Nothing Personal (1980) American International/Comedy RT: 100 minutes Rated PG (language, sexual conversation/material, brief nudity, violent images, drug use/references) Director: George Bloomfield Screenplay: Robert Kaufman Music: Peter Mann Cinematography: Lazlo George and Arthur Ibbetson Release date: March 28, 1980 (US) Cast: Donald Sutherland, Suzanne Somers, Lawrence Dane, Dabney Coleman, Roscoe Lee Browne, Sean McCann, Chief Dan George, John Dehner, David Steinberg, Craig Russell, Sean Sullivan, Michael Wincott, Catherine O’Hara, Douglas Campbell, Jonathan Welsh, Patricia Collins, Maury Chaykin, Joe Flaherty, Eugene Levy, Derek McGrath, Tony Rosato, Angus McInnes. Box Office: $700,000 (US, approx.)
Rating: ***
If Nothing Personal had been made in the 40s, it probably would have starred Cary Grant and Judy Holliday. In the 50s, it would be a Rock Hudson-Doris Day vehicle. In 1980, it’s Donald Sutherland (Invasion of the Body Snatchers) and Suzanne Somers (Three’s Company). I’ll give you a moment to let this unlikely, uninspired pairing sink in. He looks sleepier than usual. She’s just out of her depth. Yet somehow Nothing Personal isn’t a complete bust.
Nothing Personal had a hell of a time getting to the big screen. It was conceived in 1972, but stalled in development limbo for several years. Directors passed on it left and right. Then in 1979, writer Robert Kaufman penned the hit comedy Love at First Bite. It did well enough that SCTV director George Bloomfield decided to take a stab at it. To cut down on costs, he filmed it in Toronto (with a few exterior shots in Washington D.C.) in order to take advantage of Canadian tax shelter laws. It opened in March ’80 to terrible reviews and bad box office making only $700K against a $4.5M price tag. It turns out the millions of viewers who tuned in to see Somers on the popular sitcom Three’s Company each week didn’t want to pay to see her in a middling rom-com.
Comedy is subjective, but I think we can all agree there’s nothing funny about cruelty to animals. It has the opposite effect on me as well as anybody with a heart I’d imagine. I find it hard to accept that this didn’t cross the minds of anybody involved in the making of Nothing Personal. Did they really think clubbing baby seals would be a good fit in a supposed romantic comedy? I have no problem with movies addressing serious environmental issues except when it weighs down what’s supposed to be light-hearted entertainment. That’s what happens here.
Sutherland plays Roger Keller, a law professor at an unnamed university in Alaska. He’s kind of stuffy, usually stoned and content to live a life free of ambition. That is, until one of his students (Wincott, The Crow) brings a horrific situation to his attention. Baby harbor seals are being murdered to clear the way for a missile base. It seems the US is concerned about China building their own and wants to be prepared just in case. Keller decides to do something about it.
He enlists the aid of Abigail Adams (Somers), a Harvard-educated environmental lawyer to help him fight the baddies behind the project, a development company run by Ralston (Dane, Bear Island). Together with his main flunky Dickerson (Coleman, 9 to 5), they do everything they can to silence Roger and Abigail, ultimately resorting to more dire methods.
Meanwhile, Roger and Abigail explore different avenues in halting the project. He delivers a rousing speech at a shareholder’s meeting only to be shut down by the company’s majority shareholder. They look through law books at the library where they learn the land actually belongs to the Manitoba Indians. The problem is there’s only one surviving member (George, The Outlaw Josey Wales) of nearly extinct tribe. They need to find him and get him to sign papers that will stop the company from building on the land.
I know what you’re going to ask. It’s a rom-com, where’s the rom? It’s in there. Things get very personal in Nothing Personal. Let’s start with the tagline promising that the two stars “break the law in thirty-seven states, Puerto Rico and the Panama Canal Zone.” This, of course, refers to a lawyer sleeping with his or her client. Abigail might be as good at her job as she claims, but never mistake ability for professionalism. Do you know any lawyers that admit to not wearing underwear to their clients? How about any who confer with clients while lying in bed naked? Both things happen here. It isn’t long before they’re both naked in bed with each other. Shocking, even scandalous, you say? Maybe not so much in 1979 (the characters mention the year more than once)?
Nothing Personal has an interesting supporting cast. Roscoe Lee Browne (The Cowboys), one of the most dignified actors this side of Olivier, shows up Paxton, the owner of the hotel where Roger stays while in D.C. An avid Hitchcock fan, he’s ideally suited to help the pair in the film’s finale, an intricate plan involving a game of distraction, an extended car chase and a barn in the middle of nowhere. It’s always awesome to see Michael Wincott; I just wish he had a bigger role. And just in case there’s any doubt about where Nothing Personal was made, Canadian mainstay actor Maury Chaykin (Def-Con 4) shows up in a brief role.
You might have noticed that quite a few SCTV cast members appear in Nothing Personal. Look for Catherine O’Hara, Joe Flaherty, Eugene Levy and Tony Rosato in small parts. Bloomfield obviously invited his colleagues to the party. He does an okay job directing, but it might have been too much for him. According to Somers in her autobiography, he did get in over his head which is why Sutherland reportedly took charge of directing the actors. After this one, he stuck mainly to TV gigs until his death in 2011.
I won’t even try to make excuses for Somers. She can’t act. No, let me rephrase that. She has an extremely limited range as an actress. It’s impossible to look at her and see anyone other than her dumb blonde character on Three’s Company. Of course, the role required little more than jiggling, snort-laughing and looking empty-headed. She’s supposed to be playing smart in Nothing Personal, but I see no difference. All I see is Chrissy Snow using a few legal terms. She’s nice to look at though.
Sutherland basically sleepwalks through the movie. It’s abundantly clear he’s just there for the paycheck, nothing more. I suspect that’s why he appeared in other Canadian-made films like The Disappearance (1977), Bear Island (1979), Threshold (1981) and Gas (1981). Somehow, he managed to find the time to make Ordinary People (1980) during this period. He’s an actor’s actor. Too bad he has no chemistry with his female co-star.
Nothing Personal isn’t what I’d call a good movie yet I like it. Sure, it’s poorly made and has major tonal issues. It can’t decide if it wants to be a comedy-thriller, a rom-com or a serious statement about saving the environment for evil companies. It tries to be all three and ends up a mess. This movie is a near-complete misfire. However, I can’t help but enjoy it. I have a soft spot for these Canadian tax shelter films. There’s something so entertaining about them, even the bad ones. Let me put it this way. I’d rather watch Nothing Personal than any of the 400 generic rom-coms currently playing on Netflix. Call it cinematic comfort food.
