At the Movies

by Esther McCarthy

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DAMAGED GOODS

So-called comedy anything but Gold

THE GOODS: LIVE HARD. SELL HARD (16) star

THE STARS: Jeremy Piven, Ving Rhames, James Brolin, Will Ferrell

THE STORY: A cunning used-car salesman Don Ready (Piven) is hired by a company to turn their failing business around - in one weekend.

RARE LAUGHS: Jeremy Piven tries to get the crowd goingJEREMY PIVEN, what were you thinking?

After years of knocking on Hollywood's door, you land the role of your career as Ari Gold in Entourage.

Then you follow it up with this. Intended to be a comic look at the world of car dealership, this desperately wants to be an automobile Anchorman but completely blows its gasket.

Terrible

Piven isn't the only one who's association with this terrible film. Ed Helms, so funny in The Hangover, what are you doing here?

Will Ferrell, care to explain yourself?

The only possible answer is that somewhere, early on in this project, there existed a sharp script or at least the bones of a good idea.

But there's very little evidence of it here. But a strong cast is wasted in this inane, unfunny movie that may well have been an attempt at satire which completely misfires.

Piven plays Don 'The Goods' Ready, a well-known car vendor with an ego as big and loud as his sales pitch.

Strippers

WE NEED A DRINK: Jordana Spiro and Ving RhamesBesides flogging secondhand cars, his hobbies are boozing, strippers and getting out of town before his antics catch up with him.

Along with his team of wheeler dealers (including Katherine Hahn as Babs, a gal who's not afraid to use her sex appeal to close a deal) Don is known as the Mr Fixit of the auto world.

Don is lured out of semiretirement when he gets a call from beleaguered car dealer Ben Selleck (Brolin). His long running, family-owned lot is in danger and unless Selleck can turn around his business in one big sales weekend, he will have to sell the business to his biggest competitor.

He's Paxton Harding (Helms) a rich guy who wants to turn the lot into a recording studio for his 'man band' The Big Ups. Paxton also happens to be engaged to a gal that Don has taken a bit of a shine to. Cocky and convinced of his own sales pitch, Don decides to make the ultimate wager - if he doesn't flog every car in the lot by the end of the three-day sale, the business will be sold.

Misfire

Produced by Adam McKay and Will Ferrell (who also has a cameo role), this is the team that brought us flicks including Anchorman and Step Brothers. But The Goods is pretty much a misfire from start to finish and the main problem is the writing, which is lacking in a single good laugh or a rounded comic character that you can have fun with.

Here, everyone is ridiculously over the top and not even in a funny way. The normally charismatic Piven - perhaps unsure of the quality of the script - shouts his way through every line. Even a cameo from Ferrell, accompanied by a chorus of foul-mouthed angels, can't save this.

THE VERDICT:

A boisterous but fun-free movie which wastes a normally smart cast.

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