On Dec. 13, 1985, Paramount unwrapped its board game adaptation of Clue in time for the holidays. The film, from writer-director Jonathan Lynn, only claimed $14 million in its initial release in theaters but gained a cult following. The Hollywood Reporter’s original review is below:
Clue is hardly the perfect solution to a largely laughless Christmas movie season, but it does at least provide a few delicious comic red herrings. Notable chiefly as the first (but probably not the last) film to be based on a popular board game, this supremely silly Paramount release boasts a cast of expert farceurs and no less than three endings — an attempt to generate repeat business that should make for some profitable box-office sleuthing.
The setting is a dank New England mansion circa 1954. On the guest list for dinner are Mrs. Peacock (Eileen Brennan), Prof. Plum (Christopher Lloyd), Mrs. White (Madeline Kahn), Mr. Green (Michael McKean), Miss Scarlet (Lesley Ann Warren) and Col. Mustard (Martin Mull) — all of them, it turns out, government employees being black mailed by the seedy Mr. Boddy (Lee Ving), who suddenly starts living up to his name courtesy a revolver, knife, wrench, lead pipe, knife or possibly a candlestick. Five murders later, even the butler (Tim Curry) is unsure whodunit.
Debuting writer-director Jonathan Lynn, working from a story he conceived with John Landis, has high farcical intentions for these shenanigans, staging the action at a frantic pitch that often suggests a live-action cartoon. Lynn keeps the gags coming with an unflagging energy, alternating knockabout sight gags and witty bon mots with increasingly little breathing room, succeeding particularly well with the story’s built-in horror spoof elements; there’s more than a little of the old William Castle spirit afoot here, right down to the triple-ending gimmick.
Like other similar conceits, however (Murder by Death comes immediately to mind), Clue can’t always sustain a high level of invention, despite its relatively brief 87-minute running time. Lynn resorts to Three Stooges-style punishment humor, insults and cheap shots to ex tract an occasional laugh, and the resulting unevenness is accentuated by both Lynn’s own unimaginative direction and Victor J. Kemper’s flat cinematography, which tends to spoil much of the inherently eerie atmosphere.
If the film ultimately falls short of its high farcical goals, its admirably straight-faced cast still manages to deliver the goods, particularly Brennan as the hysterical Peacock. Curry lends plenty of music-hall verve as the butler, and Warren makes a sizzling Miss Scarlet. Mull brings his usual deadpan deadpan to the bull-head ed Col. Mustard, but Kahn is uncharacteristically subdued and neither Lloyd nor McKean is given much to do. Colleen Camp, on the other hand, demonstrates a flair for light comedy as an alluring French maid, though the role too often requires her to play second fiddle to her own enhanced bosom.
Adding the appropriate gothic touch to this Debra Hill production are John Lloyd’s dripping-with-mock-Victorian-splendor sets and John Morris’ delightfully tongue-in-cheek score. Costume designer Michael Kaplan scores as many laughs as the script with his ingeniously conceived, character-suited apparel, and editors David Bretherton and Richard Haines maintain a breakneck pace that keeps the hits outrunning the misses. Agatha Christie it ain’t, but it sure beats a film version of Trivial Pursuit. — Kirk Ellis, originally published on Dec. 12, 1985.
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