Duplex (2003)
Starring Ben Stiller, Drew Barrymore, Eileen Essel, Harvey Fierstein, Justin Theroux, James Remar.
Directed by Danny DeVito.
Rated PG-13.
Grade: B+
"This is the problem area. It's loose as a Dublin whore!"
On his good days, there is no one like Danny DeVito to make us laugh hysterically at the misfortune of others. He doesn't necessarily humiliate his characters like some directors do, but he makes their lives a living hell and doesn't stop to think that maybe this isn't funny. I can't think of any filmmakers in Hollywood with a spirit as unapologetically mean as DeVito's when he is behind the camera. His films don't always succeed (Throw Momma From the Train, Death to Smoochy), but when they do, do they ever (The War of the Roses, Matilda).
Duplex is very, very similar in plot to Throw Momma From the Train, and some may call it a retread. I prefer to think of it as an improvement. Alex Rose (Ben Stiller) and his wife Nancy (Drew Barrymore) buy a gorgeous Brooklyn duplex where they can start a family and live happily ever after, though the more immediate concern is giving Alex an opportunity to finish his new novel under a strict deadline. Alas, there is a tenant in the upstairs apartment, a sweet old lady named Mrs. Connely. Nancy very much wants that space to use as a nursery for the eventual baby, but she can't have it unless Mrs. Connelly agrees to move out or dies.
Mrs. Connelly (Eileen Essel) is the scariest sweet old lady to ever walk this earth. Have you ever tried refusing when an old lady as sweet as Mrs. Connelly asks you to check her plumbing or walk her to the pharmacy? This is difficult for a decent person to do, and Alex is an eminently decent person. As his deadline approaches, he finds that he has written three pages instead of the requisite three hundred, spending most of his time produce shopping with Mrs. Connelly. What's more, neither he nor his wife can get a good night's sleep, since the hard of hearing woman invariably falls asleep with the television blaring.
The film is impressively imaginative in working through the mechanics of its plot (the two yuppies must eventually decide to kill the old hag upstairs). I am loath to give away jokes (so skip the rest of this paragraph if you are loath to have them revealed), but my assertion here will probably be challenged, so I feel the need to provide evidence. The television is a problem, right? What should Alex and Nancy do about it? A lesser movie -- like Throw Momma From the Train for example -- would have settled for Alex sneaking into Mrs. Connelly's apartment and breaking the television and making it look like a burglar, or something similarly rudimentary. Not here. Here, Alex comes home with a box that he touts as "the answer to our prayers." What's inside the box? Why the Clapper, of course! This way, when the woman falls asleep upstairs, Alex can simply clap twice and the television will switch off. So he installs it but leaves the box upstairs, leading to Mrs. Connelly discovering how to use the wondrous contraption and amusing herself with it until the break of dawn.
Even if you don't find this joke amusing, consider how far DeVito takes it. He is not satisfied with just an obnoxious blaring television to make us laugh, or even with an attempt to dismantle or break it. He has his characters conjure up an ingenious solution and then tops that solution with an even more daunting problem. This solitary gag is miles ahead of the entire script for, say, The Fighting Temptations. Or, for that matter, Death to Smoochy.
The final scenes reach an almost epic level of nastiness, but we continue to sympathize with the protagonists because DeVito convinces us that they have no other choice but to do what it is they wind up doing. And truly, we see the two exhaust pretty much every variation on diplomacy and less violent trickery available to them. Moreover, Elaine Essel's portrayal of Mrs. Connelly is so eerie that we come to hate the woman every bit as much as Alex and Nancy do.
Ben Stiller and Drew Barrymore both do a nice job of authentically transitioning from everyman affability to sinister, take-no-prisoners determination. Together with DeVito, they manage to convince us that this is what any of us would do, even as the script reaches hilarious heights of improbability.