Men at Work (1990)

Why so much hype?

Truly Dreadful Film

A Brilliant Conflict

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Carl and James are two unambitious garbage men. Carl has a telescope with which he observes his neighbours. One evening he sees a man giving his girlfriend a hard time. As she leaves he shoots the man with a pellet gun. Hiding, he and James miss two men strangling the man and leaving with the body. When he appears in a can on their route they are afraid and hide the body, fearing that they may be implicated in the death. Trying to crack the case, they spy on the woman, join up with a crazed Vietnam vet, kidnap a pizza man and help to protect the environment. After all, it's the nineties.When global warming was rife, and the world was going to end, or we would have to have an atmosphere like Highlander 2, Estevez decided to make a comedy, with a hint of global awareness.It's one of those random weird comedies that were released around this time, Weekend At Bernies springs to mind, and you know that you shouldn't enjoy it, but you do, because the film makers brainwash you.The two leads have great chemistry, well they should after all. The music in the film is popular music of that time or very recent, so this gives you a comfort zone.And then it's sunny all the time, Women are beautiful, and garbage men can afford to stay in nice apartments and drink in the afternoon, all in the world is good.Add all theses ingredients with some bad guys you know are going to lose, and the film is a safe bet to entertain, not amaze, but entertain.And it does, it never out stays its welcome,a nd the humour never gets too immature.It won't be on anyones favourite list, but when it crops up on TV, I bet a few people will be transmitted back to the early nineties, with fond memories.

...Never mess with another man's French fries!Writer / director Emilio Estevez and his real-life brother Charlie Sheen are engaging as a pair of not terribly ambitious garbage men who want a little more out of life but don't do much about it. One day on their route, they discover the dead body of city councilman Jack Berger (Darrell Larson) inside a barrel. Berger, a fairly corrupt man who'd been in league with a toxic waste dumper, Maxwell Potterdam III (John Getz), had developed some scruples and decided to blow the whistle, so arrogant rich jerk Potterdam has his two (not terribly competent) thugs kill Berger. While all of this is going on, James (Estevez) and Carl (Sheen) are in trouble for their escapades while on the job, so their boss has assigned his own brother-in-law to keep an eye on them. The trouble there is, the brother-in-law is an absolutely nutty Vietnam veteran (the hysterical Keith David, who walks away with the movie) who actually keeps getting the guys into more and more trouble. You see, he HATES cops, and REALLY hates rent-a-cops. Overall, "Men at Work" is a pretty successful comedy, and one particularly amusing thing is the way Estevez has created various pairs of characters: Frost and Luzinski (Geoffrey Blake and Cameron Dye), two fellow garbage men forever locked in a war of practical jokes with James and Carl, the two moronic hit men, Biff and Mario (Hawk Wolinski and John Lavachielli), and the two smug, self-important cops Mike and Jeff (John Putch and Tommy Hinkley) who look down on James and Carl and assume them to be no-goods. The only problem is, most of the characters, while funny, aren't nearly as funny as Louis (David), and it may make one impatient to get back to any and all scenes with him. Try not to crack up at some of the things he does - such as his recurring motif whenever he incapacitates victims, or his reaction to the voices he hears at one point. He also has most if not all of the best lines, especially "The Commie bastard gets no food!" and "Ah, lookie here, somebody threw away a perfectly good white boy!". "Men at Work" does work as farce quite well in the way things just keep going from bad to worse, and there is some brief, priceless "Weekend at Bernie's" type humour with Berger's corpse (which is made to wear a Richard Nixon mask). The actors all do a good job, with Leslie Hope as the female lead, an attractive campaign manager and love interest for Carl, and Dean Cameron as the put upon pizza delivery guy. Getz is hilariously unsubtle as the ultra sleazy criminal, who gets an awfully goofy comeuppance at the end. "Men at Work" is good, undemanding, "check your brain at the door" comedy that entertains well for a solid 99 minutes. Seven out of 10.

Men at Work (1990) *** (out of 4) Emilio Estevez wrote and directed this comedy, which also has him playing the lead along with his brother Charlie Sheen. In the film the two play garbage men who dream of setting up their own surf shop but when they find the body of a man running for Mayor they get involved in a political cover up. If you're looking for some sort of high art or masterpiece of cinema then you're certainly looking in the wrong place. If you just want some cheap, juvenile fun then MEN AT WORK is just for you. I remember being 10-years-old when I first watched this movie and I found it hilarious then and it continues to be a very funny, if incredibly stupid little film. I think what the film has going it its favor is the terrific cast who really dig into their roles. Both Estevez and Sheen have no problem playing together as they have a certain chemistry that could only come from real brothers. It's funny seeing the two work together because you can tell that they know how to bounce off one another and it's clear they know which buttons to push. The screenplay leaves a lot to be desired and you can't help but feel that the two actors make a mediocre story and at least put some energy to it. Another major plus is the supporting performance of David Keith who plays a crazy Vietnam vet who tags along with the two men the day the body is discovered. Keith is hilarious in his scenes and it really pre-dates the type of character he would eventually play in THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY. Just check out the sequence where he has a flashback to his Vietnam days and takes it out on a pizza man. Even Leslie Hope as the love interest comes off well. The biggest thing working against the film is its screenplay because it's just a tad bit too silly for its own good. We get the typical, low-rent type of comedy including the garbage men going up against a couple jerk cops, doing battle with some co-workers and of course there's the hit men that are idiots. MEN AT WORK is certainly far from a classic but it contains some of that 80s comedy that was slowly making its way out of movies by 1990.

Two garbage men with dreams of opening a surf shop (Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez) stumble upon the dead body of a local politician in a drum -- a man who Sheen coincidentally shot the night before with a pellet gun. Not wanting to get blamed for the murder, the two men (along with another co-worker, played by Keith David) kidnap a pizza man, capture a girlfriend's heart and unravel corruption.When you watch this movie, it screams that it's from the cusp of the 80s and 90s. The poofy hair, the jeans and everything... and especially the women's outfits. That's a look that was hard to pull off much beyond the 1980s (and thankfully so). So if you like 80s films, especially ones with Charlie Sheen, this is one you'll like.There's not much more to say than that -- there's not a deep plot, huge jokes or intense action. It really relies on Sheen and Estevez (with Estevez's writing and directing) to make you interested. For some, like myself, that works. If not, you're going to think this is just another stupid movie that you see on a Saturday afternoon flipping through channels. I admit, it's not nearly as good as "The Chase".But hey, you have Keith David ("They Live"), one of the weirdest looking tough guys in Hollywood. You have two white rastafarians who have a running theme of encountering fecal matter in their locker. And you have the mysterious love affair between Sheen and the politician's girlfriend. Let me go on about that a moment.So this chick's boyfriend is murdered. She doesn't know he's dead yet, just thinks he's not home, but begins to be romantic with Sheen anyway (who she's just met under false pretenses). I understand the powers of the Sheen, but this chick really has loyalty issues. Kissing some dude you don't know when you're currently dating a powerful politician? Not much later, when she finds out who Sheen really is and finds out her boyfriend is a corpse, she has only minor issues with this (overcome in 30 seconds). I know it's a movie, but my goodness -- I know who not to trust.But yeah, that's it -- Sheen, Estevez and Keith David in an early 1990s movie. You may find that worthwhile. There's also a really good message in there about fighting corruption and pollution, as the politician is something like Paul Wellstone, but Estevez never wrote that deep of a script so it's really only a marginal issue and almost becomes more of a joke than anything.