Dutch (1991)

I was surprised to see that the IMDB collective viewer rating wasn't lower; but even more surprised that most of the written reviews were high. I caught this film on cable tv, late at night, and gave it a look. Though Beth-Williams "Natalie's" and O'Neill's "Dutch" were presented as caring for each other, it was not really shared with us, except as a contrasted to the awful ex-husband's connection. I stayed tuned in, in expectation for more evidence of closeness and growth for them. Next up, the meeting of Dutch and Doyle, the son, was violent, but was presented as "comedy". As the meanness continued, I kept thinking that Dutch might later surprise me, and being the "adult", he'd learn more, and share that with the boy. Or, maybe the boy would inadvertently share his own buried softer side with Dutch, who'd then grow and share. I doubted Doyle could learn anything from Dutch's rampaging self-indulgence. If Dutch did grow more selfless and caring, I only saw it in a few occasionally warmer smiles (not those other glaring smiles he pushed onto Doyle). I welcomed the scene where Dutch tried to entertain Doyle with a private fireworks display. In this scene, the camera work seemed disconnected: it showed Dutch smiling, as in trying to get the kid to laugh along, too; but the jump cuts to the car then showed Doyle only looking at the dashboard. Yes, he looked at and liked the lights, but (based on the camera work) only when Doyle was being distracted by them too . I drew back, into my hope-wait-and-see posture. As Doyle and Dutch began to fall into a shared predicament, and were stranded out in the cold, I felt they might finally draw closer. Then, in a scene at a shelter for homeless folks, Doyle warmed up inside, making a kind gesture to one of the children. The child's mother (played so well, tho' very briefly, by L. Scott Caldwell) responded very lovingly to Doyle before he slept, and I thought the uplifting changes I'd hoped for him (and for Dutch) would finally kick in. It really never seemed to though. The ending prompted me to imagine a sequel. That 2nd movie would pick up after this film's final moment. In it, Dutch's JOY in inflicting some new pain on Doyle, would be responded to appropriately by his mother. Probably not a comedy this time. Overall, Natalie, and Dutch showed no signs to me of being close in any way. They may have each wanted some "good" things, but probably not the same things. At least Dutch got the son home. But Doyle's love of mom may have been discovered as a judgmental response to Dutch's behavior, and not really as a credit to Dutch's "help". Very few laughs for me.

This is one of my favourite movies to watch at Christmas. Plot In A Paragraph: Dutch Dooley (The brilliant Ed O'Neill) goes on a cross country road trip to pick up his girl friends obnoxious twelve year old son Doyle (who is refusing to come home for Thanksgiving) from boarding school. I don't understand why this movie flopped as bad as it did, I for one love it, as do both of my kids 16 and 9. Ed O'Neill is as brilliant as he always is (this was released at the height of his TV show "Married With Children" popularity) to some he'll always be Al Bundy, but there is more to O'Neill than that. He is an absolute delight here. Ethan Embry is excellent as both sides to Doyle, it's always nice to see the lovely JoBeth Williams and Christopher McDonald is at his sleazy best whilst an attractive Ari Meyers leaves a lasting impression as Brock. Beautiful shot showing some great scenic shots of America this has a lot of laughs, I still laugh out loud at certain parts of this movie over twenty years later.

I do so love movies that lift the lid and expose our social attitudes, I could name so many other movies take a real hard poke at what amounts to class snobbery.What we have here is a rich young snob, looking down on a working class truck driver who works hard for his pay, and is therefore able to pay his way.This film also takes a poke at parents who rear such rotten kids, and without any real experiences of life, grow up to be just like their parents.And so the merry go round continues both in America, the land of the free, ha ha ha, and here in England, our green and pleasant land, ha ha ha.Both our nation's rear such monsters, and it will never change, we like being snobs, we like looking down on our peers, and why do we like doing all this ? Because those who do it, feel inferior, and the only way they can make themselves feel superior, is to look down on their peers.As stated I love films that take a real poke at judgemental snobbery, and this film did it in buckets and in a very funny way, but snobbery isn't funny, it's pathetic.

This film sort of reminds me of the film "Over the Top" without the sweaty men arm wrestling and smacking themselves to psyche up for their next match. This is a very good thing. This film is also a comedy and not an overly serious drama, sorry but a travel film such as this should be a comedy rather than a sappy drama. This film does get sappy here and there, but not as bad as that one. The reason I compare the two is because it has two men going after a military kid on behalf of the mother. Granted the mother was dying in "Over the Top" I still find the two similar. This one has O'Neil of "Married With Children" fame as the new boyfriend of a mom. He offers to go pick up her son at a military type school so that they can bond. Well things of course do not go as planned as you end up with a bit of a crazy trip. Though nowhere near as crazy as the trip John Candy and Steve Martin had in "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles." The kid has a bit of a problem with his mom and worships his dad, who is actually a bit of a stand offish type, not really involving himself in his son's life other than the phone call promising he will be there for sure next time type. The comedy is rather good, but it suffers from its similarities to the superior "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles" movie. You see some of the same jokes, however they don't have the edge of that movie. Still, it is a tolerable enough flick though they kind of made fun of it on "Married with Children" as the wife spots the movie on sale at a really low price an she kind of dismisses it completely. However, I do not think it is worthy of that kind of scorn as it has some good moments, "Over the Top" on the other hand deserves its scorn.