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''Buddy Buddy'' is a 1981 American
comedy film The comedy film is a film genre that emphasizes humor. These films are designed to amuse audiences and make them laugh. Films in this genre typically have a happy ending, with dark comedy being an exception to this rule. Comedy is one of the o ...
based on Francis Veber's play ''Le contrat'' and
Édouard Molinaro Édouard Molinaro (13 May 1928 – 7 December 2013) was a French film director and screenwriter. Biography He was born in Bordeaux, Gironde. He is best known for his comedies with Louis de Funès (''Oscar (1967 film), Oscar'', ''Hibernatus''), ...
's film '' L'emmerdeur''. It is the final film directed and written by
Billy Wilder Billy Wilder (; ; born Samuel Wilder; June 22, 1906 – March 27, 2002) was an American filmmaker and screenwriter. His career in Hollywood (film industry), Hollywood spanned five decades, and he is regarded as one of the most brilliant and ver ...
.


Plot

To earn his long-awaited retirement,
hitman Contract killing (also known as murder-for-hire) is a form of murder or assassination in which one party hires another party to kill a targeted person or people. It involves an illegal agreement which includes some form of compensation, moneta ...
Trabucco eliminates several witnesses against the mob. On his way to his last assignment, Rudy "Disco" Gambola, who is about to testify before a jury at the court of Riverside, California, he encounters Victor Clooney, an emotionally disturbed television censor who is trying to reconcile with his estranged wife Celia. Trabucco takes a room in the Ramona Hotel in Riverside, across the street from the courthouse where Gambola is to arrive soon. As chance would have it, Victor moves into the neighboring room at the same hotel, and, after he calls Celia and she turns him down, he tries to kill himself. His clumsy first attempt alerts Trabucco, and fearing the unwelcome attention of the nearby police guarding the courthouse, he decides to accompany Victor to quietly eliminate him, but his attempts are repeatedly foiled by inconvenient happenstances. Trabucco and Victor head to the nearby Institute for Sexual Fulfillment, the clinic where Celia, a researcher for ''
60 Minutes ''60 Minutes'' is an American television news magazine broadcast on the CBS television network. Debuting in 1968, the program was created by Don Hewitt and Bill Leonard, who distinguished it from other news programs by using a unique style o ...
'', has enlisted because she has become enthralled with the clinic's director, Dr. Zuckerbrot. After Celia spurns him again, they return to the hotel, where Victor attempts to leap off the building after setting himself on fire. While moving to stop him, Trabucco accidentally knocks himself out, and Victor, having a change of heart, brings him back inside and tries to take care of him. However, Zuckerbrot, sent by Celia to have Victor confined in a
mental institution A psychiatric hospital, also known as a mental health hospital, a behavioral health hospital, or an asylum is a specialized medical facility that focuses on the treatment of severe mental disorders. These institutions cater to patients with ...
, arrives and injects Trabucco, whom he mistakes for Victor, with a tranquilizer. With Gambola's arrival imminent, Trabucco tries to fulfill his contract but is too groggy to make the shot. After seeing him preparing his rifle and learning about Trabucco's true nature, Victor volunteers to take out Gambola to help his new "best friend". Victor succeeds, and the two escape the police after Trabucco, posing as a priest, has made sure that Gambola is dead, but he refuses Victor's company and heads off alone. Months later, Trabucco enjoys his tropical island's retreat until he is unexpectedly joined by Victor. Victor explains that he is wanted by the police after blowing up Zuckerbrot's clinic, and Celia has run off with the doctor's female receptionist to become a
lesbian A lesbian is a homosexual woman or girl. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with female homosexu ...
couple. Desperate to see off the irritating Victor, Trabucco suggests to his native servant the possibility of reviving the old custom of sacrificing humans in the local volcano.


Cast


Production


Development

'' L'emmerdeur'', a huge hit in Europe, had been released as ''A Pain in the Ass'' in art houses in the United States, where it had enjoyed moderate box-office success. Jay Weston of
William Morris Agency The William Morris Agency (WMA) was a Hollywood-based talent agency. It represented some of the best-known 20th-century entertainers in film, television, and music. During its 109-year tenure it came to be regarded as the "first great talent ...
obtained the remake rights and pitched on the film for Matthau, Lemmon and Wilder to work.Walk on the Wilder side The Guardian 15 Apr 1981: 10. Wilder said of the film, "If I met all my old pictures in a crowd, personified, there are some that would make me happy and proud, and I would embrace them ... but ''Buddy Buddy'' I'd try to ignore."Chandler, Charlotte, ''Nobody's Perfect: Billy Wilder, A Personal Biography''. New York: Simon & Schuster 2002. , pp. 299–304 "I couldn't say no to Billy," Matthau said later, "and I didn't want to say no to being in a Billy Wilder picture. But this wasn't a Billy Wilder picture." " Iz Diamond and I were working on another project," said Wilder, "when William Morris came to us with this one. We looked at the French movie and saw possibilities in it. I would prefer doing an original story or screenplay. The most fun is working on a movie like ''
Sunset Boulevard Sunset Boulevard is a boulevard in the central and western part of Los Angeles, California, United States, that stretches from the Pacific Coast Highway (California), Pacific Coast Highway in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, Pacific Palisad ...
'' or ''
The Apartment ''The Apartment'' is a 1960 American romantic comedy-drama film directed and produced by Billy Wilder from a screenplay he co-wrote with I. A. L. Diamond. It stars Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, and Fred MacMurray, with Ray Walston and Edie ...
'', where you start from scratch. Here I found myself with a ready-made thing, but there are certain advantages to that. I didn't have to audition for the studios and pass through Checkpoint Charlie before they would approve the project. We knew we had a starting date, which is rare enough these days."WILDER: A CYNIC AHEAD OF HIS TIME; LOS ANGELES: Farber, Stephen. New York Times6 Dec 1981: A.1. Wilder said, "I hadn't been working enough, and I was anxious to get back on the horse and do what I do – write, direct. This wasn't a picture I would have chosen." Wilder and Diamond wrote the script in three months—"a record for us" said Wilder—but then they "sat on it" waiting for the Actors Guild strike to end, and for Lemmon and Matthau to become available. The film roughly followed the original, although the ending was changed. "I aim a movie at pleasing me and maybe ten of my friends," said Wilder, adding:
That's the only way I know how to operate. The audience senses when you're doing something without any conviction ... To keep your sanity and your self-respect, you must believe that there will be an audience for what you want to do. It may not be the blockbuster of all time, but what is wrong with a modest success? Once you lose the belief that quality will pay off, you are lost. The next thing you know, you're doing a 'Tuesday the 11th' horror story. I could do that if I wanted to. After all, there are still about 360 days left in the calendar.
"It's the funniest script since ''
Some Like It Hot ''Some Like It Hot'' is a 1959 American crime comedy film directed, produced and co-written by Billy Wilder. It stars Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon, with George Raft, Pat O'Brien (actor), Pat O'Brien, Joe E. Brown, Joan Shawlee an ...
''," said Lemmon. "It has no message - it's just fun." Wilder said that the film would be "a bit like ''Some Like It Hot'' ... and hopefully it'll be fast and funny. But unlike '' Kiss Me, Stupid'', this is a commercial movie - nothing arty in it, nothing very serious, somewhere in between '' Stir Crazy'' and
George Bernard Shaw George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from the 188 ...
." Matthau said, "In farce, the object of the film is to be very funny - not just funny, but very funny. So it's easy. You either are funny, or you're not. The audience has to suspend disbelief totally, and presumably they get some pleasure in return."WALTER MATTHAU: 'I'M SERIOUS WHEN I DO COMEDY' Farber, Stephen. New York Times16 Aug 1981: A.1. The film was budgeted at $10 million, which Wilder said was "less than the average advertising campaign". He gave a key role to
Klaus Kinski Klaus Kinski (, born Klaus Günter Karl Nakszynski 18 October 1926 – 23 November 1991) was a German actor. Equally renowned for his intense performance style and notorious for his volatile personality, he appeared in over 130 film roles in a ...
, calling him "an extraordinary actor ... a funny Nosferatau. There hasn't been a face like his since
Conrad Veidt Hans Walter Conrad Veidt ( , ; 22 January 1893 – 3 April 1943) was a German and British actor. He attracted early attention for his roles in the films ''Different from the Others'' (1919), ''The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari'' (1920), and ''The Man ...
." After several years of financial difficulties and releasing few films,
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. (also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures, commonly shortened to MGM or MGM Studios) is an American Film production, film and television production and film distribution, distribution company headquartered ...
had begun to expand its film production under new studio head
David Begelman David Begelman (August 26, 1921 – August 7, 1995) was an American film producer, film executive and talent agent who was involved in a studio embezzlement scandal in the 1970s. Life and career Begelman was born to a Jewish family in New Yor ...
. Wilder had not made a film at MGM since '' Ninotchka'' in 1939. He said:
They've been renting out so much of their studio space to outside people that now they have to find studio space outside for their own pictures. But there seems to be a drive toward it becoming a full studio again. I just regret how the whole thing dissolved by selling off the props and art when Jim Aubrey was hired to supervise the graves here. In the mid-Thirties, studios had a personality. You could recognize an MGM movie from a Paramount movie from a Warner's movie. That's gone ... Every time you saw white living rooms, white beds, white décor, you knew it was an MGM movie. It's like the hotels now. It doesn't matter whether you're in Paris or Istanbul, you're in the same place. Pride is gone, confusion is rampant. People who are in power today and make the decisions couldn't be my second assistant. On the plus side, there is a push to come back. It's not all mercenary. There is enough confidence from Begelman and Frank Rosenfelt to leave us alone and not breathe down our backs.Leo Roars Again Drew, Bernard. Film Comment; New York Vol. 17, Iss. 5, (Sep/Oct 1981): 34-40,80.
Wilder met Veber on the MGM lot when the latter was in Hollywood working on ''Partners''. Wilder gave him a copy of the script, and Veber said, "I thought then that I saw flaws in it and wanted to tell him about them but I didn't dare. I have too much respect for that man. And who was I, a little Frenchman, to say anything? So I just said 'Very good' and left it at that."'A LITTLE FRENCHMAN' TRIES HIS LUCK IN AMERICA Los Angeles Times 19 Jan 1982: g4.


Shooting

Principal photography Principal photography is the phase of producing a film or television show in which the bulk of shooting takes place, as distinct from the phases of pre-production and post-production. Personnel Besides the main film personnel, such as the ...
for ''Buddy Buddy'' began at MGM in
Culver City Culver City is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 40,779. It is mostly surrounded by Los Angeles, but also shares a border with the unincorporated area of Ladera Heights to the ea ...
on February 4, 1981. From the beginning, Wilder had problems with the script. "Wilder the writer let Wilder the director down," he stated. "We had to write too fast. The script was done in three months. We always took much longer, but the wheels were rolling, and we had to go forward." Two weeks into filming, the director realized, "It didn't work to have two comics together. I needed someone serious like
Clint Eastwood Clinton Eastwood Jr. (born May 31, 1930) is an American actor and film director. After achieving success in the Western (genre), Western TV series ''Rawhide (TV series), Rawhide'', Eastwood rose to international fame with his role as the "Ma ...
as the hit man instead of a comedian like Matthau." Veber agreed, saying that Wilder "made the same mistake I made when I wrote the story as a play in Paris. It was not a great success because I did not make the killer tough enough. I changed that when I wrote the film.
Lino Ventura Angiolino Giuseppe Pasquale Ventura (14 July 1919 – 22 October 1987), known as Lino Ventura, was an Italian-born actor and philanthropist, who lived and worked for most of his life in France. He was considered one of the greatest leading men ...
played the part as a really hard killer. Billy Wilder cast Matthau in the part and that was a mistake. You cannot be frightened by him. He would have been better off with someone like
Charles Bronson Charles Bronson (born Charles Dennis Buchinsky; November 3, 1921 – August 30, 2003) was an American actor. He was known for his roles in action films and his "granite features and brawny physique". Bronson was born into extreme poverty in ...
." Lemmon said later that he told reporter that making the film was "a dream ... Not only do Walter and I know what each of us is going to do. We also had the advantage of three days of rehearsal, something Billy hasn't done before. This movie is like '' The Odd Couple'', with much of it scenes between Walter and me." Lemmon also said that he sensed a change in the director's approach to filmmaking. "Billy seemed more tense. He seemed to be pushing harder, forcing it ... It was something I couldn't put my finger on exactly. He had always been open to suggestions I had for my part ... but this time, I didn't feel as welcome with my ideas, so I didn't say anything. Who am I to tell Billy Wilder what he should do?" Matthau was injured on a laundry chute while filming. Wilder said, "If you are an experienced director today, you are old-fashioned. If you don't know where to put the camera, you are a revolutionary nouvelle vague cinematic genius. The only things that seem to do well today are garbage. You pile up cars in a wreck. However, as those pictures are keeping the companies alive and permitting them to subsidize our pictures, I suppose I shouldn't complain. But I complain." Wilder added during filming, "This is my 53rd year in the industry and in that time I've seen a lot of ebb and flow - lately there's been an inordinate amount of ebb. But to paraphrase a line of
Simon Wiesenthal Simon Wiesenthal (31 December 190820 September 2005) was an Austrian Holocaust survivor, Nazi hunter, and writer. He studied architecture, and was living in LwĂłw at the outbreak of World War II. He survived the Janowska concentration camp (la ...
's, 'A movie maker who does not believe in miracles is not a realist.' All I know is it's nice to be working." The film was a critical and commercial failure, and in later years
Klaus Kinski Klaus Kinski (, born Klaus Günter Karl Nakszynski 18 October 1926 – 23 November 1991) was a German actor. Equally renowned for his intense performance style and notorious for his volatile personality, he appeared in over 130 film roles in a ...
even denied being in it. "The best thing for me about ''Buddy Buddy'' was that not very many people saw it," Wilder said: "It hurts to strike out on your last picture." Eager to bounce back from the unhappy experience, he and Diamond immediately went to work writing what they hoped would be their next project. "Iz and I had so many ideas, we'd work on one for four weeks, and then we'd start another. We'd been burned; we chose wrong with ''Buddy Buddy'', and we didn't want to make another mistake. We'd had some failures, so our confidence wasn't as good." Although Wilder and Diamond had developed several ideas for another film, none of them came to fruition, leaving ''Buddy Buddy'' as their last collaboration and Wilder's final directorial effort.


Reception


Critical reception

Reviews of ''Buddy Buddy'' were mixed-to-negative, with only a few mainstream critics liking the film, one of them being
Vincent Canby Vincent Canby (July 27, 1924 – October 15, 2000) was an American film and theatre critic who was the chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1969 until the early 1990s, then its chief theatre critic from 1994 until his death in 2000. ...
of ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
''. Calling it "slight but irresistible", Canby observed that it "doesn't compare with the greatest Wilder-Diamond films, including ''
The Fortune Cookie ''The Fortune Cookie'' (alternative United Kingdom, British title: ''Meet Whiplash Willie'') is a 1966 American black comedy film directed, produced and co-written by Billy Wilder. It is the first film in which Jack Lemmon collaborated with Wal ...
'', which launched Mr. Lemmon and Mr. Matthau as a team, but it is the lightest, breeziest comedy any one of them has been associated with in years." He added, "There's something most appealing about the simplicity of the physical production and the small cast. I suspect that one of the reasons ''Buddy Buddy'' is so congenial, even when a gag doesn't build to the anticipated boff, is because you never feel intimidated by it. It doesn't attempt to overwhelm you with the kind of gigantic sets, props and crowd scenes that made
farce Farce is a comedy that seeks to entertain an audience through situations that are highly exaggerated, extravagant, ridiculous, absurd, and improbable. Farce is also characterized by heavy use of physical comedy, physical humor; the use of delibe ...
s on the order of ''
1941 The Correlates of War project estimates this to be the deadliest year in human history in terms of conflict deaths, placing the death toll at 3.49 million. However, the Uppsala Conflict Data Program estimates that the subsequent year, 1942, wa ...
'' and ''
The Blues Brothers The Blues Brothers (formally, The Fabulous Blues Brothers’ Show Band and Revue) are an American blues and soul music, soul revue band founded in 1978 by comedians Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi, who met and began collaborating as original cast ...
'' so oppressive. ''Buddy Buddy'' travels light, unencumbered by expensive special effects, fueled only by the talents of its actors and its director's irrepressible sense of the ridiculous." He said of Lemmon, "Not in a long time has ebeen more appealing", and he described Matthau as "extremely comic – perhaps our best farceur". Far less enthusiastic was
Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert ( ; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American Film criticism, film critic, film historian, journalist, essayist, screenwriter and author. He wrote for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. Eber ...
of the ''
Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily nonprofit newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has long held the second largest circulation among Chicago newspaper ...
'', who stated, "This movie is appalling. It made me want to rub my eyes. Was it possible that the great Billy Wilder ... could possibly have made a film this bad? ''Buddy Buddy'' is very bad. It is a comedy without any laughs. (And, yes, I mean literally that it contains no laughs.) But it is worse than that. It succeeds in reducing two of the most charming actors in American motion picture history to unlikable ciphers. Can you imagine a film that co-stars Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon and yet contains no charm, ebullience, wit, charisma – even friendliness? This whole movie is like one of those pathetic Hollywood monsters drained of its life fluids ... Basically, we are invited to watch two drudges meander through a witless, pointless exercise in farce ... ''Buddy Buddy'' is incompetent. And that is the saddest word I can think of to describe it."
Gene Siskel Eugene Kal Siskel (January 26, 1946 – February 20, 1999) was an American film critic and journalist for the ''Chicago Tribune'' who co-hosted a movie review television series alongside colleague Roger Ebert. Siskel started writing for the '' ...
of the ''
Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...
'' named it as the worst film of 1981 (Roger Ebert disliked the film as much as Siskel did, but his pick for 1981's worst film was '' Heaven's Gate'').
Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...
said, "Wilder helming the classic comic pairing of Matthau and Lemmon is always going to be difficult to dismiss, but it has to be said that all involved had seen better days at the time this got made ... There's the recognizable chemistry between the two leads, but little else here to recommend. It would be foolish to come to this movie expecting '' The Odd Couple'' or ''
The Apartment ''The Apartment'' is a 1960 American romantic comedy-drama film directed and produced by Billy Wilder from a screenplay he co-wrote with I. A. L. Diamond. It stars Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, and Fred MacMurray, with Ray Walston and Edie ...
'', but you do expect something a little better than this." Wilder later reflected, "In this Donner Pass expedition known as Hollywood, many fall by the wayside. People eat people. Very few make it. Lately I've been going to more funerals than openings of pictures. Sometimes you have a funeral and an opening on the same day, and you don't feel very good when you see a comedy after you've put somebody to rest or watched the Neptune Society blow his ashes into the Pacific Ocean ... Sometimes I feel the way you feel when you find yourself at a dinner party with an uncongenial group of people and you say, 'I've got a great story, but I'm not going to tell it to them tonight. I'm not interested in entertaining them.' A lot of energy goes into it, and sometimes it doesn't seem as if it's worth the trouble. I've been doing it now for over 50 years."


Box office

The film opened in 700 theaters, the same weekend as '' Rollover''. It finished second with a gross of $2,132,221, and eventually grossed $7.3 million in North America.


See also

*
Buddy film The buddy film is a subgenre of adventure and comedy film in which two people go on an adventure, mission, or road trip. The two typically are males with contrasting personalities. The contrast is sometimes accentuated by an ethnic difference b ...
– a related genre


References


External links

* *
Review of film
at ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
''
''Buddy Buddy''
at
TCMDB Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is an American movie-oriented pay-TV network owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in 1994, Turner Classic Movies is headquartered at Turner's Techwood broadcasting campus in the Midtown business district of ...

Article on film
at Trailers from Hell {{Billy Wilder 1981 films 1980s screwball comedy films American buddy comedy films American screwball comedy films American remakes of French films Films about contract killing in the United States American films based on plays Films directed by Billy Wilder Films set in Riverside County, California Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films Films with screenplays by Billy Wilder Films with screenplays by I. A. L. Diamond Films scored by Lalo Schifrin 1981 comedy films 1980s English-language films 1980s American films Films based on works by Francis Veber Films based on adaptations Cinema International Corporation films