Delirious (film)

Delirious
The movie cover for Delirious.
Directed by	Tom Mankiewicz
Produced by	Larry Cohen Fred Freeman Doug Claybourne
Written by	Fred Freeman Lawrence J. Cohen
Starring	John Candy Mariel Hemingway Emma Samms Raymond Burr
Music by	Cliff Eidelman
Distributed by	MGM Pictures
Release date(s)	August 9, 1991
Running time	96 min.
Language	English

Delirious is a romantic comedy film starring John Candy, Mariel Hemingway, Emma Samms and Raymond Burr (in his last film role before his death). It was released in 1991, but it did not achieve commercial success at the box offices.

Plot

John Candy plays Jack Gable, a nearly out-of-work soap opera writer, whose product, like him, is now dated. The show he produces, All My Dreams, takes place in Ashford Falls, a wealthy, sleepy suburb of New York City. Laura (Emma Samms) plays Rachel Hedison, a woman who stops at nothing to acquire wealth and power.

Jack's situation is only worsened by his despicable work associates who would sooner show him the door than work with him. Behind his back, they commission Arnie Federman, another writer, to rewrite his script, setting one of the themes for the movie. His associates want to write Laura out of the script due to the high cost of keeping her on the cast. They attempt to create a new character, Janet DuBois (Mariel Hemingway), to replace her and will be less costly with a new actress. Meanwhile, Jack has a one-sided infatuation with her, who humors and uses him but has no romantic interest in him. A fight with her boyfriend, however, leads her to call and ask to accompany him on a weekend trip to Vermont. He melts to the suggestion and as he loads her luggage in his Oldsmobile sedan's trunk, she makes up with her boyfriend and, as they kiss passionately on the sidewalk, the trunk lid suddenly pops open and strikes Jack on the chin, knocking him unconscious. When he awakens, he proceeds on his trip, only to be involved in a car accident.

Upon waking from the crash, Jack finds himself in Ashford Falls Community Hospital, the same one in which his soap opera takes place. Thinking himself the victim of a prank by the actors, he goes to the window to confirm his suspicions, only to find the view beyond the glass is entirely of his own creation. Incredulous, he checks out of the hospital and makes his way to a motel, where he looks into getting his car repaired. When a conversation with the local auto mechanic (one of the characters from his show) goes nowhere, he types in his typewriter that the mechanic calls him and tells him his radiator is fixed, only to have the words magically disappear from the page. A few seconds later, the phone rings and he suddenly finds out that his car is fixed. At this point he begins to explore the town, and in doing so he discovers that he is living within his own soap opera, a world in which he and his typewriter can control events. However, so can Arnie Federman in the "real world," which causes events to roll back and forth as he and Jack rewrite events back and forth, creating paradox after paradox.

Jack seizes his newfound power to pursue Rachel. Despite his inventive writing skills, she manages to ignore him, yet his futile efforts are redeemed by the attentions of Janet Dubois (Hemingway). Other events ensue, in which he experiences the height of the high life, the lowest of the low, the full gamut of experiences, including a wild party which he wrote. The film ends with him getting together with the woman who played Janet, and getting the show produced how he wanted it to be.

References

External links

• Delirious at the Internet Movie Database