The Whole Nine Yards film review

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THE WHOLE NINE YARDS

As Chandler in Friends, Matthew Perry more than anyone else has the natural ability to conjure a chuckle from even the most inane or innocuous line. However, put him on a movie set and suddenly that same bumbling comic schtick fails to raise even a smile.

Perry plays Nick "Oz" Oseransky, a dentist living in a peaceful Canadian suburb whose business and marriage are on the rocks thanks to the expensive tastes of his spend-happy wife Sophie (Patricia Arquette). He's drowning in debt but is unwilling to divorce Sophie, much to the annoyance of his cheery dental assistant Jill (Amanda Peet) whose advice to "dump her" continually falls on deaf ears.

Nick's bland little life soon changes with the arrival of next-door neighbour Jimmy "The Tulip" Tudeski (Bruce Willis), a renowned hit man wanted in his home town of Chicago by the powerful Yanni Gogolack (Kevin Pollak).

At his wife's insistence, Nick travels to Chicago to shop Jimmy and claim a finder's fee - hopefully enough to pay off some of what he owes. But unbeknowns to our hapless hero, no sooner is he out of town than Sophie turns up at Jimmy's door and tells the hit man that her husband is going to double-cross him. Her solution: knock off Nick before he gets there (then she can collect his life insurance).

Matters become entangled even further when Nick falls in love with Jimmy's beautiful wife Cynthia (Natasha Henstridge) and his assistant Jill reveals herself as an apprentice hit man, hired by his wife to knock him off. Oh what a tangled web screenwriter Michael Kapner weaves.

Thanks to The Sopranos and Analyze This, hired killers are the comedy heroes du jour. The Whole Nine Yards jumps on the bandwagon but isn't remotely in the same league.

Faced with a paucity of good verbal gags, Perry is reduced to begging for laughs with slapstick pratfalls (walking into glass doors) and mugging to camera. Ironically, he's far more convincing as the romantic lead, generating a fair few sparks with the statuesque Henstridge who plays the part of the walking clothes-horse to a tee.

Willis could play his part in his sleep (at times he appears to be doing just that) proudly displaying his Die Hard vest and smirking as only Bruce knows how. The real find here is Peet who seems to be the only member of the cast enjoying herself. She attacks the role of the aspiring hit (wo)man with energy and enthusiasm, something severely lacking in her co-stars.