Life Stinks (1991)
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20% of critics liked it
(15 reviews) -
43% of users liked it
(7,100 ratings)
If a comedy is to be made from the plight of the homeless, who have to scrape through their days returning deposit bottles and cleaning car windshields to get their daily bread as the rich get richer and more heartless, it may as well be Mel Brooks' Life Stinks. The trademark Brooks humor dominates… More If a comedy is to be made from the plight of the homeless, who have to scrape through their days returning deposit bottles and cleaning car windshields to get their daily bread as the rich get richer and more heartless, it may as well be Mel Brooks' Life Stinks. The trademark Brooks humor dominates this fable about a ruthless billionaire, Goddard Bolt (Mel Brooks), who wants to obliterate a poor section of Los Angeles and build a high-tech commercial center in its place. His only problem is that he owns only half the land needed for the construction, the other half belonging to equally ruthless billionaire Vance Craswell (Jeffrey Tambor), who has his own ideas for the land. The two try to buy each other out until, finally, a deal is struck: Craswell bets that Bolt cannot survive a month on the streets as a homeless man. If Bolt makes it, he gets the property. If he doesn't, Craswell gets it. Bolt agrees and, as a poor man, he begins to feel the pain of being uprooted and alone, even meeting a friendly homeless woman, Molly (Lesley Ann Warren) with whom he forms an attachment. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi
- Rating, Runtime
- PG-13, 1 hr. 33 min.
- Directed By
- Mel Brooks
- Written By
- Rudy DeLuca
- Genres
- Comedy
- In Theaters
- Jul 26, 1991 Wide
- On DVD
- Feb 18, 2003
- Studio
- MGM
Critic Reviews
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Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com
A slapstick vaudeville about the poor and homeless? Inadvertently Mel Brooks gives the dangerous impression that homelessness is cute and that Downtown LA is filled with adorable and eccentric people who "just happen" to be roofless.
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Steve Crum, Kansas City Kansan
Lesser Mel Brooks has some funny bits if homelessness is funny at all
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Ross Anthony, Hollywood Report Card
The slapstick here is nothing to rent the film over. Oddly, it's the serious moments that charm. I was embarrassed to myself for being choked up by Mel Brooks.
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Ken Hanke, Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)
So pretty much does this Brooks misfire.
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John J. Puccio, Movie Metropolis
It's reassuring to know that even comic geniuses have their off days.... Makes us all feel more secure.
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Featured Audience Ratings
Cast
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Mel Brooksas Goddard Bolt -
Lesley Ann Warrenas Molly -
Jeffrey Tamboras Vance Crasswell
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Stuart Pankinas Pritchard -
Howard Morrisas Sailor -
Rudy De Lucaas J. Paul Getty
