The (one-hit) Wonders

That Thing You Do!

Director: Tom Hanks

Cast: Tom Everett Scott, Liv Tyler, Steve Zahn, Tom Hanks, Johnathan Schaech, Ethan Embry, Charlize Theron

Released: October 4, 1996

Oscar nominations:

Best Original Song - "That Thing You Do!" (lost to "You Must Love Me" from Evita)

You!

Doing that thing you do!

Breaking my heart into a million pieces

like you always do!

And you!

Don't mean to be cruel!

You never even knew about the heartache

I've been going through.

Well I'm trying and try to forget you girl!

But it's just so hard to do!

Everytime you do that thing you do!

It's probably been well over twenty years since I last saw this movie or heard the song, but I can still sing along to every word; it all just came flooding back to me. I'm pretty sure my family owned the soundtrack (don't quote me on that, but it wouldn't surprise me) and the song is played at least a million times during the movie, so it's no wonder (no pun intended) that I haven't missed a beat (again, no pun intended). Even though I don't remember hearing this song on the radio, it must have been played on popular radio stations because I read it was released as a single. 

It was robbed of an Oscar win for best song. "You Must Love Me" from Evita won instead. The other songs nominated were "Because You Loved Me" from Up Close and Personal; "I've Finally Found Someone" from The Mirror Has Two Faces; and "For the First Time" from One Fine Day. Now I think all those songs cancelled each other out because they were all from romantic or romantic-adjacent movies (two of which starred Michelle Pfeiffer!). So I wan't familiar with "For the First Time" so I went to listen to it. Kenny Loggins sings it and I immediately recognized it when it started playing it. I think it was on a compilation CD of movie songs I owned (back in the heyday when people used archaic artifacts like CDs -ask your ancestors, kids). Funnily enough, this CD also included "I've Finally Found Someone." I don't think of "Because You Love Me" being from a movie; I think of it as a single from Celine Dion's grammy-winning album, Falling Into You. I feel like "You Must Love Me" only won because Madonna sung it and was composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Now if "Don't Cry For Me Argentina" (which wasn't even nominated) had won, I would have been fine with that because that song slaps. "You Must Love Me" is a boring, insipid ballad. What I'm simply trying to say is that from the five nominated songs, "That Thing You Do!" should have won. 

I saw this movie in theaters with my dad. He was a teenager in the '60s, when this movie is set, and played in a band, so of course this movie was made for him. This movie is basically about a small town (Eerie, Pennsylvania) band who are discovered and soon become a national sensation with their hit song, the same as the title of the movie, That Thing You Do! 

Guy (Tom Everett Scott) is asked to fill in as the drummer of a band who his friends are in (I guess Guy isn't initially in the band because he works at his dad's appliance store, I'm not really sure) after the drummer, Chad (Giovanni Ribisi), breaks his arm right before they're supposed to play at the Mercyhurst College Talent Show. The other band members include lead singer, Jimmy (Jonathan Schaech); lead guitarist, Lenny (Steve Zahn); and the bass player (Ethan Embry). For some reason, he is credited as T.B. Player as in The Bass Player, so he wasn't given a name. I'll just refer to him as Ethan. 

This band must have just formed after Jimmy wrote a song called "That Thing You Do!" (you might be familiar with it) and wanted to perform it at the talent show. I say that because when Guy comes over to practice with them after he's replaced Chad their band still doesn't have a name. Jimmy has suggested The Heardsmen and The Chordvettes. As you can see, he likes being creative with how he spells the name. I'm sure there's a word for that, but I have no idea. When Guy asks if they're only playing the one song at the show and Jimmy confirms that, he replies, "Wonderful", emphasizing the "won" sound. Jimmy's girlfriend, Faye (Liv Tyler), is there and she lights up when she hears him say that and tells them they should call themselves The Wonders. Jimmy also likes this idea, probably because he can spell it in a creative (and let's be honest, really dumb) way. On a notepad he writes it as THE ONEDERS. Of course, the other band members thinks it reads as "Oh-nee-ders." They will later write it as One-ders, which is a little better, but why not just write it as 1-ders? Actually, scratch that. Now that I see it, it looks awful written that way. Later, they will spell it correctly, but personally, I think The Wonders is not the best name for a band. Why? Because of one-hit wonders. What if you only have one hit and you're called The Wonders? (And this is pretty much what happens to them.) That's just asking to be mocked. 

They're practicing "That Thing You Do" and it's a slower-paced song than what we will eventually know and love it as. 

At the talent show, Guy brings his girlfriend, Tina. She is played by....wait for it....Charlize Theron! This was one of her first movie roles and I did not remember she was in this at all. I probably didn't remember because she was in this before she was famous and she's not in it that much. She's not really impressed that Guy is playing in a talent show and doesn't seem to be into this whole thing at all. Charlize has bigger and better things ahead for her! 

When it's the One-Ders turn to perform, Guy starts playing the drums really fast and at first there's confusion because that's not how the song is supposed to go, but the rest of the band goes with it and this is probably the best decision Guy ever made because it's going to change all their lives. First of all, everyone loved the song and they won first place - a whopping $100 split four ways. I supposed back in 1964, that was a lot of money. Maybe? 

There's an applause-o-meter chart with different rankings that a girl uses her arm to point to a ranking after each performance depending on the audience's reaction. (Obviously a very scientific method. The rankings include: "You Stink", "Not Terrible", "Good", "Extra Good", "Super", and "Wicked.") Not surprisingly, they got the highest score. 

They later play at an Italian restaurant (of all the random places) and some guy asks them where he can get a record of their songs. This gives Guy the idea for them to do just that. He has a relative "in the record industry" who records church music and he could record their songs for them and sell them for a dollar a piece. They play their songs in a church while his uncle is using some very old-fashioned technology to record them. His uncle is played by Chris Issak of "Wicked Game" fame (you know, the song). 

A guy who introduces himself as Phil Horace comes down to the appliance store to talk to Guy about the band. He wants to take them to rock 'n' roll shows to play their music, specifically "That Thing You Do!" He tells them he can get that song on the radio and if the radio doesn't play the song within ten days he'll tear up the contract. 

We see a scene of Tina at the dentist. She's a first-time patient and is very attracted to her handsome dentist. Later, we will later find out she ends up with him. I'm not really sure what the point of having her in the movie was for; it's no wonder I don't remember Charlize Theron at all in this. I heard the director's cut is two and a half hours (way too long!) and I'm sure we get a lot more backstory with her character. 

The band members (and Faye) are wearing ear pieces, listening to the radio so they don't miss it should their song be played on the radio. Guy is working at the store and his dad yanks it out of his ear and tells him to go help the two women who are looking at stoves. Faye is mailing a letter when a song has just finished and the DJ announces the next song as being from "a local Eerie band" and that they just won the Mercyhurst Talent show. She starts screaming and shrieking and running down the street like a maniac, but her enthusiasm is infectious. She sees Ethan who is coming out of a store and they are shrieking in joy together. They run into the appliance store where Guy's telling the two women what colors the stoves come in and Faye tells him to turn on the radio, so he does. In fact, they go around the whole store turning on several radios. Now you can hear the music more clearly; before it sounded a little more muddled. Outside the window we see Lenny and Jimmy pull up and park right in the middle of the street and run in. Guy's dad and sister (who also works at the store) don't look very happy, but his mother, who is sitting in the back where she's doing some paperwork, is smiling and grooving to the music. This is the best scene in the movie; you can't help but smile when you watch it. It's gotta be pretty exciting when your song is played on the radio! 

Later that evening, Guy calls Tina to ask if she heard the song which played three times on the radio that day and she said she didn't and points out she's heard that song many times already. She doesn't seem to care that his band's song was on the radio. Not the most supportive girlfriend! 

Because of their radio success, they've been invited to play at the Orpheum in Pittsburg (the closest big city to them). This is a big deal for them, but unfortunately it turns out to be a disaster. Right before they're about to start, they notice the mikes not working (didn't someone do a sound check?), then when it's turned on, it gives that awful screeching sound and the entire audience are holding their hands to their ears. Once that's corrected, they start playing the song, but then one of Guy's cymbals fall and it's not a great performance. They're lucking that this was pre-Internet/social media or otherwise this would become viral!

The next day, Phil takes Guy to meet a man named Mr. White who is with Play-Tone records and was in town to catch the show. He is played by Tom Hanks and I didn't catch the characters' first name, but according to Wikipedia, it's Amos. He wants to release their record and add The One-ders to their record label. He's also the first person (outside the band and Faye) to get the pronunciation of the band correct and after he becomes their manager, his first order of business is to have them spell their name as The Wonders so there's no more confusion. Many of the label's bands and artists will be touring state fairs and he wants The Wonders to be one of those bands. 

Their record will be released nationally and they will be doing a lot of promoting of it, mostly on radio shows. Mr. White tells them they will be touring until Labor Day (I think it's the beginning of summer when they start), but Ethan tells them he joined the Marine Corps so he has to report to South Carolina at the end of August, but he can stay with the band until then. Maybe this is the reason Ethan Embry isn't given a name in this movie? But he's still in quite a bit of the movie. Mr. White decides the band needs a gimmick so he give Guy a pair of sunglasses to wear while he's performing and has given him the nickname "Shades". 

Their song ends up hitting #93 on the Billboard 100 charts. It was right below "Viva Las Vegas" by Elvis Presley. I paused the movie to look at the other songs, but I didn't recognize any of them. You're probably wondering if they perform any other songs besides "That Thing You Do!", and yes, yes, they do, but honestly, I don't even remember how they go. I think we hear two other songs. 

After getting a montage of them touring many of the fly-over states, Mr. White tells them that there's been a change of plans and they'll next be flying to Los Angeles because their song has become "the fastest-rising single in the history of the Play-tone label." Not only that, but they also have the number 7 record in the country. Not bad for an amateur band! 

As they're leaving to get into the car to take them to the airport (they're currently in Wisconsin), they are attacked by a mob of screaming girls. One of them even jumps on the car. Honestly, it's so embarrassing and we've seen this from the Beatles to One Direction. (Okay, I know One Direction is old news by this point, but I can't think of anything more current.) On the plane, Mr. White tells them he can get them to appear in a motion picture and The Hollywood Television Showcase. Jimmy is the only one who doesn't seem to care about any of that. He just wants to get into the studio to make some music.

The movie they have a cameo in is some lame film called Weekend at Party Pier and they're wearing sailor outfits, playing their instruments outside of a shrimp shack. The main actors, playing characters named Rick, Anita, and Goofball (what is this? The Archies?) are dancing in front and when they have lines, the music stops, but everyone keeps dancing or pretending to play their instruments as though they're still hearing it. There is no way this is being released in theaters; this has to be a TV movie. I would say it's going to straight to video, but I don't think video rentals were a thing back then (just like they're no longer a thing now, heh). Jimmy thinks what they're doing is pretty lame and I have to agree with him. 

Guy gets the chance to meet his hero, a jazz player named Del Paxton when he goes to a jazz bar and is introduced to him by the cocktail waitress (played by Rita Wilson). The old man gives the young musician some sage advice: since bands come and go, he's "got to keep on paying, no matter with who." You could also call this foreshadowing. (Because The Wonders won't last, spoiler alert!)

When they're about to be on the Hollywood Television Showcase, everyone is there except the unnamed bass player. Nobody knows where he is, so Mr. White just brings in a new member named Scott Pell who goes by the nickname Wolfman. I guess since he knew they would be losing their bass player anyway, he had somebody waiting in the wings. It's funny that this guy gets a name and nickname and poor Ethan Embry's character didn't get either! By the way, he was at Disneyland. I guess he didn't take this band that seriously! 

We see some acts/interviews before them and one is astronaut Gus Grissom and he is played by Bryan Cranston and as someone whose favorite show is Breaking Bad, this was very amusing to see. So I did a quick deep dive on him (Gus Grissom; not Bryan Cranston): he was a pilot in the United States Air Force and was selected by NASA for Project Mercury, which trained and launched astronauts into outer space. (Yes, I got this from Wikipedia.) The movie The Right Stuff is all about Project Mercury and Fred Ward played him in the movie. Sadly, Grissom died long before the movie was released in 1983. I noticed on his Wikipedia page that he died at the age of 40 in 1967 in Cape Canaveral and right away I knew he died of something going wrong on a launch. And, yes, during a pre-launch test, the command module interior caught fire and Grissom and two other astronauts were killed. Anyway, back to something a little more light-hearted...(or maybe not, but at least nobody dies in a horrific way in this movie...)

While they play their hit song, we see the camera zoom in individually on all the band members with their names on the bottom of the screen. When they get to Jimmy, there's added text that says, "Careful girls, he's engaged." I mean, c'mon, why do they need to add that? It's not like these girls would have a chance with him anyway! Jimmy sees this on the monitor and he's not singing enthusiastically as he once was.
He's not very thrilled by this. 

We get a funny moment where Guy's family and Chad (the original drummer that Guy replaced) are watching the show on the TV and his mom yells, "Quiet down, I'm trying to hear it!" even though nobody is talking. 

Afterward, in the dressing room, Jimmy yells at Faye, asking her where she got the idea they were engaged and that's "the last thing [he] needs." But it wasn't Faye who told the producers to write that on the screen (I don't think she would even have the authority); it was Mr. White. Oh, and if you're wondering why Faye has been following them around the country even though she's not in the band, there's really no good reason aside from the fact that she's Jimmy's muse. A sad-looking Faye addressed Jimmy in front of everyone and tells him she's breaking up with him and "I have wasted thousands and thousands of kisses on you...shame on me for kissing you with my eyes closed so tight." In my mind, I can see Peter Jackson watching this movie and when he sees Liv Tyler looking so sad he knew right away he had found his perfect Arwen! And also because Liv Tyler is so, so pretty and would make the perfect elfin princess. 

The band ends up breaking up because Jimmy wants to record his own music, Leo has gotten married (and soon divorced) and Guy ends up with Faye. Throughout the movie we see little snippets that he likes her, so it's not a big surprise that they end up together. 

Mermaid in Manhattan

Splash

Director: Ron Howard

Cast: Tom Hanks, Daryl Hannah, Eugene Levy, John Candy

Released: March 9, 1984

One of the first things I noticed about this movie is just how skinny Tom Hanks is. And it's not like he's ever been overweight, but when you watch this movie, you just can't help but notice how skinny he looks! Of course, he was pretty young in this...28, although I would have guessed even younger! This was his first big starring movie as well as the first big movie directed by Ron Howard. 

The movie starts with a flashback twenty years ago where we see young Alan Bauer (Tom Hank's character) as a child on a boat with his family on Cape Cod. (I've been there! My favorite place I visited was Chatham!) Alan, about eight years old is looking down in the water and suddenly just jumps in! Of course, his parents and everyone else start freaking out. Alan definitely saw something because he's underwater with a young blonde girl about his age. We don't see that she's a mermaid (but we know she is one!) until he's back on the boat and dried off. Not too far off, she's just bobbing in the water and he sees her, but nobody else on the boat notices that a young girl is just bobbing in the water! And it's not like she's trying to hide herself or anything! She then dives back into the water and that's when we see she has a tail fin. Gasp! She's a mermaid! 

We're now twenty years later in New York City where Alan and his older brother, Freddie (John Candy), have a produce business. It seems totally random. Alan has a girlfriend he lives with named Victoria, but we never meet her. In fact, she breaks up with him within the first five minutes of the audience meeting him as an adult because he never told her he loved her. This happens the same day he and his brother are ushers at a fellow friend's wedding and everyone keeps asking where Victoria is and he lies and tells them she's sick until he just screams at one guy (who didn't even ask about her) that she left him and how she broke his heart. It sounded like he did have feelings for her because he keeps going on how how "brilliant" and "beautiful" she was. Not really sure why he never told her he loved her, I guess he had commitment issues or something. Though if they were already living together, that was a big step anyway. Well, it doesn't really matter. I guess they just wanted to show us that he was in a relationship, but now he's not and he's sad because now he thinks he'll never find anyone. 

After the ceremony, Alan is feeling down and he tells Freddie he's going to Cape Cod because he likes it there and it makes him better better: "I look out at the water and I feel closer to something." Still wearing his tux from the wedding, he hails a cab to take him to Cape Cod. I have so many questions: why is he going right now? Why didn't he at least go home to change, or, I don't know pack a suitcase? I don't know how long he plans to stay on Cape Cod, but you'd think he'd want a change of clothes and some toiletries! This seems very spontaneous and probably the result of drinking too much. 

It's 300 miles to Cape Cod and the sun is just starting to come up when he gets there. We see him walking along the beach, coming up to a scientist named Walter Kornbluth (Eugene Levy) and his two bumbling idiot assistants unloading a box containing some equipment for a diving expedition. Alan walks up to them and tells them he was "dropped off on the wrong side of the beach" and asks if he could take him over to the island. I would love to know what part of Cape Cod they're on, but we are never told. Walter tells him they can't get him a lift on their boat because they're not heading that way, so Alan tries his luck with someone else. Walter thinks that he must be a spy. 

Alan gets a ride in a very small boat from a random guy. He tells the guy he can't swim and the guy, being a jerk, starts rocking the boat to scare Alan. This causes the boat to end up stalling and the guy can't get the motor to start so he just jumps into the water, telling him he'll go back for the other boat. He says the shore is only a few miles away, but I don't see any land anywhere nearby! And there are sharks in these waters! I know because when I visited Cape Cod, I saw signs warning about sharks! He says he'll bring back the smaller boat and Alan is aghast by this because the boat they're already in is so teeny-tiny. 

On the boat with the scientist and his assistants, Walter uses his binoculars to spot Alan sitting alone in the small boat and assumes he's spying on them. Alan tries to start the engine himself, but ends up falling into the water. On the bright side, he actually got the boat to start (so that guy swam to shore for nothing), but the boat seems to have a mind of its own and it knocks Alan on the head and he starts to sink. His wallet falls out and hits the sea floor, but, luckily, before he can hit the sea floor, he is saved by somebody "mysterious" (let's be honest, we all know who saves him!) and he ends up on a beach with clear blue waters and a white sandy beach. Wow, the mermaid must have swam a long, long way with Alan (try 1200 miles, the distance from Cape Cod to Nassau) because that is most definitely NOT Cape Cod! I'm pretty sure they're in the Caribbean (I looked it up and some scenes were filmed in the Bahamas). The fact that they're trying to pass this for Cape Cod is just hilarious. 

Alan isn't unconscious for too long and when he gets up he sees a beautiful blonde woman crouching in the flora staring at him. Except for a beaded necklace adorned with seashells and her long hair covering certain body parts, she is completely naked. She walks up to him, kisses him (and not just a peck on the lips, it lasts for quite a few seconds), then jumps into the ocean and swims away. He calls for her to come back, then bemoans the fact that he never learned how to swim. When he turns his back to start walking away from the water, we see her jump into the air like a dolphin. I can only imagine his reaction if he had seen that!

We see her swimming underwater. This is not the 2023 version of The Little Mermaid where they are using special effects to make it look like Daryl Hannah is underwater; no, she is actually swimming around underwater. There are many cuts so either she came up for air or was given a tube to breathe in before they shot again. 

The audience sees Walter in his scuba gear before she does. They are both surprised when they see each other. Walter tells her to "Wait a minute" so he can grab his camera to take a photo of her. This made me laugh because a) she doesn't understand what he's saying. Even if she did understand English, his voice is very muffled; and, b) she's not going to wait just so he can retrieve his camera and take a picture of her! 

She has found Alan's wallet on the sea floor and takes it to a wrecked ship nearby where she finds an old timey map of New York. It's apparent that she's very familiar with this ship and what's on it. She's able to find out Alan lives in New York from his driver's license and uses the map of New York to figure out where it is, I guess. I'm not really sure how she does this without knowing any English. I would assume she also doesn't know the Latin alphabet either. 

During a group tour of the Statue of Liberty, everyone is shocked when they see a completely nude woman walk towards them. They all start pointing their cameras at her and taking photos. While I'm sure this is the furthest from home she's ever been, we know she's seen humans (like on the boat when she was a young mermaid) so she has to know they wear clothes. You would think she would find something to cover up with. We next see her wearing a t-shirt and she's on a boat with the Coast Guard. Two guys are trying to figure out who she is and where she came from, but they soon realize she doesn't understand English. We get a funny exchange where one guys states, "She don't speak no English" and the other guy replies, "And you do?" Ha! Nice zinger. That would totally be my reply too.

They find the wallet she was carrying and she points to the picture of Alan, so they call him. He's at work when he gets the call and he practically sprints to the police station. He even double parks in front of two police cars...I'm sure the cops loved that! The blonde woman greets Alan with a long kiss and he takes her back to his apartment.

Okay, a couple things before I continue. First of all, I know it's annoying I keep referring to MADISON as "the blonde woman" or "the beautiful blonde", but this is because she hasn't received her name yet and I feel like it's not right to call her Madison (even though we all know that's her name!). So just bear with me...we're almost to that part of the movie and I can refer to her as Madison for the rest of the review, yay! Second of all, if this movie was made today, there would be a lot more depth to Alan and Madison's, excuse me, the beautiful blonde's relationship. Let's be honest: Alan only likes her because she's gorgeous and she keeps making out with him, right? It must be mermaid mating season because she cannot keep her hands off of him. It just seems to be a physical attraction (especially on Alan's end!) and if this movie was made today, they would, you know, actually have our two main characters get to know each other. Hell, they already kind of remade this movie with the 2023 version of The Little Mermaid, if you think about it! 

After spending some "quality time" with his new "friend", Alan goes back to work in a cheerful mood, singing "Zippity Do Dah" and everyone is like "Wha-?" because it wasn't that long ago he was being a Debbie Downer. 

He has left his mysterious new friend at his apartment with the TV on. Look, I understand he likes this girl. I get it: she's pretty and she enjoys kissing him and being with him. However, I am shocked he just leaves a stranger alone in his apartment while he's gone! Isn't he worried that he might get robbed? Well, I guess he's too love struck to even think about that! But leaving someone you just met alone in your place, not a good idea. Anyway, the human mermaid gets inspired when she sees a commercial for the Ann Klein collection at Bloomingdales. The collection is fugly if you ask me, but it was 1984. Daryl Hannah wears a lot of extremely ugly outfits when her character is trying to fit in the world of New York. 1984 was a terrible year for fashion. But you know what she does look good in? One of Alan's suits. She goes outside wearing one of his suits (or his only one, probably) and she pulls it off quite well. She says "Bloomingdales" to the doorman and he hails a cab to take her there. When she gets out of the cab, the driver holds out his hand and she just hands him Alan's wallet. I'm not sure why she still has it. The driver just takes money out of it and hands it back. I wonder how much he took? Probably more than he should have, but at least he gave the wallet back!  

After buying a bunch of ugly clothes (I realize they're not supposed to be ugly, but to my modern eye, they are!), she makes a stop at the antiquated technology department and starts watching all the shows that are on the TVs on display.

When Alan returns home after work, he realizes she's not there and he runs downstairs and asks the doorman if he's seen her and hurries to Bloomingdales. (I've been there!) By the time he gets there, the store is getting ready to close, but he convinces them to let him in. He runs all over the store and finds her in the electronics department, dancing to a Richard Simmons exercise video. The manger tells Alan that she's been there for six hours! He also tells him that he told her it was closing time, but she didn't seem to understand and Alan tells him it's because she doesn't speak English. Right after he says that, she says, "Hello, Alan. How was you day?" in very clear English, then thanks the Boomingdale's employee for letting her use the televisions and that it "was very educational." 

Now that she can communicate, Alan finally gets to ask her what her name is, but she tells him it's hard to say in English. We soon figure out why this is when she starts screeching like a dolphin and all the TV screens break. Uh...I hope he doesn't have to pay for all of those! Surely the store has insurance! 

They walk back to Alan's apartment with Alan carrying her merchandise in two "big brown bags" and three huge boxes. He doesn't seem to mind that she purchased all of this with his money. He asks her why she hasn't said anything to him until now and she tells him because she didn't know English. Duh, Alan. But to be fair to him, he doesn't understand how she suddenly is fluent in it now. She tells him she learned it in the six hours when she was watching TV. Mermaids must learn at a much faster rate than normal humans because there is no way you could learn a language fluently in six hours! 

It was hilarious when she kept running around to the stoplights or people singing on the corner or a place making pizza going, "What's that? What's that?" I was getting Buddy the Elf vibes from her. There is a moment earlier in the movie that reminded me of Buddy when she goes through a revolving door, but keeps spinning around and around. Alan is especially shocked that she doesn't know what music is (hmm, I guess she's not from the same part of the ocean as Ariel and her singing sisters and Sebastian!). He asks her if she's American and she replies she's not...in her American accent. Okay, to be fair to the movie, it does make sense that she has an American accent since she's been watching American TV. He asks her how long she's gong to be in town and she tells him six days then the moon will be full and if she stays longer, she "can't ever go back." Hmmm, are we to believe that when the moon becomes full it will permanently make her a human? Alan just assumes it's some sort of "immigration problem." 

Finally, finally, about 45 minutes into the movie, our human mermaid is given her name. Well, her pronounceable name! Alan tells her she needs a name and gives her a list of very common women's names. As they're coming up on Madison Avenue, he wonders out loud where they are and says "Madison" as he's reading the street sign. His female companion tells him she likes "Madison" and wants that to be her name. He sort of laughs her off and tells her it's not a name. Well, guess what, Alan, the joke's on you because it certainly is now! This is from the Splash Wikipedia article:

Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner's book Freakonomics (2006) credits the film with popularizing the name Madison for girls, as does Steven Pinker's The Stuff of Thought (2007). In the film, Hannah's character takes her name from Madison Avenue (itself named after President James Madison) after walking past a road sign. Hanks' character comments that it is not a real name as, at the time, it was a rather unusual name for a woman. However, in the years since the film was released in theaters and re-released on VHS and then DVD, the name's popularity has skyrocketed.^[35]

According to the Social Security Administration, the name Madison was the 216th most popular name in the United States for girls in 1990, the 29th most popular name for girls in 1995, and the third most popular name for girls in 2000.^[36] In 2005, the name cracked the top 50 most popular girls' names in the United Kingdom, and articles in British newspapers credit the film for the popularization

The third most popular name for girls born in the U.S. in the year 2000! I can believe that too! I remember this name being VERY popular around that time. If this movie gave us anything, it was the popularization of the name "Madison". So Madison is born and Alan makes a joke that it was a good thing they weren't on 149th Street.

In the middle of the night, Madison gets up and fills the tub, adding salt to it. She gets in and transforms to her mermaid form. I have to say, for the time, her fish tail and scales are very impressive. It's this beautiful red/orange color and looks very realistic. I love when she unfurls her tail at the end of the bathtub. Apparently it took five hours for Daryl Hannah to get into the tail which sounds like absolute hell. Five hours just to put the thing on, then who knows how long they film for! She had to be glued into the tail which is why it took so long. 

Alan wakes up and hears the water running in the bathroom. He knocks on the door (which is locked) and asks her what she's doing and she tells him she's taking a bath. He asks if he can come in and she tells him no, then starts to panic and gets out of the tub, but since she doesn't have legs she falls to the floor with a thud. He gets concerned and tries to open the door, but she tells him everything is fine. She's frantically trying to dry her tail so her legs will reappear. Alan is still insisting that he needs to get in there; he tells her something is wrong and she needs to open the door. I don't like Alan in this scene. Yes, I realize he is worried for her well-being, but she is obviously fine as she's talking to him so it's not like she's unconscious. He breaks the door open and finds her laying on a rug, covered in towels. We see her spin around and it is revealed she has legs. She gets up and tells him she wouldn't let him in because she was shy. He is baffled by this because she wasn't shy in the car, elevator, bedroom, or on top of the fridge. Good Lord those two sure do move fast! And they haven't even known each other for 24 hours! I'm surprised that Alan didn't notice the box of salt that was sitting on the edge of the tub. 

We return to Walter and his two moron assistants on the boat and he sees that one of them is reading The Star Confidential and the cover story is titled "Beauty Bares All at Statue of Liberty." He recognizes the woman as the mermaid he saw and demands to be taken back to shore. 

Alan brings home a gift for Madison, a baby blue Tiffany box with a white ribbon. She thinks the box is the gift and tells him it's beautiful and that she loves it, ha! He explains to her that the gift is inside so she opens it and finds two dancing figurines in a glass case. It is very twee. That's the only word I can think of to describe it. That evening the two of them are walking around and they come across a large fountain with a statue of a mermaid on a clam shell. Madison asks Alan if he likes it and he tells her he does, that it's always appealed to him. She asks him if he likes the sea and he replies no, then tells her about the accident he had on the boat when he was eight and fell overboard. (Uh, pretty sure he jumped intentionally!) She tells him "I remember", then when he gets confused by this, blames it on forgetting the word and she really meant to say "I understand." He almost tells her that when he was underwater he saw a mermaid but he doesn't admit it to her. So I guess we are to believe he's never shared his secret with anyone, though, let's be honest, nobody would believe him anyway. 

The next day, when Alan comes home from the gym, Madison has a surprise for him. He sees a couple of guys with tools and a moving trolley leaving his apartment as he's coming back. Madison covers his eyes and leads him to his bedroom and it is revealed the huge mermaid statue is at the foot of his bed. His room must be huge if there's enough room between the foot of his bed and the wall to fit this massive statue. Granted, there's not much room anymore since this huge-ass statue is taking up all the space now! Alan agrees with me since his reply is "That's big! This is very...big! It's just so big!" (Ha! Do you think Tom Hanks was sending us a subliminal message?) She tells him they were gonna tear it down so she bought it to give to him. One of my first questions of how did she pay for it is answered when he notices her necklace is missing and we learn that she traded it for the statue. Dang, that necklace must have been very valuable. But of course it's valuable; it probably has precious stones and gems from the sea that nobody has ever discovered. I bet her necklace is much more valuable than this statue and she got majorly gypped. It was pretty dumb and naive of her to trade her extremely rare necklace for a fountain that doesn't belong in a NYC apartment. (Or anywhere inside for that matter). Another question I have (one that didn't get answered) is how did she fit it through the front door of the apartment then though his bedroom door? I can assume there was a service door to the apartment building and a service elevator that she was able to get the statue to the floor his apartment's on, but after that, how the hell did it even make it into his room? Did they have to take it apart? How long did that take and then to put it together? How did they fill it back with all that water? This whole thing just seems like a huge hassle that's not worth it. But I guess it was worth it to her because she tells him she traded her necklace for the fountain because she knows how much the fountain means to him and that she loves him. I don't know whether to "aww" or roll my eyes. Also, while he may like the fountain, I don't think he likes it THAT much! He tells her, "Madison, I love...this present." At first I thought he was going to say "Madison, I love you", but something was holding him back from saying that as we know he never said it to his last girlfriend and just in the previous scene he and his brother were having this very conversation, but then, like three seconds later he tells her he loves her. It was very anti-climatic. 

Walter has come to the American Museum of Natural History (I've been there!) to tell them about the mermaid. None of them believe him and are angry that he wasted their time. He decides he's going to prove to all of them that the girl in the paper is a mermaid. He's on a mission to soak Madison with water so everyone will see that he's right. He must have figured out where she was because he's waiting for them in his car outside Alan's apartment and when he sees them leave and walk down the sidewalk, he gets out of the car and retrieves two large buckets full of water from the backseat. The fact that he was driving around with two large buckets full of water is just amusing to me. He hurries after them, running through crowds of people, water sloshing from the buckets. It looked like he was doing a challenge from Survivor. He sees a blonde woman in a turquoise coat (the same color Madison is wearing) looking at a window display and throws the water on her. Of course, it's not Madison and he gets slugged by the woman's husband. 

Alan and Madison have gone to have dinner at a fancy restaurant. Alan is playing with his silverware and he accidentally sends the spoon flying to a nearby table. It reminded me of something out of Big. He tells Madison that she doesn't need to leave the country, that he could give her a job at the market or she could "marry, like, an American." It's adorable how awkward he is in this scened. I believe there's a word for this: adorkable. They each have a huge lobster and Madison just picks hers up and starts eating it, shell and all. Um, I'm pretty sure at a fancy restaurant like this they would leave the lobster in the shell, but crack the shell for you so you wouldn't have to do that. But Madison is just biting into the shell and eating it (ugh!) and everyone, including the piano piano, who stops playing for a few seconds, is staring at her. 

After dinner, they go ice skating at Rockefeller Center (that ice rink looks so dinky!) and when they take a break, he tells her he wants to talk about what happened at the restaurant and she tells him that's how they eat lobster where she comes from. But he tells her that he wasn't talking about that, that earlier he was trying to ask her something, but "did it very badly". He wanted to know if she wanted to get married. Yes, he did a pretty poor job of asking her that. He then proposes to her and she looks very distraught and tells him "No." He asks "No? Just no? You don't wanna think about it? You don't wanna kick it around?" I mean, to be fair to Madison, they've only known each other for three days. It's a terrible idea for them to get married. She tells him she can't marry him and she can't tell him why. That has to be frustrating for Alan. He tells her that he knows she has "some big secret that you think you can't tell me, but you can." She replies she has three days left and wants to "make them wonderful." I get why Alan is frustrated, but he's being pretty pouty. They see an older, happy couple skating and she comments how happy they look and he replies they should be happy because they get to spend their lives together. He ends up upsetting her and she runs off.

It starts raining and he's looking everywhere for her. She's hiding in an alley, trying to keep dry. (Yep, that would be pretty awkward if she got caught in the rain!) She comes back to him the next day and simply tells him "Yes", then adds that before they get married, she needs to tell him everything, but she's not ready to tell him today. 

They go back to his building and get on the elevator to head up to his apartment. In the lobby, we see a guy mopping. We don't see his face, but I knew it was going to be Walter. (I was right, though the cast he was wearing on his arm probably gave it away. That guy really did a number on him.) I thought he was going to dump the dirty mop water on Madison, but I guess even he thought that was too extreme. After Madison and Alan get on the elevator he races up the stairs to their floor. He gets there before the elevator and grabs his camera which he had hiding behind a large potted plot and breaks the glass containing the firehose. He has it aimed at the elevator doors and when they open he sprays the occupants inside it. Those two people just so happen to be the same woman and her husband from earlier. What are the odds of that in a huge city like New York? Once again, the man pummels Walter.

Where are Alan and Madison, you ask? They have come back down to the lobby because Alan decides that they're going to get hitched in Maryland because you don't need a blood test there like you do in New York to get married. So this greatly confused me because why would you need a blood test to get married? Is it to make sure you're not related to your potential spouse? I looked this up and apparently it was to "prevent people with STDs from obtaining marriage licenses and passing the disease to a spouse or children of the marriage." Uh, do they realize you don't need to be married to pass it on? This is no longer the case, but it was only in 2019 when all 50 states abolished this rule. Look at that! I learned something from a forty-year-old Tom Hanks movie! 

Alan suddenly remembers that they're supposed to go to a political dinner with the POTUS as a speaker, but he says they can go after. Don't ask me why he was invited to some big fancy dinner with the President as the Guest of Honor. I'm sure it was explained, but I just forgot. But it is part of the plot, so that's why it's in here. 

At the banquet, we see Walter in the kitchen, posing as a waiter in a red coat. He tells the head chef that the union sent him. I'm not sure that's exactly how it works. Don't they need to vet these people first to make sure they're not a danger to the President? Not only that, but as the head chef, I would be concerned that one of my waiters has a broken arm, a neck brace, and one of the lenses in his glasses are shattered. Somehow, Walter has managed to sneak a hose attached to two canisters which he has hiding under his waiter's jacket and it's so obvious he's got something hiding under there. How did he even get past security with this stuff? I know it was 1984, but sheesh! Unless it was already there? I think I'm asking questions I'm not supposed to be asking. So obviously Walter is attempting to spray Madison with the hose (don't even ask me how he knew they were gonna be here; he must have just followed them), but I thought he was accidentally going to spray the President instead. (No, that one couple was not in attendance.) But the secret service are doing their job. When Walter is carrying a bowl of rolls towards Madison, one of them sees him with this huge hump under his coat and talks into his earpiece, telling the others, "Table five. Intercept busboy with suspicious hump." Just as they see him reaching for the hose that's inside his jacket, they quickly and quietly surround him and escort him out as he's telling them what he's doing has "nothing to do with the president." Ha! Like they believe that. 

During the president's speech, Madison tells Alan that it's time for her to tell him. He's surprised she wants to do it now, and frankly, so am I. She doesn't want to do it in the dining room with all these people (good call), so they get up to leave. Walter is outside with the secret service team and the press when they walk out. Alan sees him and tells Madison that he knows that guy. He remembers seeing him on the beach on Cape Cod. Walter sees them and he grabs the hose to spray Madison. Guess the secret service didn't do a good job of restraining him! I was a little confused why she didn't run away when she saw him reaching for it, then figured she probably didn't know what it was until he started spraying her. She falls and all the cameras are flashing. It makes sense now why they have this random banquet with the President; they needed the media there to capture this. Everyone is looking at her with shocked expressions and the camera pans back to reveal she has transferred to a mermaid. She's calling for Alan to help her, but he can only stare in shock at her. The secret service take her to a research facility at the Natural History Museum that is heavily guarded. 

They must have also taken Alan (whether he went willingly or they had to force him, we never see) because the next scene shows him in a tank of water. He is standing, completely naked, covering his groin with his hands. There are wires to monitor him. I guess since he was with Madison they think he might be a merman. It's hilarious when he yells, "I am not a fish!" We soon find out he's been in that tank for TWELVE HOURS so I can't blame him for being more than a little agitated. The scientists bring in Madison because they want to see some "interaction". It soon becomes clear to them that Alan is just a mere man (not a merman!) and the next thing he knows, he's being let out of a van, blindfolded, at his apartment building. He is surrounded by reporters ready to pounce and ask him about the mermaid, but he is saved by Freddie who pulls up in his car and drives them to their business. Everyone there is staring at him and Freddie says "What are you looking at? You've never seen a guy who slept with a fish before?" I mean, when you say it like that, ew. Also, I don't think mermaids would appreciate being called fish and she was technically a human when she was with him as she had legs and other parts of the right anatomy, I assume. So she was 100% a human when he was with her; he never "slept with a fish". 

Alan is upset he met a woman that he really liked, but she isn't even (truly) a human. Freddie tells him he's lucky that he even met someone to make him feel that way and not everyone is as lucky as he is. 

Walter is in the lab where they have Madison in the tank, hooked up to all kinds of machines for testing. He starts to grow a conscious and thinks she looks a little pale. The main scientist, Dr Ross, wants to do a few more tests, than thinks she'll be ready for "the internal examination." Yikes! Walter questions this and Dr. Ross tells him he wants to study her pulmonary system and reproductive organs among other things. Actually, it would be fascinating to know know how a mermaid breathes.

Alan finds Walter who is feeling guilty about what he did. He apologizes and said he did it because he had to prove to people he wasn't crazy. He tells Alan he can help him get into the lab to see her. We next see Alan and Freddie dressed in lab coats, following Walter into the museum. Before they enter the restricted area, Walter tells the posted officer there that he is with "Doctors Jarred and Johannsen from the Stockholm Institute." The guard says he thought they were coming in later with Dr. Ross, but Walter tells him that was just to fool the press. The guard seems content with this answer and is about to let them in, but then he tells the brothers that he just so happens to be half-Swedish (of course he is) and starts talking to them in Swedish. The brothers reply "Ja!" when he asks how their trip was. This sort of raises a bit of suspicion in the guard and in Swedish, he asks, "What are two Swedish scientists doing so far from Sweden?" (What, Swedish scientists can't leave their country to study something they might be experts in? This is a really stupid question, I'm sorry.) Freddie replies, in Swedish, "Hey, baby! I got a twelve inch penis." Uh....for some reason, this explains everything to the guard and he lets them through the secured door. The hell? If anything, that should make him even more suspicious. And in case you're wondering how Freddie knew how to say that in Swedish, it's because it's from a Swedish porno he's seen at least 500 times, so he's memorized certain lines. Freddie is a bit of a pervert. When we first meet him as a child in the flashback on the boat, he's dropping change, then using it as an excuse to look up women's skirts when he's behind down. It's pretty cringe-y when he's a ten-year-old child doing this, but then they show him doing it at the wedding he attends with Alan at the beginning of the movie as a thirty-something man and it's downright pathetic. (Not to mention offensively gross). Also, nobody seems to notice he's doing it and I'm shocked he didn't get bitch slapped. 

There's another guard posted at the door of the room Madison is in and they manage to get through without any questions. Madison and Alan share a passionate kiss and Alan jokingly asks her if the big secret she's been keeping from him is that she's a mermaid or is there something else. She tells him not to feel guilty about not loving her anymore. Uh, he's happy to see you and he ran up to kiss you; obviously he loves you. She realizes that he does love her and this makes her very happy. 

To distract the guard, Walter comes out, all panicky and demands him to stand back. He goes back in and comes out second later with Alan and they are carrying what is clearly Madison, but she' covered in towels and rags. They tell him it's the other doctor and that when he went to examine the mermaid, "these rays came out of her eyes." The guard is about to go in, but they warn him not to or "she'll melt your face right off." Walter also instructs him not to let anyone else in the room and tells him he'll be back with nuclear weapons. I'm surprised the guy didn't notice the difference in weight (the person they were carrying was clearly not an overweight man!) or ask to double check to see who they were carrying out. Once Madison is in the passenger seat of Alan's car, she takes off her disguise. She's also been dried off so she has legs. 

We see Dr. Ross with the two actual Swedish scientists. When the first guard realizes who they are, he tells that that Dr. Kornbluth left with what he thought were the two visiting Swedes not that long ago. They immediately check the room with the tank and Freddie is sitting with his feet in the water and has a fishing pole. (Where did they find a fishing pole?) Once they realize their mermaid is missing, everyone is sent out to find her and bring her back. 

They soon realize they're being pursued and when they're in an alley, Walter tells Alan to stop the car so he can get out and slow them down. As he tells Madison, "I caused all this. Now, I'm gonna finish it." He's let out and Alan and Madison continue driving away. Walter stands in front of an oncoming armored truck and puts his hand out as though he's a traffic cop attempting to stop traffic. The car doesn't show any signs of slowing down or stopping so he has to jump out of the way. 

After a few minutes of being chased, Alan drives near the Hudson River and they get out and embrace. Madison tells him, "I was ready to stay with you forever." He tells her that since they know who she is, they're never going to leave her alone. And you know that everyone in the world knows about her, or will soon know about her. I don't think groundbreaking news like this traveled as fast as it does now than it did in 1984, but the entire world will soon find out about this. He says he wishes he could go with her (do you really, Alan?) and she tells him he can. This is when he finds out that she was the young mermaid he saw in the water when he "fell" overboard. I'm honestly shocked he didn't figure this out already when he found out Madison was a mermaid. Like, duh, of course she was the young blonde mermaid he saw when he was a child! She asks him if he felt safe when he was with her and he says he did and she says this is because he was with her. Uh, he was only in the water for less than thirty seconds. I think going to live underwater permanetly is quite a different thing! You know, Walter really did mess everything up. If it hadn't been for him, Alan and Madison could have been living a happy life together on land. Alan thinks everything will work out though. He can go live with Madison in the depths of the ocean and come back and visit Freddie at Christmas. Just like Hannah Montana, he'll get the best of both worlds! Madison bursts his bubble when she tells him he'll never be able to return. I'm not sure if this is because they'll still be looking for him or he will have adapted to life under the sea ("is better than anything they got up there!") and will physically be unable to come back to land, but I'm guessing it's the former because Madison was able to come to land with no problems. Now Alan isn't so sure anymore and Madison realizes he's not coming with her and she tells him she understands. The trucks and cars and helicopters are getting closer and she dives into the river. 

It takes a few seconds for Alan to realize he does want to be with her and jumps into the river. He still can't swim (great idea going to live with your mermaid girlfriend in the water when you can't swim) and immediately starts sinking. The tac team have now put on their scuba gear and are diving in to retrieve him. Madison swims up to Alan and kisses him and I guess her underwater kiss has granted him the ability to breathe underwater and swim. That's one powerful kiss! They fight off the men and swim away. Apparently the Hudson River is full of coral and tropical fish! As they're swimming, a schmaltzy song starts playing and immediately I was reminded of the schmaltzy song that is played at the end of Teen Wolf. Here are the lyrics that play while Alan and Madison are swimming:

One fine day love came for me. And love was rare as love can be. I saw stars shining in clear blue skies. We flowed together once and forever. Love came for me. One fine night love let us see how far we'll go, how good we'll be. We saw a world no one ever saw before. It was the world love can start with a beat of a heart. Love came for me.

Who wrote that? A five-year-old? That being said, the lyrics to the Teen Wolf song are worse if you can believe it. 

They reach some kind of Atlantis-esque underwater empire and the movie ends. Will Alan ever evolve and get a fish tail or will he be stuck with legs? Also, I have a hard time believing that Madison will be able to protect him if they're attacked by a shark. I realize he may be happy with his decisions because he loves Madison, but, really, what is there to do in the ocean? I feel like he's going to get bored very soon once the thrill of being with Madison wears off. It's not like you can read or watch TV in the ocean! They don't even have music (at least Ariel and her sisters had that to entertain them!). Call my cynical, but this just seems like the worst idea in the history of mankind to follow a woman you've only known for six days. It would be crazy enough if he had only known her for six days and moved to a different country, but she lives in the freaking ocean! Hell, it would be crazy is he had known her for six days and went sailing around the world with her on a boat, but, again, she lives IN the ocean. There's no way he's going to be happy with his decision!
 

Disturbia

The 'Burbs

Director: Joe Dante

Cast: Tom Hanks, Carrie Fisher, Bruce Dern, Corey Feldman, Rick Ducommun, Henry Gibson, Wendy Schaal

Released: February 17, 1989

I had seen this movie a couple times before, but I remembered absolutely nothing about it...probably because it's not that good of a movie. (And probably because it's been quite awhile since I last saw it). It's a bit of an odd movie and is now considered a cult classic, which doesn't surprise me. I read that it was the worst reviewed movie of 1989, which also doesn't surprise me. 

I have to wonder if Marc Cherry got inspiration from this movie to create Desperate Housewives because that's what I was reminded of while watching this. (Though DH is much, much better). The cul-de-sac neighborhood in this movie (which I've already forgot the name of) is very similar to Wisteria Lane from DH. Some odd, new people have moved into a house on the lane and all the neighbors are trying to figure out their big secret (pretty much the storyline for every DH season!). Another reason why I was probably reminded of Desperate Housewives is because both were filmed in the same Universal backlot. (Hey, it's a good place to film if your setting is a cul-de-sac!) The houses are different, obviously. 

Let's meet the neighbors and residents of non-Wisteria Lane, shall we? There's Ray and Carol Peterson (Tom Hanks and Carrie Fisher) who are the "normal" people on the block. (Well, at least Carol is. Compared to his friends, Ray is relatively normal). They have a son who doesn't add anything to the plot at all and Ray is taking a week off of work. Carol wants all of them to go to the lake, but Ray doesn't want to go. He wants his vacation to be a staycation. 

Across the street from them is Mark Rumsfield (Bruce Dern), a Vietnam War vet, and his trophy wife, Bonnie (Wendy Schaal) who is clearly quite younger than him. Next door to them lives high schooler Ricky Butler (Corey Feldman) and his parents, but we never meet his parents because they're away during this time, so Ricky is always inviting his girlfriend or friends over to his house. 

Next door to the Petersons, on one side, lives Art Weingartner (Rick Ducommun) and his wife. We never meet the wife, because, she, much like Ricky's parents, is also out of town for the week. This neighbor was particularly annoying. First of all, he has no common decency for any sort of life. When we first meet him, he has a rifle and is trying to shoot a hawk that's been eating bird food that's meant for the smaller birds. He shoots four times (missing each time) and when Ray comes out of his backyard to see what the commotion is, he turns towards him and nearly shoots Ray! If I were Ray, I would be pissed because I have a young kid and a dog (and the dog was in the backyard, quite near where Art was shooting). Then this neighbor is also a schlub and a mooch. He pretty much invites himself over to the Peterson's house and stuffs himself with food. We see he's cleared a plate of pancakes and eggs while he's given another plate. When Carol passes by him with a bowl of something, he takes a few pieces out without her noticing, but then, in the background, we see her set the bowl down. It was dog food, ha! No wonder he made that face when he ate it. Then he helps himself to some ribs that were in the fridge AND asks Carol if he can eat Ray's eggs when Ray goes to do something. I'm honestly surprised they didn't cast someone who was more overweight. Also, for someone who seems to always be hungry and stuffing his face, they don't really keep that up. You'd think he would always be eating in every scene, but he doesn't. Yeah, we might get a couple scenes where he mentions food, but that's about it. Not that I'm complaining because it was really gross seeing him gorge himself with the ribs. 

And then we have the neighbors who live on the other side of the Petersons. They are very odd. They moved in about a month ago and nobody has ever seen them. Nobody ever goes in or out. They don't ever seem to have any visitors or deliveries. They're not even sure how many people live there. All they know is that their surname is Klopek. Art is super suspicious of them, but Ray just assumes they just want to keep to themselves. In one of the only scenes he has, Ray's son tells them there are three of them and they only come out at night and he saw them digging in their backyard one night last week when he was using his telescope. Oh, yeah, that's not suspicious at all! (I mean the Klopeks digging, not the kid using his telescope). 

Oh, there's another neighbor who lives at the end of the cul-de-sac who is important to the story. His name is Walter and he has a little white dog named Queenie. This dog, a Bichon Frise named Darla, was also in The Silence of the Lambs and if you've ever seen that movie, you would definitely recognize her right away. 

While Ray and Art are in Ray's garage and Ray is showing him something, Art walks out to the driveway and sees a young man (probably in his early twenties) with bright red hair, and, look, there's really no nice way to say this, but he has an "inbred" look to him. He would definitely stand out in a crowd. All the neighbors are witnessing this and we get the viewpoint from the redheaded young man. Ray now sees what the others are seeing and murmurs, "It's my neighbor." But isn't he everyone's neighbor? And soon Ray and Art will get into an argument over that when Art suggests to Ray that he should go over and say hi. Ray replies that he could go say hi to him too. Art tells Ray he's his (the redhead's) neighbor, but Ray tells him he's their neighbor as well, but Art is quick to remind him that he (Ray) shares a property line with the Klopeks. Ray points out they're all on the same block which Art agrees is true, but they all also live in the same town and if the Klopeks ever needed to borrow anything, they would go to Ray's place. Yeah, so while this conversation is going on, the young Klopek ends up going back in the house and they missed their opportunity to say hello. (Though I don't think anything would have happened even if they had, most likely he would have just gone back in his house without saying anything). 

Ray and Art notice that everyone has seen them arguing, including Ray's son. Not wanting to look like he's afraid in front of his own son, both men decide to go up and knock on the door. We get a close up shot of all the neighbor's faces as they watch Ray and Art walk up to the Klopek's porch, including the dog's, which was hilarious. 

As they're walking up the steps to the porch, Art notices there are bars on the basement windows. In a deadpan voice, Ray points out, "They've got holes in their porch, too." He says this right after Ray's foot has sunk into the porch due to rotting wood, I guess. Actually, this movie may be funnier than I'm giving it credit for. Their address number is 669, but when Ray uses the big brass knocker, the nine is knocked down and turns to a six. He knocks again and the number sign falls out of its place and knocks off a light which reveals a bunch of bees. :::shudder:::: They run and with all the commotion they're making, I'm surprised we don't see any of the Klopeks peering out the window to see what's going on.

That evening, Ray takes his dog for a walk. And when I say walk, what I mean is that he lets the dog off the leash to let him go wherever he wants and Ray walks next door to Art's house porch where he's hanging out with Ricky and drinking beer with him. Ricky asks Ray if he's ever seen The Sentinel, a movie about an old guy who owns an apartment "which is kind of like the gateway to Hell" and nods towards the Klopek house. Both Art and Ricky have theories that the Klopeks are involved in something seedy, but Ray doesn't believe any of that. At least not yet.

They each go back to their homes, and, for some reason, Art sneaks over to Ray's house and taps on the widow of the living room where Ray and Carol are watching Jeopardy. He tries to hide when Carol looks behind her, but obviously she ends up seeing him. I don't understand this. Why doesn't he just go to the door? Ray gets up and tells his wife that he'll be back in a few minutes. They get Mark who has an infrared night-vision scope (he has a bunch of these military gadgets that come in handy in the movie) so they can spy on the neighbors because Art is convinced they have a dungeon in their basement. They're going to use the scope to look in the barred up basement windows.

Meanwhile, Ricky has invited over his girlfriend who has the permed blonde hair and the colorful outfit and dangly geometric earrings. You definitely know what decade this girl comes from! He has set up two folding chairs on his front porch to watch what's going on in the neighborhood. His girlfriend (I don't remember her name or if she even had one) wants to watch TV or go to a movie, but he tells her, "This is better than anything on television. This is real. This is my neighborhood." Was Ricky ahead of his time? Was he the first to truly discover not just reality TV, but reality reality? 

A hum is coming from the Klopek house and it keeps getting louder and louder and it looks like flames are coming from the basement. This all looks very suspicious and surely it has to wake up the whole neighborhood with all the racket that's going on. I would call the police just for the disturbance! Ray is about to go over and inspect it, but the other two tell him to get down and they hide behind garbage cans when they see the Klopek garage door open and the young redhead guy backs out of the driveway to the end where the their garbage cans are situated. He gets out of the car and takes a hefty trash bag that is stuffed full of something out of the trunk and puts it in the trash can which he has to really pack in the receptacle. I think we're supposed to assume there's a body (or at least body parts) in the trash bag, but what kind of murderer tosses his victim out in his own trash? That's just asking to be caught. He then gets back in the car and drive it back into the garage. The three men all agree that it's super weird that somebody would drive from their garage to the end of their driveway to dump their trash. Yeah, no kidding. After Redhead Man goes back in the house, Art wants to investigate the trash cans, but Ray tells him it will look too suspicious if all three of them are going through their neighbor's garbage at 11 at night in the middle of a rainstorm. Mark agrees with Ray and says they'll wait til morning. 

Before he goes to bed, Ray looks out the window and sees his three neighbors, all in hooded cloaks, digging in their backyard. And remember, this is around 11 at night during a rainstorm. This is all very suss, especially considering they're all digging large holes that could fit, oh, I don't know, a body. Why not call the police? I have to admit, I wasn't sure if this scene was a dream or not when I watched it. 

Either they all woke up late or they don't know when their own garbage is picked up on their street because by the time they wake, they see the garbage truck has come and they have dumped both the trash bins at the Klopek house. Both Art and Mark see this and wave to the garbage men, telling them to stop dumping the trash, but when the realize they are too late, they both get in the garbage truck and start digging through it and all this garbage ends up on the street in a huge pile which we will see for the remainder of the movie. It's actually pretty funny that nobody will pick it up and it is just left there. Mark does tell the garbage man to pick it up since he is the garbage man, but the garbage man says he only picks up garbage that is in garbage cans and I have to side with the garbage man here. (Also, how many times can I say "garbage man" in one sentence? A lot, apparently.) He did pick up the garbage, but Art and Mark are the ones who are tossing the garbage from the truck to the street. They should be the ones to pick it up. 

Ray tells both of them that he saw the three Klopeks digging (so I guess it wasn't a dream), and they all come to the conclusion that they took the body from the garbage and buried it in the backyard. (Is burying your victim in your backyard any better than throwing it away in your trash? Maybe slightly better, but still, that's one of the first places they're gonna check if you're suspected of murder! Also, I'm sure the cops are gonna notice if your yard has been freshly dug up.) 

While all this is going on, Mark's wife, Bonnie, sees Queenie, Walter's dog, in their yard, all dirty and shaky. She picks up the dog and wonders if Walter knows that his dog is outside, but when she goes to his house, nobody answers the door. She tells this to her husband and the others (and by this time, Ricky has joined them), so they all go over to Walter's house to see what's going on. Nobody is still answering the door, so Mark breaks in through the back way and opens the door for all of them. The first thing they notice is that the TV is on and a chair is on its side as though there's been a struggle. Other than that, nothing is really out of place, but they continue searching the house. 

Bonnie goes in the kitchen to get some food for Queenie. The guys are in the living room when they hear her scream and they come running. She points to something hairy on the stove, claiming it's a rat. (In her defense, it does look like a rat...I probably would have had a similar reaction too!) Her husband tells her it's just Walter's toupee. Why it's on the stove, I'm not really sure! They think it's odd that Walter would leave his house without his hair and that must mean foul play. 

These two will go on to be in 
Oscar-winning films!

Besides the earlier scene where Art is eating breakfast (and ribs and dog food) at the Peterson's, this is the only other scene where we see him around food. He picks up a plate of cookies and when he does, Ricky (who had been looking upstairs) opens the swinging door and the plate and cookies fall to the floor, everything shattering. Ray tells everyone they need to leave, which they all do. I love that they don't even sweep up the broken glass or cookie pieces. If you're worried about Queenie, no need. Ray takes her home with him, but first writes a note to tell Walter that he has his dog. His first draft reads, "Your dog is at my house. Your window is broken because we all thought that..."  When he realizes he doesn't know what to write after the ellipses, he rips up that piece of paper and simply writes him a new note: "I have you dog" and places is through the mail slot along with Walter's toupee, which he still had. (The reason why he took it, then returned it, is just for the sake of plot). 

Later, Ray and Art are in Ray's basement (with the door locked so Carol can't interfere) reading a large dusty tome titled "The Theory and Practice of Demonology." Where did they get this book? From the Sunnydale High School library? Art is convinced that their neighbors are Satanists and that Walter was a human sacrifice. I'm not sure where he came up with these conclusions. Yes, it was super suspicious that they were digging holes in their backyard, but that doesn't make them Satanists. Murders? Perhaps. And perhaps they should call the police if they really do think their new neighbors have anything to do with the disappearance of their other neighbor. Art also tells Ray that they need to go to "the religious supply store and get themselves a couple gallons of holy water." What, is he talking about the church? Turns out he is because he then adds his cousin is a priest and he can get them a deal. A deal on holy water? I didn't realize you could buy the stuff. Oh, that reminds me of the scene from The Lost Boys (speaking of Corey Feldman!) when the Frog brothers go into a church to fill up their canteens with holy water to ward against vampires. Hilarious. 

Before they go to bed, Ray does tell his wife about their theory and she thinks it's absolutely ridiculous. That night he does have a nightmare about his neighbors where he's being sacrificed. The next morning, he's watching Mr. Roger's Neighborhood. Well, he's so much not watching it as it just happens to be on and he's staring at the screen. Ha, you could say Tom Hanks was doing research for a movie he would do thirty years in the future! 

When Ray goes out on the upper deck of his house, Art and Mark come running over, telling him they've got a plan. Carol hears them and tells them Ray isn't feeling well and needs to stay home and rest. She knows he didn't get much sleep last night. Their grand idea is to put a note that says "I know what you've done" under the door, then ring the doorbell and run away. That is so childish and what exactly are they hoping to accomplish with that? After they do it, Art runs over to Ray's backyard where Ray is trying to take a nap on a chaise lounge. Art tells him what he and Mark did and Ray can't believe he did that. He is furious because when he wrote the note for Walter and stuck it in his mail slot, he noticed that one of the elder Klopeks saw what he was doing and now he thinks that they'll think that he was the one who wrote and sent the note.

While they're bickering back and forth, Ray's dog, who had been digging in the Klopeks yard (there's a hole in the fence he's able to squeeze through) comes back with a huge bone in his mouth. It's a human femur bone (thigh bone) and this thing is massive. Art even takes the bone and throws it so the dog can fetch it a few times. I'm not sure how neither of them even notice that the dog has it until a few minutes have passed. It's kind of hard to miss, but I guess that's the joke. They finally notice the size of the bone the dog is fetching and Art recognizes it as a human femur bone. I feel like maybe now this is the time to call the police if a human bone is found in your neighbor's yard. But do they? No. Art is now totally convinced that their neighbors are murdering people and chopping them up and burying them in their backyard. He is sure that the bone belongs to Walter. Both of them scream "Nooooo!" and the movie does this annoying thing where the camera zooms in and out on their faces. A few seconds of this would have been fine, but it goes on way too long and was super annoying. They then notice that someone on the Klopek side has tossed a piece of crumped paper over the fence and of course it's the note they had received earlier. 

Carol gets the idea for the two couples (she clearly lets Art know that he is not invited) to go over to the Klopeks and introduces themselves and invite themselves over for "a nice, neighborly chat" and get to know them. Bonnie tells the two guys that they'll (herself and Carol) will "find out more in five minutes of friendly chat than in a month of snooping around." 

The redhead answers the door and they all sort of just barge in around him. We find out his name is Hans and he lives with his Uncle Ruben who we meet next. They're obviously foreign, but I don't think we ever learn where exactly they're from. Mark asks Reuben if "Klopek" is a Slavic name, but he hisses out, "No!" My guess is that they're German. For one thing, their accent sounds German and for another, Hans is wearing lederhosen. 

They're all sitting awkwardly in the living room (Carol and Bonnie on one couch, Ray and Rueben on the couch across from them, and Mark is standing against a wall) when Hans brings some (odd) snacks on a TV tray: a bowl of pretzels and a can of sardines. When offered, Carol takes some pretzels and Bonnie tells him, "I'm trying to cut back." When Ray is offered the food, he looks at Carol and she nods, so he takes a pretzel, then takes a sardine out of the can with his fingers (and it makes the most disgusting squishy noise) and places it on top of the pretzel and proceeds to eat it. By the look on Tom Hanks' face, I don't think he was acting! 

Mark knocks on the wall and floor to show them what a good, solid house they have and after he knocks on the floor with his foot, he hears a thud knock back. The Petersons and Rumsfields are startled by this, but this seems to be forgotten (for now) because Ray starts having an allergic reaction to the dust in the house. They soon meet the third resident of the house, Dr. Verner Klopek (Henry Gibson), who is Reuben's brother. He comes up from the basement wearing gloves that are covered in a red substance. When he shakes Ray's hand, we're supposed to think it's blood, but I knew it was paint. No one is that out of touch that they would shake hands with somebody while wearing bloody gloves. That is disgusting. 

The doctor tells them all how he was just mentioning to his brother how he wanted to meet all his neighbors (they sure didn't make any efforts to do that!) and now they're all at his house. Mark tells him that all the neighbors are not there and at first I thought he was talking about Art, but he actually meant Walter and tells the Klopeks they don't know where Walter is. Mark cuts through the chitchat and wants to know what the weird noise is coming from the basement. Carol quickly gets up and says she think they should go. Mark tries to get Ray on his side, telling him to tell the Klopeks that he also saw/heard the weird light/noise coming from the basement the other night, but Ray just runs towards what he thinks is the bathroom. When he opens the door, a huge Great Dane comes bounding out. The Petersons and the Rumsfields decide it's time to leave and they all convene at Ray's house. Art joins them too, because, of course he does. Ray says that the Klopeks may be eccentric, but he doesn't think there's anything nefarious going on. He tells his wife and Bonnie that he wants to talk to the guys alone. This right there should have been a red flag to Carol, but she and Bonnie just let them be. Once alone in the den (with the doors closed), we soon discover that Ray was lying about the neighbors and he definitely think there's something unsavory going on with them. He takes out Walter's toupee from his pants and tells them he found it after the dog was released. He doesn't understand how the Klopeks have this since he put it back in Walter's house. Not only that, but he found it wedged between some magazines all addressed to Walter. They surmise that means the Klopeks went back inside Walter's house and got the wig. 

The Klopeks had mentioned they were going away tomorrow for the whole day, so Ray wants to play CSI and he's "not coming back till [he] finds a dead body." He also adds, "Nobody knocks off an old man in my neighborhood and gets away with it." 

To make sure Carol doesn't find out what he's doing (because he knows she won't approve), he tells her he's going golfing with Art. He also gets her to get out of the house and visit her sister with their son. He seems very eager to get her out of the house and even Carol can sense that. He tells her he think it would be good for her to get out of the house "after the week [they've] had." 

Ricky sees that his neighbors have something big planned so he starts calling his friend and girlfriend to come down because "it'll be live" (although they're gonna have to wait awhile before they see anything, ahem, explosive). At least they can look forward to the pizza dude! 

In a really stupid move, Art climbs up a telephone pole to disconnect the wires so no alarms go off. He somehow manages to cut the right wire, but he gets shocked and ends up falling into a shed (making a comical human-shaped hole in the roof). By all accounts, Art should be dead. 

While Mark is keeping a lookout on his roof with his binoculars and Walkie-Talkie, Ray and Art are digging large holes in the Klopek's backyard, which seems to be mostly comprised of dirt. I've never seen a backyard with that much dirt and no grass at all. They're making no progress with finding anything and decide to check the house because it will be cooler. They'll start in the basement and work their way up. Art theorizes they didn't find anything while digging because the Klopeks probably dug up the bodies and are now hiding them in the basement. According to Art, these Klopeks sure move their bodies around a lot. First, they put them in the trash receptacle, then they move them to the backyard, now they're in the basement. 

In a hilarious scene, we see Ray try to break into the house by using a credit card, but he ends up just breaking the card. Luckily, it was just a credit card from a particular store (you can't tell where it's from, but I'm pretty sure it's a made up one) and Art tells him, "It was a sh*t store anyway." Ray just covers his hand with some kind of cloth and breaks the glass and reaches in to unlock the door from the inside 

It's a good thing they start in the basement because there they find a huge, old furnace. One might even call it an incinerator. It is ridiculously big for the size house they have and they notice about forty batteries are connected to it. Art turns it on and it starts whirring and making the same loud noise they hear every night so now they know what was making all that racket. Ray finds a big pile of dirt near the furnace and surmises that they must have burnt Walter's body in the furnace, then buried his bones right there. He grabs the shovel from Art and starts digging. 

It's nighttime now and and the Klopeks have just turned onto the street in their car. Even though Mark and Ricky and all of his friends are outside, none of them see their car. The Klopeks notice their furnace is on, so they know someone is in their house (and probably have a good idea who) and they turn around and leave. 

By this time, Ray has dug a huge hole (pretty sure Art isn't even helping; he's just standing next to him) and they hear a clink when the shovel hits something metal and they get all excited because they think he must have hit a crypt and Walter's body must be in there. I'm not sure where they even come to that conclusion. They don't even know what they've hit and they definitely don't have an evidence that Walter is dead. Right now, the only evidence they have of any kind of foul play going on with the Klopeks is the femur. I don't know, I feel like if your dog dug up a human bone in your neighbor's yard, you might want to call the police unless there was a valid reason for a human bone to be in their yard (not sure what good reason there would be, though!) Art calls Mark on the Walkie to tell him they've found Walter, but he kinda jumps the gun with that because they haven't! They haven't found jacksh*t!

While Mark didn't see the Klopeks from his vantage point on the roof, he does notice a car drive to Walter's house and lo and behold, Walter gets out of the car with some assistance from his daughter. (In a later scene, we find out that's who is with him in the car). Mark calls Ray on the Walkie to tell him, "Guess who's not in the basement? Walter!" But Ray doesn't hear him and just keeps digging and mud and sludge cover up the Walkie. 

Ricky also sees Walter has come back and when Art comes outside (to get Mark, I guess), he points Walter out to him. Things get even worse when the Klopeks have returned and this time they have a police car following them. Now all the neighbors notice that they are back. Art tells Ricky to keep them preoccupied so he can go get Ray. Ricky jumps on the police car's hood and tells them all these people are at his parents' house eating their food. (Hmm, I thought he had called the PIZZA DUDE!)  

Just as Art comes down to the basement, Ray yells at him to run because he's hit the gas line. Art runs out of the house screaming that the house is gonna blow and it does just that. Because Ray was struggling to get out of the hole he had dug for himself (literally and figuratively!), he was still in the house when it exploded. By all accounts, Ray should be dead and that's what everyone thinks until Bonnie sees movement in the house. Very slowly, Ray stiffly walks out the front door. His clothes are all tattered and shredded, his skin is all ashy, and one of his eyes is closed shut. I love the way he sort of just slides down the front steps.  

We next see Carol come back (though she seemed to have left their son at her sister's because he's not in the car) and she sees a burning house, firetrucks, police cars, and a huge crowd. Despite everything, she doesn't seem too mad at her husband who could have died and he's lucky nobody else got hurt with that explosion.

One detective tells Ray that he's looking at counts of destruction of private property, destruction of public property, three counts of criminal trespassing (not sure why it's three counts), harassment, assault, vandalism, plus Walter thinks the note he received from Ray about his dog was a ransom note (even though it didn't specifically ask for money so I don't know why he would think that; though I will admit the note was a little ominous!) and he had dognapped Queenie. 

Speaking of Walter, another detective tells Art that Walter had been in the hospital and his daughter and son-in-law had taken him there. I'm guessing they were over at his house and something happened (I think they said it was his heart) when he was watching TV and thats why the chair was knocked over. He also mentions that the Klopeks had been picking up his mail which I thought was odd for a couple of reasons:

1) The Klopeks have not talked to anyone at all since they've moved to this neighborhood, and now they're getting someone's mail? That doesn't make any sense and it's just there for the plot.

b) Walter is only gone for what? Two days top? Why does he need someone picking up his mail? Hell, I've been gone for over a week and I just let my mail pile up! Luckily, I don't get that many catalogues. 

They also have this weird explanation for the wig where they said the doctor got the wig mixed up with the newspapers. Huh? How does that happen? They should have just said they took the wig to keep it safe at their house, I don't know! It really doesn't make any sense why they have the wig, but again, Ray had to find it at the Klopeks to move the plot forward. 

Art is still convinced there's a body that goes with the femur they found (I mean, he's not wrong), but Ray has had enough and starts defending the Klopeks. He's very convincing and I find myself siding with him as he yells at Art, "They didn't do anything to us" and he can't blame them for keeping to themselves because they "live next door to people who break into their house and burn it down while they're gone for the day." Uh, it didn't just "burn down", it exploded! He says they are the one who are being unneighborly. "We're the ones vaulting over fences and peeking in people's windows. We're the ones throwing garbage in the street and lighting fires. We're the ones acting suspicious and paranoid. We're the lunatics. Us! It's not them!" What he is saying is 100% correct; they are the ones who acting more suspicious (although that femur is still pretty suspicious!) than the Klopeks, who, at this point, are just eccentric. 

Ray is so fed up and just wants to go to the hospital, so in a hilarious scene, he picks up a gurney and pretty much throws it into the back of an ambulance, then flops down onto it. The doors close and while he's laying in the ambulance, Dr. Werner Klopek comes in and Ray apologizes to him and tells him once he gets out of prison, he's going to help him rebuild his house. (Yeah, right). The foreign doctor just ignores what he's said and tells him that he may have fooled the others, but he doesn't fool him. Ray has no clue what he's talking about and Werner tells him that when he was in his basement, he must have looked in the furnace. He then goes on further to say, "You saw one of my skulls, didn't you?" What the actual f*ck? This guy is giving a lot away when he doesn't need to. Maybe there are more delicate ways to go about this than admitting that you have skulls in your furnace! (Also, how did Ray and Art miss that?) We'll soon learn in a few minutes that this is not his first rodeo (i.e. murder) so I don't know why he's being so dumb here. Well, I guess he is planning on killing Ray by injecting him with something, so it really doesn't matter if he knows that Werner is a murderer or not. 

Oh, yeah. Surprise! The Klopeks were a family or murderers after all! That's the big twist. Obviously, they did not kill Walter, but they did kill the Knapps, the elderly couple that lived in the house before the Klopeks did. Since the Klopeks already live in the house when the movie starts, we never meet the Knapps (well, for one thing because they were already dead!), but we do hear about them through snippets of dialogue. In an early scene when Art is telling Ray about how secretive and weird the Klopeks are, he defends them (I bet he regrets that now!) by saying the Knapps also weren't conversationalists and they didn't even say goodbye when they moved (and now we know why!) When the two couples are meeting the Klopeks, Mark mentions he didn't even see the Knapps move, but one of the Klopeks insist that the moving truck was out all day. The only thing we really know about the Knapps, besides that they weren't too chatty, was that they were an elderly couple. Werner goes on to tell Ray that they "took" the house from them and that he had offered to buy it, but they had refused to sell because "You know how old people are. They grow so attached to things." Well, at least now we know the femur belonged to one of the Knapps. Also, I'm pretty sure you can't just kill the residents of a home and move in there...I'm no real estate agent, but I feel like there are usually papers to be signed. Also, did the Knapps have no family members who were worried about them? Unless they were a couple who never had children, so I guess it's possible. 

When he takes out the huge syringe, Ray starts to get up and tells him he thinks he forgot his wallet, but the murder doctor pushes him back down and it is revealed that Hans is sitting in the driver's seat and starts driving the ambulance erratically through the neighborhood while Ray is struggling with the doctor to keep him from sticking him with the syringe. Hans ends up crashing the ambulance in the front of Art's house. When that happens, the back of the ambulance doors open and the gurney comes rolling out with both Ray and Werner still struggling against each other. The gurney runs into the Klopek's car and when it does the trunk opens. It is absolutely hilarious when Ray stands up and starts yelling out, "Citizen's arrest! I am placing you under citizen's arrest for my attempted murder!" I mean, how many times do you ever get to say that? I feel like "citizen's arrests" are only something you see in movies and TV shows. He then tells the others (as you can imagine, everyone has gathered around them) that Dr. Klopek has confessed to the murders of the Knapps. One of the (foolish) detectives tell him he doesn't have any evidence and as he's saying that, Ricky looks into the open trunk of the car and he lifts up a blanket and says, "You do now." We see that the blanket has been covering a bunch of bones. I counted five skulls. Just how many people did they kill? (Cuz you know there's more!) 

So all the Klopeks are arrested and taken away. Why do they murder? We really never find out. Everyone goes home. The final joke is that Art's wife is back and his house is on fire. Mark and Bonnie tell him his wife is back and he exclaims, "My wife is home!?" He seems more shocked about that than his house being on fire (not to mention the huge ambulance that his ran through the front). 

Yeah, this movie is really stupid, but it was actually a lot funnier than I thought it would be, so I can see why so many people love it and why it's considered a cult classic.