Ed O’Neill

  • Dutch (1991)

    Dutch (1991)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, November 2019) It’s not hard to watch Dutch and wonder what screenwriter-producer John Hughes was thinking in putting together the story. As a buddy-comedy road movie on the eve of Thanksgiving, it clearly apes his own Planes, Trains and Automobiles. It does crank up the drama by featuring not two strangers brought together by circumstances, but a gruff construction man trying to bond with a bratty teenager who may become his step-son. At that point, the film could have gone anywhere as a zany farce or a manipulative offering … and it does. Meaning that we get people shot in the groin with a BB gun, plenty of crazy adventures, quite a bit of personal property destruction, and the heartwarming aw-they-really-love-each-other maudlin moments in the end. The tonal control isn’t there from one moment to another, and if Dutch hangs together, it’s thanks to Ed O’Neill doing his best in a role that asks him to be both a credible middle-aged man and a cartoonish butt of physical comedy. Intensely predictable in structure but chaotic in a scene-to-scene scope, Dutch should work in the end but doesn’t feel as if it has a middle.

  • Little Giants (1994)

    Little Giants (1994)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2019) As an underdog kids’ sports movie, Little Giant is exactly what you’d imagine as an example of the genre. The plot threads are familiar and obvious, the details are well observed and the film is often more interesting in its execution than its overall structure. Much of the film’s success comes from two well-matched actors: Ed O’Neill as a hometown football hero (echoing his more famous turn in Married with Children) facing down a kid brother played by Rick Moranis. The plot details are unimportant, leading us anyway to an absurdly important climactic football game won by the expected underdog. Some material involving Shawna Waldron playing a tomboyish teenage girl is more interesting than expected. Otherwise, it’s a comedy firmly in the mould of mid-1990s material. Some of it hasn’t dated well—considering what we now know about concussions, the idea of a kid’s movie about football seems more irresponsible than ineluctably American. (But do I repeat myself?) You also must swallow an unhealthy amount of skepticism retardant in order to believe in the amount of plot cheats required to make it from beginning to end. Still, as those movies go, Little Giants plays rather easily. One note to francophone viewers: The Québec dub of the film is particularly annoying, adopting a dialect that almost touches upon Québec joual before reverting to the mid-Atlantic correctness we expect from American film dubbing.