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The lady-killers - Tom Hanks, Marlon Wayans, JK Simmons, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Threat advisory: Elevated - Significant risk of entertaining activities

Movie propaganda

The greatest criminal minds of all time have finally met their match.

Academy Award-winner Tom Hanks teams up for the first time with Academy Award-winning filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen for this retelling of the critically acclaimed 1955 comedy, The lady-killers. Hanks stars as Goldthwait Higginson Dorr III, PhD, a charlatan professor who's assembled a gang of "experts" for the heist of the century. The thieves: experts in explosions, tunnelling, muscle, and the critical "inside man". The base of operations: the root cellar of an unsuspecting, church-going little old lady named Mrs Munson (Irma P Hall). The ruse: the five need a place to practice their church music. The problem: it quickly becomes evident that Dorr's thieves lack the mental capacity to do the job. The bigger problem: they have all seriously underestimated their upstairs host. When Mrs Munson stumbles onto their plot and threatens to notify the authorities, the felonious five decide to do her in. After all, how hard can it be to knock off one old lady?

Theatrical propaganda posters

Target demographic movie keyword propaganda

Film comedy crime heist robbery landlady Mississippi floating casino Coen brothers

Persons of interest

Tom Hanks .... Goldthwait Higginson Dorr III, PhD
Irma P Hall .... Marva Munson
Marlon Wayans .... Gawain McSam
JK Simmons .... Garth Pancake
Tzi Ma .... The General
Ryan Hurst .... Lump Hudson
Diane Delano .... Mountain Girl
George Wallace .... Sheriff Wyner
John McConnell .... Deputy Sheriff
Jason Weaver .... Weemack Funthes
Stephen Root .... Fernand Gudge
Lyne Odums .... Rosalie Funthes
Walter K Jordan .... Elron
William Rose .... Screenwriter (1955)
Ethan Coen .... Screenwriter
Joel Coen .... Screenwriter
Joel Coen .... Director

Cinematic intelligence sources

The lady-killers official movie site
The lady-killers QuickTime movie trailers
Awards and film festivals:

Cannes Film Festival 2004: In competition

Studios and distributors:

Touchstone * Buena Vista International

Intelligence analyst

Special Agent Matti

Theatrical report

Ah, a lot is explained when you learn that The lady-killers is a remake - by a couple of literate Americans - of a 1950s British black comedy. The characters are strangely (ie absurdly) incompetent. The protagonist - Goldthwait Higginson Dorr III, PhD - is a blithering idiot. The only vaguely human character is the antagonist and victim, Mrs Munson, and she's a Southern Baptist, overweight, big-breasted African American widow. Sheesh.

As for the tagline, there is a case for suing BVI over false advertising: "the greatest criminal minds of all time" these are not. They make the cast of Welcome to Collinwood look positively genius. Oy.

Still, it's not merely Ocean's Eleven, it's an episode in the lives of Ethan and Joel Coen. Hmmm...