production Manager, Gloria Katz - Producer, Giora Porter - Set Designer, R. Chris Westlund - Set Designer, John R. Elliott - Special Effects, Richard Johnson - Special Effects, Jerry Jost - Sound/Sound Designer, Robin Gregory - Sound/Sound Designer, Rick Dees - Stunts, Everett Creach - Stunts, Everett Creach - Stunts Coordinator, Willard Huyck - Screenwriter, Gloria Katz - Screenwriter, Robert Grossbach - Book Author
The movie takes place as two parallel plots separated by several years: Moore is an engineer developing a targeting system on a tank for the United States Army and Murphy is an American tank commander who finds himself forced to use the vehicle years later when Iraq invades Kuwait (an unintentional foreshadowing of the Gulf War that occurred seven years after the release of the film).
The protagonists never interact in any way throughout the film. However a cut scene showed both Dudley Moore and Eddie Murphy together, but was edited out from the final film.
The film progresses as the indifferent and incompetent Moore slowly becomes more and more conscientious as he sees his corrupt employer falsifying test results on the notoriously unreliable system. This is interwoven with clips of the reluctant Murphy being forced into combat with a pair of ill trained Kuwaiti crewmen and the lemon of a tank (the machine gun falls apart in Murphy's hands, etc).
The film reaches its climax when Murphy attempts to fire the main gun, which jams due to an overheated component ("The WAM's overheating! The WAM's overheating! What the Hell is a WAM!?!"). Flashbacks then show the reformed Moore ignoring his bosses' orders to cut costs and making a sound engineering change to fix an anticipated overheating problem in the component ("Damn it, something on this tank is going to work!"). The camera cuts away to the tank's innards, showing Moore's fan turning on and cooling the component, and the AA rockets getting launched to save Murphy from an Iraqi anti-tank helicopter. The film ends with Moore and Murphy as heroes in their respective jobs.
Production and critical reception
It was judged to be so bad that the studio re-worked it and created a part for Eddie Murphy, who was at the peak of his popularity. Murphy's part was almost unconnected with the rest of the film and his character never even came into contact with the main cast.[2] Eddie Murphy was credited as "Strategic Guest Star". Murphy would later joke about taking that role when he hosted Saturday Night Live that his reaction to being offered the role was "This script sucks, man! Oh, THAT much money? Let's go!"
ABC edited just 35 seconds from this film for its 1987 network television premiere.
