Trading Places

Director: John Landis
Year Released: 1983
Rating: 2.0

Two evil rich white men play God with the lives of two Philadelphians - a WASP (Dan Aykroyd; a prim-and-proper caricature of a Harvard Grad) and a street peddler (Eddie Murphy; crass and streetwise) - only to have the tables turned on them. With some dumb plot elements (Aykroyd's being caught with stolen money, Jamie Lee Curtis' unfathomable good intentions) and rather weak comedic dialogue and situations (the train sequence doesn't belong anywhere), its sole salvation is a very likeable cast and Pennsylvania locale. By this point in his career, Landis' best work (Animal House, Kentucky Fried Movie, The Blues Brothers) was already well behind him.