Ed (film)
Ed is a 1996 American sports comedy film starring Matt LeBlanc about a talented baseball pitcher and his friendly ball-playing chimpanzee as his team's mascot.
Ed | |
---|---|
Directed by | Bill CouturiƩ |
Screenplay by | David Mickey Evans |
Story by | Ken Richards Janus Cercone |
Produced by | Rosalie Swedlin Bill Finnegan[1] |
Starring | |
Cinematography | Alan Caso |
Edited by | Robert K. Lambert Todd E. Miller |
Music by | Stephen Endelman |
Production company | Longview Entertainment[2] |
Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 94 minutes |
Budget | $24 million |
Box office | $4,422,330[3] |
The film received negative reviews from critics, with a 6% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Plot
In Santa Rosa, California, Jack "Deuce" Cooper (Matt LeBlanc) is a farm boy who arrives at an open tryout for the Santa Rosa Rockets minor league baseball team. He makes the team after blowing away the scouts with his 'rocket' arm as well as having a strong training camp. Deuce also befriends a chimpanzee, 'Ed,' after being told the chimp is his new roommate/teammate. After they move into their apartment, Deuce develops a relationship with his neighbor, Lydia. Also, Ed becomes very close with her daughter, Elizabeth. Deuce's game really begins to take off as well as Ed's and the team becomes a league contender. Deuce's coach, Chubb, thinks Deuce can be an MLB starter if he keeps his head on straight. But after the owners sell Ed to make a buck, Deuce takes matters into his own hands and goes to find Ed only to see him being tortured by a pair of goons. Deuce saves Ed but Ed escapes and finds a truck of frosted bananas and does not realize he is stuck inside the trailer, which is ice cold. Ed ends up in the hospital from almost freezing to death before the final game of the season and Deuce questions his own ability to continue playing without his best friend. Deuce ends up playing and struggles right off the bat. But when Ed, Elizabeth and Lydia arrive at the game together, Deuce turns up the heat and the Rockets take the championship. Deuce eventually gets called up to the Dodgers. In the end, Ed, Deuce, Lydia and Elizabeth then become a family and live happily ever after.
Cast
- Matt LeBlanc as Jack "Deuce" Cooper
- Jay Caputo and Denise Cheshire as Ed
- Jayne Brook as Lydia
- Doren Fein as Liz
- Jack Warden as Chubb
- Bill Cobbs as Tipton
- Jim Caviezel as Dizzy
- Jim O'Heir as Art
- Steve Eastin as Shark's Manager
- Brad Hunt as Carnie
- Sage Allen as Cooper's Mother
- Stan Ivar as Cooper's Father
Reception
The film was a box office disappointment. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 6% of 17 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 2.7/10.[4] It received four Razzie Award nominations for Worst Picture, Worst Screenplay (David M. Evans), and Worst Screen Couple (for LeBlanc and Ed the chimpanzee), losing all of those categories to Striptease starring Demi Moore. LeBlanc was also nominated for Worst New Star for his role, but "lost" to Pamela Anderson in Barb Wire. Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 25 out of 100, based on 11 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade of "B+" on a scale of A+ to F.[5]
See also
References
- "TV and film producer William Finnegan dies at 80". Los Angeles Times. 2008-12-02. Retrieved 2022-02-28.
- "Ed (1996)". BFI. Archived from the original on May 8, 2019. Retrieved December 13, 2020.
- "Ed". Box Office Mojo.
- "Ed". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. Retrieved October 6, 2021.
- "Cinemascore". Archived from the original on 2018-12-20. Retrieved 2020-07-21.