Real Men Love Grosse Pointe Blank

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This is one of those films that holds up over time.  You may laugh at the thought of a film aging badly in ten years, but let’s not forget the immediate ditch of obsolescence Hackers dug itself into back in 1995-96 with its technology, fashion and hairstyles.  Grosse Pointe Blank could be released today and aside from a few cars and cell phones you wouldn’t know the difference (oh, and the actors would look a little too young).  It’s hilarious, it’s poignant, it’s moderately violent and all real men should love it.

The High Concept

Before getting into any details, you have to admire that they stretched out what would have been a good concept for a five-minute sketch into a full 107 minutes without wearing it out.

Dan Aykroyd Is in a Funny Film for the First Time in About Ten Years

Also for the last time for about ten years.  Between 1975 and the late 80s, Dan Aykroyd was comedy gold.  Then it seemed like the second-rate comedies started piling on and his talent dulled a bit. It’s hard to say whether the low point of his career has been Britney Spears’s Crossroads or Tim Allen’s Christmas with the Cranks (you’d have to tell me, I’ve only seen one of them. I won’t say which.), but you can only rag on the guy so much.  This happens to a lot of comedians as they age.  Hell, it happens to most.  One of the few rays of sunshine (along with perhaps Tommy Boy) on this mostly gloomy, post-80s career is Grosse Pointe Blank.  His character Grocer has more than his fair share of great lines, he naturally looks hilarious wielding a pair of guns, and his recurring bit about starting a hitman union is a joke that just doesn’t get old.

The Soundtrack

Hit after hit after hit.  Hits from the 70s, hits from the 80s, even a few from the 90s.  The late Joe Strummer from The Clash is credited with “composing the original score,” but you kind of forget about the score when the soundtrack keeps throwing you classic songs you can admit to liking (“White Lines”, “Monkey Gone to Heaven”) alternated with songs you probably shouldn’t admit to liking (“99 Luftballoons”, “Take on Me”).

Jeremy Piven

Sure now everybody loves him because of his character Ari on Entourage, but he was stealing the show even ten years ago as Martin’s old friend Paul.  Whether he’s selling real estate to yuppies, doing a ridiculous monkey dance to impress the popular girl, or helping Martin dispose of a body wrapped in the school banner, the eye goes to Piven.

Cusack Disarms a Bully with Psychology

Michael Cudlitz plays Bob, the drunken former bully of Pointe's High School who antagonizes Martin for a little while and keeps asking people if they want to do some blow with him.  When he finally proposes fisticuffs with Martin, the smooth hitman reminds him that they don’t actually have the bad history that the bully is hinting at, and that Bob is clearly displacing his anger.  Bob breaks down, reads a poem, then offers Martin some blow.  It’s a perfect send up of the “nerds get even” cliché of high school or back-to-high school movies.

Alan Arkin 

Alan Arkin is perhaps the rare exception to the Dan Aykroyd syndrome I mentioned before:  he’s always been funny.  Oh, he’s been in some crap movies too (Tim Allen’s Santa Clause 3 for example -- see a developing pattern?).  But it’s hard to think of a time when he wasn’t hilarious.  His delivery is consistently perfect in the role of Martin’s therapist.  He shows no emotion and at times seems to be sleeping through the role, but his lines are still pitch perfect because of the rhythm at which he says them and the way his eyes always seem to be everywhere but his target.

A Fairly Convincing-Looking Kickboxing Fight

When most people look at John Cusack they don’t automatically say to themselves, “I bet that guy is a world class martial artist,” and yet, you almost believe that he could win that kickboxing fight with the assassin that followed him to the reunion.  Fact:  according to IMDb, the actor who played that hit man is Benny "The Jet" Urquidez, a world champion kickboxer who also served as Cusack’s kickboxing instructor. Fact:  that guy also did a great job with his only line: “It is I... Sydney Feldman.”

You Can Play Spot the Cusacks

The Microwave Bomb 

I’m not even close to being a demolitions expert, but I have some doubts about how that microwave bomb worked.  You’ve got to appreciate the logic that must have gone into thinking that thing up.  It’s a bomb that looks like a potato with some wires sticking out of it that destroys the entire convenience store when the timer on the microwave runs out.  Why the sudden absence of microwave radiation would trigger a bomb is beyond me, but it’s a great scene regardless (or perhaps as a result of).

Cusack Blows Off Bruce Willis' Head

Well, a cardboard facsimile thereof.  During the gun fight in the Ultimart, Martin fires some shots at Felix who happens to be standing in front of some cut-outs of the major characters from Pulp Fiction (Travolta, Thurman, Willis and Jackson sans the jheri curls).  A stray bullet takes off Bruno’s big bald gourd.  You’d imagine that something that probably helped this film get made was the enormous success of Pulp Fiction only three years earlier. Consider their similarities:  they’re both quirky semi-comedies about hit men having epiphanies regarding the meaning of life, and they both have fantastic pop soundtracks.  So giving a slight nod followed by a slight “fuck you” to Tarantino’s film is a great, subtle, irreverent, ballsy move.  Not to mention I’d never want to publicly deface an effigy of Bruce Willis.  That guy’s still in pretty good shape.  He could probably break Cusack in two in 1997, kickboxing or no.

You Could Watch it With a Lady

There are bits that border on chick flick.  Just a few.  While back in town for the hit, Martin is trying to rekindle things with the girl he stood up on prom night (Minnie Driver) to run off and join the army.  Their chemistry hearkens back to the screwball comedies of the 40s the way Debi embarrasses him and makes him jump through hoops, not to mention the witty banter.  So if your girlfriend doesn’t like action films, there’s that tiny rom-com nougat at the center of this blood-covered Snickers (a gross analogy, admittedly).  Also, your significant other probably deep down loves John Cusack a little bit more than you.  Seriously, they can’t get enough of “the Couscous” (what they call him, not my invention).

That Hypnotic Baby

A real man doesn’t have the biological clock that makes women want to have children, but a real man can have paternal instincts nonetheless.  This infant completely mesmerizes Martin while Bowie and Queen’s “Under Pressure” plays in the background, giving Martin his “newfound respect for life.”  Oh, he still caps a half dozen guys after this, but in a lot of ways, that kid is the turning point in the movie.  Little Robbie and his doting (and not bad-looking) mother show Martin that there may indeed be promise in going the conventional route of marriage, children and the resulting responsibilities. If there were a sequel no doubt we’d discover that this was a pack of lies.

Joan Cusack's Face During This Scene

While describing Felix La PuBelle to Martin over the phone, Marcella (Joan Cusack) shifts into 40s mode and delivers her lines like a hard-bitten PI.  But does she have to do that with her face?  Is that on purpose or does she have some facial tic?  It’s unsettling but funny.

"It's Not Me"

It’s not very subtle either, but the existential crisis at the core of Martin’s character is well-handled and developed.  His mantra “it’s not me” pops up just about every time he kills somebody or something blows up.  He uses this catchphrase to avert blame, but as becomes apparent, he’s also disassociating himself from his “moral flexibility” and violent lifestyle.  He rationalizes by saying that governments hire killers all the time, that cops shoot protesters at random which is in his mind less ethical than a planned hit.  But ultimately he admits that the real reason he does what he does is “you get to... like it.”

"Popcorn!"

If there’s one moment in this movie that’s truly unforgettable, it’s the final showdown between Cusack and Aykroyd.  The two fire wildly at each other from opposite sides of the half-wall dividing the kitchen from the living room.  Cusack admits that he’s out of ammunition and Aykroyd agrees to sell him a gun for 100 grand.  Cusack accepts this offer, but Aykroyd throws the gun well out of reach.  Thinking he has the upper hand, Aykroyd jumps to his feet -- guns drawn -- and inexplicably yells, “Popcorn!” only to be clobbered by a fatal dose of television-to-the-head.  It’s the perfect combination of comedy and violence, just like the rest of the movie.