Gigli

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Not to be confused with Gigi

Gigli
Movie poster for Gigli
Directed by	Martin Brest
Produced by	Martin Brest Casey Silver
Written by	Martin Brest
Starring	Ben Affleck Jennifer Lopez Al Pacino Christopher Walken Lainie Kazan
Music by	John Powell
Cinematography	Robert Elswit
Editing by	Julie Monroe Billy Weber
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures Revolution Studios
Release date(s)	August 1, 2003
Running time	121 min
Language	English
Budget	$54,000,000 (estimated)
Gross revenue	$6,068,735 (USA)
IMDb profile

Ratings
United Kingdom:	15
United States:	R

Gigli (pronounced /ˈdʒiːli/ or /ˈʒiːʎi/) is a film released in 2003 which was written and directed by Martin Brest, starring Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez, Al Pacino, Christopher Walken, and Lainie Kazan. The critical reception of the film was very poor and the film became infamous as one of the worst movies ever made.

Contents 1 Plot 2 Reaction 3 References 4 External links

[edit] Plot

Larry Gigli (Affleck) is a low ranking mobster who is commanded to kidnap the disabled, Baywatch-obsessed younger brother (Justin Bartha) of a powerful federal prosecutor, to save his mobster boss from prison. Gigli successfully convinces the man, Brian, to go off with him by promising to take him "to the Baywatch". However, Gigli's boss does not trust him; he hires a woman calling herself Ricki (Jennifer Lopez) to take over the job. Although Gigli is attracted to Ricki, he resents the fact that Louis (Lenny Venito), his boss, does not have faith in him and that he has to take orders from Ricki. He is also frustrated by Brian's insistence on going to Baywatch and Ricki's lesbianism. The events of the movie take on a darker turn when Larry and Ricki receive orders from Ray to cut off Brian's thumb, something neither of them wants to do.

When Ricki's girlfriend shows up at Gigli's apartment, accusing her of cheating, she slits her wrist and has to be rushed to the hospital. While at the hospital, Gigli goes to the morgue and cuts off a corpse's thumb, which he sends to his boss as Brian's thumb. Gigli and Ricki eventually go back to his apartment and Gigli confesses his love for Ricki, who has sex with him. Afterwards, they are called to meet with their mob boss. The boss Starkman (Al Pacino) reveals that he didn't approve of the plan to kidnap a federal prosecutor's brother, knows that the thumb they sent doesn't match Brian's fingerprint, and shoots Gigli's boss dead. Starkman is about to kill Ricki and Gigli as well, but Ricki points out that only the three of them know what happened, so Starkman allows them to leave and take the brother back to where they found him. On the way, they discover Baywatch shooting an episode on the beach and leave Brian there to be picked up.

[edit] Reaction

The movie was considered a spectacular failure, often called the worst movie of 2003, grossing less than $4 million in its opening weekend after costing $54 million to make. It earned nearly universally negative reviews and scores only a 6% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 157 reviews ^[1] and an 18% on metacritic.[1] It also scores only a 9% on the Rotten Tomatoes Cream of the Coop, a 3% among notable critics at Rotten Tomatoes (of the 37 reviews from notable critics, only one was positive) and a 2.2 among metacritics users. Gigli also set a record for the biggest second-weekend drop in box office gross of any film in wide release since that statistic was kept; its gross dropped by almost 82% in its second weekend compared to its first.^[2]. By its third weekend on release, only 73 U.S. theaters were showing it, down from 2,215 during its first weekend, a drop of 97%.^[3]

It was also named by the Global Language Monitor as one of the top words from Hollywood impacting the English Language for 2003.^[4] Late night talk show hosts in paticular blasted the film in their monologues, for example Conan O'Brien said "The Mets are doing so badly that they will be re-named 'The New York Gigli.'" It was eventually withdrawn from U.S. theatres after only 3 weeks (one of the shortest circulation times for a big-budget movie), earning a total of only $6 million domestically and $1 million abroad. In terms of budget percentage, it is one of the biggest box-office bombs ever. In the UK, the movie was dropped by virtually every cinema after critics universally panned it.

The film received six Razzies in the 2003 Golden Raspberry Awards – Worst Picture, Worst Actor, Worst Actress, Worst Director, Worst Screenplay, and Worst Screen Couple. For a film to win the "Academy Awards grand slam", it must win the awards for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Writing, Screenplay. Conversely, winning those awards' Razzie counterparts makes Gigli the only film to ever perform the "Razzie grand slam". A year later, the film won a seventh Razzie for "Worst Comedy of our first 25 Years."

Currently, Yahoo! Movies rates Gigli number one on their Bottom Rated Movies of All Time,^[5] with a critics rating of D−.^[6] The Onion, a satirical newspaper, ran an article about the film, titled "Gigli focus groups demand new ending in which Affleck and Lopez die."^[7] Roger Ebert, while panning the film, was one of the very few critics to not write it off completely.^[8] He ranked the film with two and a half stars, saying, "They didn't quite get to where they wanted to be, but the film is worth seeing for some very good scenes." A rare positive, as opposed to less negative, review came from Amy Dawes of Variety. She conceded the story was ludicrous and that the film would tank, but stated that on balance she found it a fun film with several good performances.^[9] Perhaps the only element of the film that received any noticeable positive attention was Justin Bartha's performance as the mentally handicapped man. Even some of the critics who were completely panning the film gave a sliver of positivity when mentioning Bartha's performance. [2] Nonetheless, his performance did nothing to overshadow the films unanimously bad reviews. Gigli, is often considered along with Battlefield Earth to be the worst picture of the decade.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Sony Pictures: Gigli
• Gigli at the Internet Movie Database
• Gigli at Rotten Tomatoes
• Gigli at Metacritic
• Gigli at Box Office Mojo

v • d • e Films directed by Martin Brest Hot Dogs for Gauguin (1972) • Hot Tomorrows (1977) • Going in Style (1979) • Beverly Hills Cop (1984) • Midnight Run (1988) • Scent of a Woman (1992) • Meet Joe Black (1998) • Gigli (2003)