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List Price: $14.99 | | Label: Walt Disney Video
Salesrank: 6388
Released: April 2, 2002 |
| Our Price: $8.85 |
| Used Price: $7.27 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Cruise back to Baltimore 1963, to the time and turf of a rare American breed: the "tin man" (aluminum siding salesman). Two less-than-honest rivals in the tin game (Richard Dreyfuss and Danny DeVito) meet in a fender bender, but their bruised egos and quick tempers turn the minor accident into a major vendetta against each other's symbols of success -- their prized Cadillacs. In what would seem to be a coup de grace, Dreyfuss decides to seduce DeVito's neglected wife (Barbara Hershey), but this romantic maneuver causes nonstop twists and turns to both the heart and the funnybone. With a supporting cast that's absolutely classic and music by The Fine Young Cannibals, TIN MEN sounds as good as it looks!
Description of Tin Men:
Tin Men, the second in Barry Levinson's ongoing film series about his native Baltimore in the 1950s and '60s, focuses on a pair of competing aluminum-siding salesman at a point when the industry was loaded with scam artists. Richard Dreyfuss and Danny DeVito play rivals who get involved in a fender-bender that quickly escalates from a minor argument into an all-out war, as they begin pulling practical jokes on each other. Dreyfuss takes it too far, however, when he sets out to seduce DeVito's unhappy wife (Barbara Hershey) and winds up falling in love with her. Much of the humor here comes from Levinson's keen ear as writer and director for the way these people talk--and what they talk about (like the discussion of why four men are living together without women on the Ponderosa in Bonanza). Beside the leads, the cast includes a great host of character actors, including Jackie Gayle, Bruno Kirby, John Mahoney, and J.T. Walsh. Others in Levinson's body of Baltimore films are Diner, Avalon, and the most recent, Liberty Heights. --Marshall Fine
Tin Men Reviews:
richard dreyfuss 
2009-10-10 - A great movie, especially if you are from Baltimore, very ethnic, and very entertaining, it is worth seeing a few times,
Mad Men 
2009-08-30 - Long before Mad Men Mad Men - Season One [Blu-ray] was even a gleam in Matt Weiner's eye, Barry Levinson perfectly recreated Baltimore in 1963 in his valentine to that era, Tin Men. The comical plot revolves around two aluminum siding salesmen (Richard Dreyfuss and Danny DeVito) who become embroiled in a protracted, and at times, violent feud over a minor car accident. This escalates into Dreyfuss seducing Barbara Hershey, DeVito's character's innocent and neglected wife and further complications ensue. The times, they are a changing!
But the real star is the innocence of the era, pre-Kennedy assassination, pre-Vietnam, pre-women's lib. The art department does a marvelous job here:spot-on costuming, wonderful gas guzzler cars, even tiny details like square Melamine plates and Frank Lloyd Wrightesque office interiors. This isn't Glengarry Glen Ross but still you get the sense of how the cut throat business of home improvements actually works and the supporting cast is just excellent.
Like the earlier Diner, this movie is all about the boys (or men as it were). However, wonderful locations shots, original songs by the Fine Young Cannibals and a touching performance by Ms. Hershey make this a movie that I love revisit periodically.
Stands The Test of a Couple Decades
2008-11-29 - Twenty years past its release date, Tin Men remains a keeper. Danny DeVito may have worn out his exasperated/enraged small man schtick by now, but in 1987 it was still fresh. Like Diner, Tin Men is set in end-of-an-era Baltimore, 1963, and so much that is in it has disappeared or declined. Crowd noise from old Memorial Stadium fills a part of one scene and the camera captures those brick row houses that lined the streets around the stadium in their prime. The Life Magazine scam scene and the diner and driving riffs on Bonanza are laugh out loud funny. In an excellent cast -- not only of leads, but with some of the era's best supporting players --, Barbara Hershey as the wife caught between the tantrums of shady aluminum siding salesmen stands out. And the fender level camera view of the tin men parking their perfect Cadillacs is auto nostalgia at its best. Overall, Tin Men serves up that nostalgia, but also wry look at human nature, and a well-shot picture of a working and living city into an enduring package. It is one very good movie.
gem of a comedy...
2008-11-24 - everything is so right about this film, the setting, the music, the acting. Really takes you back to the early 60's with Richard Dreyfuss, Barbara Hershy, Dany DeVito doing some of their finest work. The supporting cast is incredible, John Mahoney, Bruno Kirby, the familiar faces and great work just goes on and on. But it is the writing that really seperates this into the 'special' category. Great writing, great directing amd great acting make for a especially great comedy.
A guys movie. The opposite of a 'chick flick'.
2008-11-13 - One of my favorite films ever. Following on from `Diner', its quirky humor lies in the everyday banter of the characters, for which the actors seem to have been given freedom to ad lib. Charm and authenticity are added by Levinson's attention to detail, in what is a sixties period movie.
Women be warned. When my sister saw this at the theatre, she was so bored she walked out before the end. My girl friend had a similar reaction when watching at home. At first this puzzled me, as I absolutely loved the film. However, you need to have a male psyche to understand it. The story revolves around two competing male egos and the girl caught in the middle. There are allusions to the male obsession for new cars, the pride that believes you can always beat the other guy at pool, and the `getting the girl' just to prove that you can.
Great characters, innovative directing, and sparkling acting by the lead roles in Dreyfuss, DeVito and Hershey, makes you think that they had a lot of fun making this film.
It's not 'Beaches'. It's not 'Fried Green Tomatoes'. And that's the beauty of it.
