On the commodities trading floor, the Dukes commit their holdings to buying frozen concentrated orange juice futures contracts, legally committing themselves to buying the commodity at a later date. Other traders follow their lead, driving the price up; Valentine and Winthorpe short-sell juice futures contracts at the inflated price. Following the broadcast of the actual crop report and its prediction of a normal harvest, the price of juice futures plummets.
The film was also released in a pack that included Coming to America. To celebrate the film’s 35th-anniversary in 2018, a special edition was released containing a Blu-ray and digital version of the film, and behind-the-scenes featurettes. A limited-edition release of Bernstein’s score was made available in 2011. Along with the impact their respective roles on had on its stars’ careers, Trading Places is considered one of the best comedy films ever made and part of the canon of American comedies. In a 1988 interview, Aykroyd said that he considered it among his “A-tier” films, along with Ghostbusters, Dragnet, The Blues Brothers, and Spies Like Us. Vincent Canby said that although the film is an homage to social satire screwball comedies of the early 20th century, Trading Places is a symbol of its time.
- At the time, the share was generating an average of $10,000 per annum.
- They plot to return Valentine to the streets, but have no intention of taking back Winthorpe.
- Harris also drew inspiration for the story from his own living situation; he lived in a rundown area near Fairfax Avenue in Los Angeles.
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- The film’s use of the word “nigger”, said during Mortimer’s statement that he will never allow Valentine to run his family business, is sometimes censored in TV broadcasts.
After not working in film for more than a decade, Ameche followed Trading Places with the 1985 comedy-drama Cocoon, for which he won his first and only Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Maslin called it a strange but well-cast film representing multiple Hollywood generations. Ebert said that what could have been stereotypical characters were elevated by the actors and the writing, adding that Murphy and Aykroyd made a “perfect” team. Canby said that Murphy demonstrated why he was the most successful comedian in the last decade. Several reviewers compared his role to that in 48 Hrs.; Arnold said that Trading Places was evidence that Murphy’s successes were not a fluke, and that Murphy demonstrated an “exhilarating comic authority”. Canby said that Trading Places gave Murphy an opportunity to demonstrate the range of his abilities in a “lithe, graceful, uproarious” performance.
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Throughout the 1980s, he went on to star in the blockbuster phenomenon Ghostbusters , Spies Like Us and Dragnet . He earned an Academy Award nomination for his performance in the comedy-drama Driving Miss Daisy . Trading Places is considered Curtis’ breakout performance, allowing her to move into films outside the horror genre; actor John Cleese cast Curtis in the 1988 heist comedy A Fish Called Wanda specifically because of her performance in Trading Places. Curtis said Landis had “single-handedly changed the course of my life by giving me that part”.
She was dismissed as only a horror film star before her critically well-received breakthrough performance in Trading Places. Watch full seasons of exclusive series, classic favorites, Hulu Originals, hit movies, current episodes, kids shows, and tons more. Of course, we would not be able to offer this wonderful merchandise without the thousands of Suppliers who have moved, downsized, relocated or continue to redecorate their homes on a regular basis. Trading Places is a venue and marketplace for sellers to showcase their furniture and home decor, on consignment, and receive top dollar from the proceeds of the sale.
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As part of their revenge against the Dukes, Winthorpe disguises his identity by donning blackface makeup, an act enabled by Valentine who has helped loosen up this strait-laced character. This requires Valentine to accept and support Winthorpe despite having numerous reasons to dislike him, including originally getting Valentine wrongly arrested and then later trying to frame Valentine to reclaim his old job. Even so, Valentine befriends Winthorpe and helps him get revenge on the Dukes, the old establishment characters who demonstrate explicit racism. The film requires Valentine to act “white”, performing as is expected of him to survive in the Dukes’ world.
The season featured expected hits such as the third installment in the Star Wars series, Return of the Jedi, Superman III, and the latest James Bond film Octopussy. Studios had to strategize their releases to avoid damaging their own films’ performances by pitting them against better-performing competition. Paramount Studios opted to release Trading Places at the start of summer, as those films expected to do well would benefit from being in theaters longer during this busy period. Comedy films were considered counterprogramming that attracted audiences who had already seen, or were not interested in, the major film releases that were mainly focused on science-fiction and superheroes. Trading Places was released between Return of the Jedi in May and Superman III in mid-June. While sequels were expected to do well having the advantage of a built-in audience, Trading Places was predicted to be successful based on its cast.
The Duke & Duke upstairs offices were filmed inside the upstairs of the Seventh Regiment Armory in New York. Murphy’s character, pretending to be crippled, is introduced in Rittenhouse Square. The nearby Curtis Institute of Music, shown as the exterior of the Heritage Club, is seen adjacent to Rittenhouse Park in the film’s opening. The interior was filmed at the then-abandoned New York Chamber of Commerce Building. During filming in Philadelphia, Murphy was so popular that a police officer had to be stationed outside of his trailer to control the crowds.
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There are no featured reviews for Trading Places because the movie has not released yet (). S review, the reviewer concluded that the middle segment of the film lacked humor. People said that the ending was perfectly presented, but Arnold considered it to be confusing and reliant on the audience’s knowledge that the “heroes” were being heroic to compensate for a lack of clarity in their actions.
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The following day offers a Christmas redemption and a change of fortune as Winthorpe is integrated into the non-traditional family unit of Coleman, Ophelia and Valentine. The 37th British Academy Film Awards named Elliott and Curtis the Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress, respectively. Harris and Weingrod were nominated for Best Original Screenplay; they lost to Paul D. Zimmerman for the 1982 black comedy The King of Comedy. 1983, entirely on location in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and New York City. Elmer Bernstein scored the film, using Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s opera buffa The Marriage of Figaro as an underlying theme.
He had worked previously with Aykroyd on the musical comedy film The Blues Brothers ; the experience had been positive. They felt that Aykroyd working alone would be akin to Bud Abbott, half of Abbott and Costello, working without Lou Costello and Aykroyd’s recent films had fared poorly at the box office. On New Year’s Eve, the four board Beeks’ train in disguise, intending to switch the original report with a forgery that predicts low orange crop yields. Beeks uncovers their scheme, and attempts to kill them, but is knocked unconscious by a gorilla being transported on the train. The four disguise Beeks with a gorilla costume and cage him with the real gorilla. After sharing a kiss with Ophelia, Winthorpe travels to New York City with Valentine, carrying with them Coleman’s and Ophelia’s life savings to carry out their plan.
This is demonstrated by the Dukes’ bet, showing their own sense of superiority over, and disregard for, the lives of those beneath them, even Winthorpe. Author Carolyn Anderson noted that films often feature an “introduction” scene for characters elevated above their station, like Valentine, to help them understand the rules of their new world. Conversely, there is rarely a complementary scene for those subjected to downward mobility.
Several publications have attempted to explain exactly how Valentine and Winthorpe make a large sum of money on the commodities market while simultaneously bankrupting the Dukes. The fake crop report created by Valentine and Winthorpe indicates to the Dukes that the orange crop will be poor, making the limited stock more valuable. The Dukes attempt to buy up as many Frozen Concentrated Orange Juice futures contracts as possible to corner the market—effectively owning a substantial enough number of contracts that they are able to control the price of FCOJ. The other brokers realize what the Dukes are doing and join in buying futures.
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Canby said the pair had well-written roles that were supported by their comic performances. He continued that Ameche was as funny in Trading Places as he was always meant to be. I skimmed over the comments to this movie and was heartened to see that so many people love it like I do.
They learned of financial market incidents, including Russian attempts to corner the wheat market and the Hunt brothers’ efforts to corner the silver market on what became known as Silver Thursday. They thought trading orange juice stock trading robots and pork bellies would be funnier because the public would be unaware such mundane items were traded. Harris consulted with people in the commodities business to understand how the film’s finale on the trading floor would work.
GQ argued that its social commentary remained relevant in spite of these elements. During the firm’s Christmas party, Winthorpe plants drugs in Valentine’s desk, attempting to frame him, and brandishes a gun to escape. Later, the Dukes discuss their experiment and settle their wager for $1.
Harris has described the story as a satire of greed and social conventions, but in the end, the good guys win by becoming extremely rich. Economic inequality is demonstrated by the wealthy who live in luxury. They are completely removed from those whose lives are affected by poverty.
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At the time, the share was generating an average of $10,000 per annum. A musical adaptation of Trading Places debuted at the Alliance Theater in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 4, 2022. Trading Places also employs several conventions of its Christmas setting to highlight the individual loneliness of the main characters, in particular, Winthorpe. On Christmas Eve he humiliates himself in front of his former bosses, unwittingly losing his opportunity for his swap with Valentine to be undone by having become a criminal. He attempts suicide and only fails because the gun does not fire; then it begins to rain on him.
Where the earlier films espoused the benefits of things other than money, Trading Places is built around the value of money and those who aspire to have it. The heroes win by making lots of money; the villains are punished by becoming part of the impoverished. The heroes’ reward is escaping to a tropical island, completely divorced from the poverty-stricken neighborhoods that had previously been their home. Money is demonstrably a solution to all of the problems raised in the film, and when it is taken away, it is shown that people quickly resort to a basic criminal nature. It can be seen as an example of supply-side economics, alongside films like the comedies Arthur and Risky Business . The central storyline of Trading Places—a member of society trading places with another whose socio-economic status stands in direct contrast to his own—has often been compared to the 1881 novel The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain.
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This reflected the fact that average audiences were aging and now in their late teens to late 20s, and led to a shift in focus away from making films targeted mainly at children. His rapid rise to fame led to Murphy leaving Saturday Night Live the following year; he said he had grown to dislike the job and felt he was resented for his success. He and Landis had collaborated previously on several films including The Blues Brothers and the horror-comedy An American Werewolf in London . Landis conceived of the idea to use the opera buffa The Marriage of Figaro by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart as the underlying theme for the score.