Dumb and Dumber is a 1994 American buddy comedy film directed by Peter Farrelly, who co-wrote the screenplay with Bobby Farrelly and Bennett Yellin. It is the first installment in the Dumb and Dumber franchise. Starring Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels, it tells the story of Lloyd Christmas (Carrey) and Harry Dunne (Daniels), two dumb but well-meaning friends from Providence, Rhode Island, who set out on a cross-country trip to Aspen, Colorado, to return a briefcase full of money to its owner, thinking it was abandoned as a mistake though it was actually left as a ransom. Lauren Holly, Karen Duffy, Mike Starr, Charles Rocket, and Teri Garr play supporting roles.
The film was released on December 16, 1994. It grossed $247 million at the box office and has developed a cult following in the years after its release and is now one of the best comedies of the 1990s. The success of Dumb and Dumber launched the career of the Farrelly brothers, established the range of the heretofore dramatically acclaimed Daniels as a gifted comedic actor and vitalized his Hollywood career, and solidified Carrey's reputation as one of the most prominent actors of the 1990s. The film also spawned an animated TV series, a 2003 prequel, and a 2014 sequel.
plot[]
Lloyd Christmas and Harry Dunne, two kind but dimwitted young men, are best friends and roommates living in Providence, Rhode Island. Lloyd, a chip-toothed limousine driver, immediately falls in love when he meets Mary Swanson, a woman he is driving to the airport. Upon arriving and saying goodbye to Lloyd, she leaves a briefcase in the terminal. Lloyd sees this while driving away and crashes into a nearby car, but nonetheless retrieves the case and hopes to return it to her, unaware that it contains ransom money for her kidnapped husband, Bobby, and that she intentionally left it for her husband's captors, Joe "Mental" Mentalino and J. P. Shay. Her Aspen-bound plane has already departed, leading to Lloyd running through and falling out of the jetway.
Fired from his job for leaving the scene of his accident, Lloyd returns to his apartment and learns that Harry has also been fired from his dog-grooming job after delivering dogs late to a show and accidentally getting them dirty. Mental and Shay follow Lloyd home from the airport in pursuit of the briefcase. Mistaking the crooks for debt collectors, the two flee the apartment and return later to find that Mental and Shay have ransacked the apartment and decapitated Harry's parakeet. Lloyd suggests they head to Aspen to find Mary and return the briefcase, hoping she can "plug them into the social pipeline". At first, Harry opposes the idea, but he eventually agrees and the pair leaves the next day.
Mental and Shay catch up to the duo at a motel that night. Posing as a hitchhiker, Mental is picked up by Harry and Lloyd while Shay secretly follows them. During a lunch stop, the duo pranks Mental with chili peppers in his burger, unaware that he has an ulcer. When Mental reacts adversely, they accidentally kill him with rat poison pills (which he planned to use on them) after mistaking it for his medication. Meanwhile, the police are waiting on the road to Colorado for them to show up, after finding out about Mental's death. Nearing Colorado, Lloyd takes a wrong turn while trying to stop Harry's snoring by plugging his nose at the fork between Aspen and Nebraska and ends up driving all night through Nebraska. Upon waking up and realizing Lloyd's mishap, Harry gives up on the journey and decides to walk home, but Lloyd later persuades him to continue after trading the van for a minibike.
The two arrive in Aspen, but are unable to locate Mary. After a short scuffle over some gloves that night, the briefcase breaks open and they discover the money; they spend it on a hotel suite, clothes, and a car. They learn that Mary and her family are hosting a gala and prepare to attend. At the gala, Harry, attempting to lure Mary over to Lloyd, reluctantly agrees to go skiing with her the next day and lies to Lloyd that he got him a date. The next day, Lloyd finds out Harry lied to him after waiting all day for Mary at the hotel bar.
In retaliation, Lloyd pranks Harry by serving him a coffee laced with a potent dose of laxative, causing Harry to spontaneously defecate in a broken toilet at Mary's house. Lloyd arrives at Mary's house and informs her that he has her briefcase. He takes her to the hotel, shows her the briefcase, and confesses his love after some initial struggle; she rejects him, as she is already married. Nicholas Andre, an old friend of the Swansons and the mastermind behind Bobby's kidnapping, arrives with Shay and, upon learning that Harry and Lloyd had spent all of the ransom money and replaced the money with IOUs, takes Lloyd and Mary hostage, as well as Harry when he returns. An argument leads Nicholas to shoot Harry. Before Nicholas can kill them, an FBI team led by Beth Jordan (whom Harry met earlier at a gas station and Lloyd met earlier at the bar) raids the suite, where Beth tells Harry and Lloyd that the FBI and the police had been following them all the way from Providence. Harry is revealed to be alive thanks to a bulletproof vest that was strapped on him earlier. Nicolas and Shay are arrested, and Mary and Bobby are reunited, much to Lloyd's dejection.
The next day, Harry and Lloyd are seen walking home on foot because all of their purchases were confiscated and their minibike has stalled. The two inadvertently decline the chance to be oil boys for a group of bikini girls, after which Harry tells Lloyd that they will get their "break" one day. Harry and Lloyd then play a friendly game of tag as they walk back to Rhode Island.
cast[]
- Jim Carrey as Lloyd Christmas: A goofy chip-toothed slacker who has been fired from several jobs. He has a crush on Mary Swanson, unaware that she is already married.
- Jeff Daniels as Harry Dunne: Lloyd's ditzy and airheaded best friend and roommate. He has a crush on Mary too, but is also unaware that Mary has a husband.
- Lauren Holly as Mary Swanson: A wealthy but troubled heiress whose husband Bobby has been kidnapped. She was Harry and Lloyd's crush and both of them were unaware she was married.
- Karen Duffy as J.P. Shay: A henchwoman of Nicholas Andre.
- Mike Starr as Joe "Mental" Mentalino: A henchman for Nicholas Andre. He has a stomach ulcer and regularly takes medication for it.
- Charles Rocket as Nicholas Andre: A greedy, wealthy resident of Aspen, Colorado and the mastermind behind Bobby's kidnapping.
- Teri Garr as Helen Swanson: Mary's stepmother.
- Victoria Rowell as Beth Jordan (credited as "Athletic Beauty"): An FBI agent masquerading as a talkative young woman moving to Aspen to get away from her boyfriend.
- Cam Neely as Sea Bass: A hot-tempered trucker who gets into frequent confrontations with Lloyd and Harry on their way to Aspen. Their first encounter was at a Pennsylvania diner.
- Joe Baker as Barnard
- Harland Williams as the motorcycle police officer
- Brad Lockerman as Bobby Swanson: Mary's kidnapped husband
- Lin Shaye as Mrs. Margie Neugeboren (referred to by Harry as "Mrs. Noogieburger"): A dog owner and client of Harry's.
- Hank Brandt as Karl Swanson: Mary's father
- Felton Perry as Detective Dale
- Brady Bluhm as Billy: a blind and young boy who uses a wheelchair, to whom Lloyd sold some of his and Harry's belongings, including Harry's decapitated parakeet. He appears on A Current Affair when Harry and Lloyd arrive in Aspen.
- Connie Sawyer as elderly lady
production[]
The Farrelly Brothers had been trying for years to get their first movie made. Director Peter Farrelly's agent encouraged him to make a movie himself, alongside his brother Bobby.
The Farrelly Brothers did not know who Jim Carrey was; they were only told that he was "The White Guy" on In Living Color. Only after a screening of Carrey's first major acting role, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, did they realize they had struck gold. Based on the box-office success of Ace Ventura, Carrey was able to negotiate a salary of $7 million for this film.
Nicolas Cage, who was proposed to be Carrey's co-star, tried to negotiate a $2 million increase in his fee but New Line decided against casting him and signed Jeff Daniels instead. Daniels was only paid around $50,000. New Line Cinema originally did not want Daniels in the film, as he was known only for his dramatic work at the time. However, the Farrellys and Carrey wanted Daniels for the part. Although New Line agreed to their demands, Daniels was offered the low salary in the hopes it would discourage him from signing on to the film. Daniels ultimately accepted the role, despite his agent reportedly dissuading him out of fears it would kill his career.
Steve Martin and Martin Short both turned down the role of Lloyd. According to Splitsider, Gary Oldman and Cage were the original choices for Lloyd and Harry. Chris Elliott and Rob Lowe were both also considered for the role of Harry.
Carrey's chipped tooth is genuine, resulting from a fight with a classmate in his childhood, but he had since had it capped. He simply had the crown temporarily removed from that tooth to portray Lloyd.
filming[]
Scenes taking place in Aspen were filmed in Breckenridge, Colorado and Park City, Utah. The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado was transformed into the "Danbury Hotel" for the filming of the movie. The "Danbury Hotel" bar scene and staircase shot were the shots filmed there. The scenes filmed in the snow were shot at Copper Mountain Resort, Colorado.
Some of the external street scenes were filmed in Salt Lake City, and the airport scene was filmed at Salt Lake City International Airport.
Some scenes from the beginning of the film were shot on location in the Providence, Rhode Island, metropolitan area, including shots of the skyline and The Big Blue Bug; scenes from the beginning of their road trip were shot in locations in Cumberland, Rhode Island.[better source needed]
Parts of the film were also shot in Ogden, Utah and American Fork Canyon.
music[]
soundtrack[]
The original soundtrack to the film was released by RCA Records on November 22, 1994. The soundtrack album's first single, "New Age Girl" by Deadeye Dick, was a chart hit, reaching number 27 in the US, while the music video for the Crash Test Dummies' version of "The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead" featured Jeff Daniels reprising his role of Harry.
The soundtrack album has generally seen positive reception from critics. Joe Bishop of Vice named the album his favorite movie soundtrack, while the same site's Cameron Matthews described it as "a perfect slice of the mid-'90s sound: bubbly pop rock with jangly chords and just enough grit, or aka the thing you can give your kids when they one day ask you what the '90s were like."
Though not present on the soundtrack, the film famously features Carrey and Daniels singing an a cappella version of "Mockingbird" to Mike Starr's character. Also missing on the soundtrack is Apache Indian's "Boom Shack-A-Lak," which accompanies the film's opening sequence, as well as several other songs appearing in the film. Songs not included on the soundtrack are "Red Right Hand" by Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, "The Rain, The Park and Other Things" by The Cowsills, "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" by Crash Test Dummies, "Oh, Pretty Woman" by Roy Orbison, "Can We Still Be Friends?" by Todd Rundgren and "Rollin' Down the Hill" by The Rembrandts.
Beck had been approached about including his song "Loser" on the soundtrack, but he refused. He recalled the process: "I remember getting a phone call one day. My manager said, 'There's a film. They want to use 'Loser' as the theme song.' There was a long pause, and he said, 'The name of the film is Dumb And Dumber.' And I just remember: That sums up what the world thinks of me at this point. I tried to have fun with it, tried to not take it too serious. But at the same time, it was a little disheartening sometimes."
references[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Dumb and Dumber (1994)". American Film Institute.
- ↑ "Dumb & Dumber (1994)". British Film Institute.
- ↑ Box Office Information for Dumb and Dumber. Archived June 24, 2017, at the Wayback Machine The Wrap. Retrieved April 4, 2013.
- ↑ Dumb and Dumber (film) at Box Office Mojo