Brain Donors

A wealthy woman dies leaving a will that requires a ballet company be founded. An incompetent, crooked lawyer named Roland T. Flakfizer sets out to run it. He picks up a hospital orderly and a mechanic, and the three of them take the ballet world apart. Dennis Dugan directs. John Turturro plays Flakfizer, with Bob Nelson and Mel Smith. David Zucker, Jim Abrahams and Jerry Zucker are among the producers. It is not a covert adaptation but an open copy. It takes the structure of the Marx Brothers' A Night at the Opera from 1935 almost exactly: the fast talking fraud, the silent partner, and the dismantling of a cultural institution. Turturro is playing Groucho. It failed completely and got almost no distribution; the studio did not believe in it and did not promote it. A small cult formed afterwards. The joke density is high, it runs under ninety minutes and leaves almost no gaps. That density is the reason both for its defenders and its detractors. Zucker and Abrahams were known for Airplane and The Naked Gun; this is the least known entry in that line. Who it is for: viewers who like a fast joke rate and imitation of classic comedy. Who it is not for: the film sits far below its source. If you know the Marx Brothers it produces a constant comparison.