Muddled and terrifically unfunny, The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard is a completely inconsequential comedy with little redeeming value other than to prove that Jeremy Piven can, in no way, carry a movie. Directed by Neal Brennan, The Goods is an ode to capitalism and obnoxiousness with a nice slice of Americana on the side. Its reliance on outdated “shock” comedy doesn’t score it any points, either, and it lumbers through its relatively short runtime despite the appearance of some truly unique comic talents.
Brennan is the latest in a line of bland comedy directors, confirming with The Goods the notion that a handful of sketches tied loosely together by a core plot doesn’t make for a good complete picture. Brennan is entirely useless as a director, as anyone could have been behind the camera and produced the same results. It’s a mishmash of sideplots and lines, many of which have cruel foundations in homophobia, racism and rah-rah American jingoism.
Piven stars as a slick car salesman named Don Ready. He has a team of salespersons and they’re like nomads in that they cruise around from town to town trying to sell cars for dealerships that really need it. (Plots don’t get more captivating than this, do they?) Ready and Co. wind up taking an assignment in a small town in an effort to save Ben Selleck (James Brolin) and his family dealership.
Along the way, a series of entanglements attempts to interest us in the respective plights of the characters. Selleck, for instance, has a crush on salesman Brent Gage (David Koechner) while saleswoman Babs Merrick (Kathryn Hahn) chases around Selleck’s young son (Rob Riggle). Jibby Newsome (Ving Rhames) is looking for love, too, and Don’s also dealing with his own romantic complications with Selleck’s daughter Ivy (Jordana Spiro). There’s also a boy band and an old racist guy in the mix, just for fun.
Now, right out of the gate it’s hard to imagine that a flick with the plot of The Goods is going to be any, well, good. It’s a plot that doesn’t really sell itself. Watching a bunch of car dealers finagle various customers using cheating and deception is, after all, supposed to be hilarious given the economic condition the world is in at the moment and, don’t forget, we’re supposed to also care about the con artists selling these vehicles. On top of it all, we’re supposed to respect them a lot because, hey, they really like America.
It’s all a little much to begin with, but then writers Adam Stock and Rick Stempson pack things with a whole whack of homophobia, racism and weird twists on other crap nobody but 13-year-old wrestling fans are interested in anymore. Of course, that’s probably the target audience for this hard R-rated comedy anyway, but I digress.
I can’t say that this movie fails because of the cast because everyone actually does do what they’re asked to do. Piven does about all he can to pull off a big screen version of his character from Entourage and the other actors do what they’re supposed to do too, but that’s part of the problem: what they’re “supposed to do” just isn’t funny. Jokes feel forced and idiotic, with a lot of mean-spirited and misplaced crassness highlighted all the angles.
Look, one expects a movie like The Goods to be rude and crass. But most films, like this year’s I Love You, Man, manage to balance the crassness with a little something those of us over the age of 13 like to call “substance.” The Goods not only flounders in delivering any significant laughs, but it also fails to deliver any sort of reason for its existence. It’s an entirely meaningless, ultimately forgettable comedy.
0.7/10
Trailer:
