Head Office (1986)

Ohhhh, I hate when this happens.

I hate it when a movie starts off with comic energy in fifth gear – funny scenes, funny characters – and then loses its nerve and gets all soft and nice.  Please!  When comedy has teeth, don’t pull them.

Head Office starts with a series of hilarious gags involving high bid executives, including Danny DeVito as a man who comes to his office only to find that, not only is the furniture being moved out but he’s been given a watch for early retirement.  Not a Rolex, but a Timex!  He heads for the parking lot, out the window.

Rick Moranis is harried PR guy, busy answering a volley of phones on his desk one after another before a brief break in which he confesses “I love this business”

Jane Seymour plays a woman seemingly modeled after Barbara Stanwyck in Babyface, a sexy opportunist sleeping her way to the top because, she reasons, “Why sleep my way to the bottom?”

Bryan Doyle-Murray is a military officer who is addressing a room full of execs at a prayer breakfast, reminding them that corporate greed is God’s calling, “Through business and industry, the Lord can become a real force in America.”

Then the plot gets rolling and the laughs basically stop.  Judge Reinhold plays a corporate stooge, a guy who comes into the company, called Inc, and makes a name for himself and keeps getting booted up the ladder despite the fact that he hasn’t really done anything.  Turns out that he’s part of a master plan.  His old man is a high-ranking politician whom the executive board are hoping to use to get things moving their way politically.

I’m not sure what happened.  Head Office started as a parody, kind of like Airplane! but then slowed down to become an ersatz Frank Capra-style plot all about the little guy being boosted by corruption at the top.  Why?  What happened?  Did director Ken Finkeman lose his nerve?  Were there two scripts laying around and they decided to use them both?  What was the motivation here?  If you must see this movie, cut out after ten minutes, you’ll have seen a great comedy.