![]() But while seeing Candy in all the wild costumes and disguises has some potential, it winds up masking his inherent talent and the movie might have worked better if it leaned on his natural comedic skills. The narrative here is a fun one, allowing Candy to be the black sheep of an otherwise masterful line of detectives and the material puts him into plenty of off the wall scenarios. ![]() Can Harry prove that he belongs on the same level with his forefathers, or did Eliot choose the right man for the job, the botch job, that is.Įntertainment Value: This might not be a comedy classic, but Who’s Harry Crumb? manages to sneak in some laughs and is powered by a terrific cast, headlined by John Candy. But Harry gives the case his all, even working together with the wealthy man’s other daughter (Shawnee Smith) to track down clues before it’s too late. His boss Eliot (Jeffrey Jones) doesn’t want the case solved at all, so he knows Harry has no chance at figuring out the mystery. Why would the firm give clumsy Harry the job? Simple. The case? The daughter of a multimillionaire has been kidnapped, with a ten million dollar ransom in the balance. As such, he has never been allowed to play at the top level, but his chance at greatness has just arrived. You see, the last of the Crumbs, Harry (John Candy) is not as disciplined as those before him, and he bumbles his cases, often with disastrous results. It’s a shame because I would think if he had the write creative team, Candy absolutely had the talent for something much more enjoyable than what was delivered here.Plot: The Crumb lineage has produced a chain of top notch detectives, but that heritage is somewhat in jeopardy these days. The comedy and the lack of a compelling mystery are what keeps Who’s Harry Crumb? from giving Candy his own Fletch. It’s these kind of cheap and easy gags that are littered throughout the movie. Crumb then crashes in, tumbles and stumbles into the man’s chair. The man accuses the woman of an affair and asks if a man has been sitting in his chair. In an early scene, Crumb swings into the window of an apartment just as a man and woman are arguing. But like everything else in the movie, they don’t really take the plot anywhere terribly funny.Ī lot of the comedy is contrived and expected. Crumb gains a kooky sidekick in the kidnapped woman’s sister. The central mystery in the film (a kidnapping plot) isn’t very interesting, sadly. Unfortunately, the disguise scenes don’t have anything else to draw humor from aside from “Hey, look at John Candy’s disguise” sight gag. Only because of the elaborate design of the costumes. But even if you put yourself into that late 80s mindset, the disguises are only slightly humorous. There are some disguises that Crumb uses that are racially insensitive and would cause outcry in 2019. But when it doesn’t work, the comedy falls entirely flat.Ī lot of the humor doesn’t age well, either. There’s a silent scene in an early montage wherein Crumb is choosing a rental car only to get t-boned just as he leaves the lot. When the comedy works, the movie can be pretty funny. Who’s Harry Crumb? is a passable private eye spoof that seems to be designed to prove that John Candy can have his own analogous to Fletch. Now that I’ve seen it, (and although I didn’t necessarily “hate” it) I would have been okay having never seen it. Who’s Harry Crumb?, however, is a movie I never saw. Uncle Buck, Brewster’s Millions, The Great Outdoors, and Cool Runnings were all on heavy rotation in my house growing up. I grew up watching and enjoying a lot of John Candy’s work. Letterboxd Challenge: 30 From 30 – 1989 Movies Watchlist – 1/30 Premise: Harry Crumb is a bumbling and inept private investigator who is hired to solve the kidnapping of a young heiress which he’s not expected to solve because his employer is the mastermind behind the kidnapping. $5 Tier – Movie Reviews and Commentary Tracks.$2 Tier – TV and Book Reaction Recordings.Godzilla: The Showa-Era Films 1954-1975.
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