Stir Crazy

1980 comedy

Rating: 15/20

Plot: Two disillusioned buddies decide to leave New York City and venture west. Along the way, they have some car trouble and get a job at a bank to earn money to pay for repairs. They're framed for bank robbery and sentenced to 125 years in prison where the white one is discovered to be adept at riding bulls.

Yeah, the story's a mess here because everybody in the late-70's/early-80's was on crack. That's right--even Sidney Poitier. As far as I know, this is the highlight of Poitier's directing career unless I find out he directed Ghost Dad or something. Stir Crazy's story's got that crazy anything-goes-even-if-it-shouldn't 80's feel, and there's a scene in a strip club because all 80's comedies need to have one of those apparently. Not that I mind. I'm a warm-blooded American male and all, but the raw sexuality of one Gene Wilder combined with the strip club scene is almost too much for my middle-aged heart to take. But this story--it almost feels like it was made-up as they went.

"Well, we got them in prison. Now what do we do?"
"How about we have a rodeo?"
"That's a great idea! Get Gene Wilder a hat!"

Speaking of Gene, one of the two great Genes in acting history, I watched this in honor of the man's birthday. There are other Gene Wilder appearances that I like better, but he's nearly comedically perfect in Stir Crazy, all excitability and naivete and hair. Seriously, almost every single thing he does in this is perfect. Correcting his own grammar in front of a pair of cowboys, demonstrating his prowess with a speed bag, "getting bad" as he and Pryor walk to the jail cell, saying things like "This is my first frisk" or "Do they know I hate confinement" or "I only have one speed--balls out," screeching following his sentencing, freaking-out in the prison, meeting Erland van Lidth (Dynamo in The Running Man) with this perfect facial expression and posture, or intimidating with his karate moves. It's all comedy gold. Pryor's fine as well, a guy who could handle his coke, and the pair have good rapport. The movie makes me laugh. Here's a question though. The real robbers get in the woodpecker costumes, happen to know the little song that Wilder and Pryor's stand-in (because he apparently was too good to prance around in a woodpecker costume) sang, and start robbing the bank. The little girl in the cowboy hat who asked Wilder and Pryor if they were real woodpeckers--you know, because that makes sense--is still there. What the hell's up with that? Ok, that's not a real question. It's rhetorical.