Production Year: 1999 - Comedy - Director: Harold Ramis - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Lisa Kudrow, Joe Viterelli, Chazz Palminteri, Leo Rossi, Molly Shannon, Bill Macy, Kyle Sabihy, Rebecca Schull, Robert De Niro, Billy Crystal more
Analyze This [DVD] [1999]
Cast Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal together in a film and it should be a sucker's bet ... more
as to who's going to be funnier and who's going to give the more nuanced performance. Somehow, though, De Niro walks away with most of the laughs, mugging gleefull...
Analyze This [DVD] [1999]
Cast Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal together in a film and it should be a sucker's bet ... more
as to who's going to be funnier and who's going to give the more nuanced performance. Somehow, though, De Niro walks away with most of the laughs, mugging gleefull...
Analyze This DVD
Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal team up with Lisa Kudrow Chazz Palminteri and ... more
director/co-writer Harold Ramis to make you a comedy offer you can't refuse in this laugh-out-loud mob hit. De Niro deftly spoofing the wiseguy roles that have been a stap...
estimable career plays powerful New York crime family racketeer Paul Vitti. Crystal always one joke ahead of sleeping with the fishes is shrink Ben Sobel who has just days to resolve Vitti's emotional crisis and turn him into a happy well-adjusted gangster. Yes Sobel is a family psychiatrist. But surely this isn't the kind of family he had in mind! Analyze That: They locked up mob boss Paul Vitti in Sing Sing and that's where he sang sang - bellowing West Side Story tunes and convincing officials he's more suited for a nut house than the Big House. Better yet the Feds say let's release Vitti into the custody of his therapist Ben Sobel!
expect.Analyze This(1999) had the advantage of a then-fresh idea--Robert De Niro as a neurotic mob boss seeking therapy with reluctant shrink Billy Crystal--but that idea's stale (and has been handled more authentically inThe Sopranos), so this sequel relies on established chemistry and zesty dialogue that matches the original. There's nothing wrong with a retread when it's this funny, and De Niro's latter-day penchant for comedy suits him well when, as kingpin Paul Vitti, he lures Dr Sobel (Crystal) into a prison breakout scheme involving faked catatonia andWest Side Storyshow tunes. The contrived plot involves Vitti's criminal comeback. Unfortunately, there's little room for Lisa Kudrow as Sobel's sarcastic wife, but De Niro'sRaging Bullco-star Cathy Moriarty-Gentile is welcomed as a rival mob queen. You want a comedy masterpiece? Fuhgeddaboudit. You want 95 minutes of easy fun? It's right here... and don't miss those obligatory outtakes. --Jeff Shannon
Analyze This (1999) [VHS]
Cast Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal together in a film and it should be a sucker's bet ... more
as to who's going to be funnier and who's going to give the more nuanced performance. Somehow, though, De Niro walks away with most of the laughs, mugging gleefully throughAnalyze This, a buddy action-comedy about a mob boss (De Niro, naturally) suffering from panic attacks who makes a shrink (Crystal, naturally) an offer he can't refuse--actually, it's not really an offer, it's a command. The good doctor is forced to help the gangster get in touch with his feelings. Had the brilliant TV seriesThe Sopranosnot underscored how thin and formulaic director-cowriter Harold Ramis's approach to such potentially rich material actually is, the movie--a hit in cinemas (and De Niro's biggest film ever)--would seem more fresh. De Niro is definitely a hoot as the ever milder menace and Crystal actually concentrates on giving a credible performance opposite the acting legend (alas, he doesn't turn his character's fear of his patient into inspired comedy, as Alan Arkin did inGrosse Pointe Blank). The conclusion devolves into the requisite gunplay and Chazz Palminteri and Lisa Kudrow are criminally wasted as an opposing mob boss and Crystal's fiancée, respectively, but overall,Analyze Thisis breezy fun.--David Kronke
expect.Analyze This(1999) had the advantage of a then-fresh idea--Robert De Niro as a neurotic mob boss seeking therapy with reluctant shrink Billy Crystal--but that idea's stale (and has been handled more authentically inThe Sopranos), so this sequel relies on established chemistry and zesty dialogue that matches the original. There's nothing wrong with a retread when it's this funny, and De Niro's latter-day penchant for comedy suits himwell when, as kingpin Paul Vitti, he lures Dr Sobel (Crystal) into a prison breakout scheme involving faked catatonia andWest Side Storyshow tunes. The contrived plot involves Vitti's criminal comeback. Unfortunately, there's little room for Lisa Kudrow as Sobel's sarcastic wife, but De Niro'sRaging Bullco-star Cathy Moriarty-Gentile is welcomed as a rival mob queen. You want a comedy masterpiece? Fuhgeddaboudit. You want 95 minutes of easy fun? It's right here... and don't miss those obligatory outtakes. --Jeff Shannon
as to who's going to be funnier and who's going to give the more nuanced performance. Somehow, though, De Niro walks away with most of the laughs, mugging gleefully throughAnalyze This, a buddy action-comedy about a mob boss (De Niro, naturally) suffering from panic attacks who makes a shrink (Crystal, naturally) an offer he can't refuse--actually, it's not really an offer, it's a command. The good doctor is forced to help the gangster get in touch with his feelings. Had the brilliant TV seriesThe Sopranosnot underscored how thin and formulaic director-cowriter Harold Ramis's approach to such potentially rich material actually is, the movie--a hit in cinemas (and De Niro's biggest film ever)--would seem more fresh. De Niro is definitely a hoot as the ever milder menace and Crystal actually concentrates on giving a credible performance opposite the acting legend (alas, he doesn't turn his character's fear of his patient into inspired comedy, as Alan Arkin did inGrosse Pointe Blank). The conclusion devolves into the requisite gunplay and Chazz Palminteri and Lisa Kudrow are criminally wasted as an opposing mob boss and Crystal's fiancée, respectively, but overall,Analyze Thisis breezy fun.--David Kronke
Comedy - Director: Richard Boden, Mandie Fletcher, Martin Shardlow - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Hugh Laurie, Miranda Richardson, Stephen Fry, Brian Blessed, Tim McInnerny, Tony Robinson, Rowan Atkinson
Comedy - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matthew Perry, David Schwimmer, Matt Le Blanc
Comedy - Director: John Howard-Davies, Bob Spiers - Original Language: English - Classification: Parental Guidance - Starring: Connie Booth, Andrew Sachs, Prunella Scales, John Cleese
Comedy - Original Language: English - Classification: 12 years and over - Starring: Tessa Peake-Jones, Buster Merryfield, David Jason, Nicholas Lyndhurst
A review by dave27 on Analyze This (DVD) May 15th, 2001
Author's product rating:
Did you enjoy it?
Loved it
Story
Outstanding
Characters / Performances
Good
Special Effects
Standard
How does it compare to similar films?
Outstanding
Advantages:
De Niro, the script
Disadvantages:
The very idea of Billy Crystal
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
Analyze This is one of the biggest comedy films of the last couple of years and certainly merits its popularity – it’s a wonderful, wonderful movie and one of the funniest things around on Sky at the moment. Made by Harold Ramis for Warner Brothers, it features Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal as the main players and they give tour de force performances. I don’t generally like Crystal but he is certainly on outstanding form here. Lisa Kudrow from Friends is the other star.
It’s worth just recapping on what Harold Ramis has done before and saying a few words about him, before I move onto the movie itself. He came to real prominence in the 1980’s as one of the three main protagonists of the two Ghostbusters films, alongside the more well known Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd, but prior to that he directed Caddyshack and National Lampoon’s Vacation. He also directed Murray in Groundhog Day in 1993 and has numerous other directing and acting roles to his credit over the last twenty years or so. He seems to now favour directing.
As for the two stars, Crystal has been disappointing in his films to date - his most famous performance was in When Harry Met Sally, but even then he was smug and insufferable. De Niro, in sharp contrast, is one of the finest character actors of his generation, appearing in great films like Taxi Driver, The Deer Hunter, The Godfather Part II, Cape Fear and Raging Bull, among dozens of others.
Regarding the film, I can only summarise it as being absolutely marvellous fun. It tells the tale of a mafia mobster and gang leader in modern day New York, Paul Vitti, played by De Niro, who suddenly collapses under the stress of his lifestyle and starts to undergo panic attacks. He’s two weeks away from a major Mafia meeting and has to be on peak form, so he’s desperate to sort himself out and enlists the help of a psychotherapist, Ben Sobel, played by Crystal, in the task of putting his head back together again.
De Niro is well known for his Mafia roles in previous films and the smash hit playing of the young Don Corleone in The Godfather series way back when, who later developed into the better known later life hood played by Marlon Brando. He also starred brilliantly as Al Capone and in Goodfellas. In Analyze This, he’s playing it strictly for laughs and is playing well up to the stereotypical hood. The language is near the knuckle, as it normally is in modern day Mafia films of the modern era, but it’s all the funnier for the swift wordplay, sarcastic asides and relationship between De Niro and Crystal.
The film opens back in 1957, with De Niro narrating the tale of the mob travelling to a farm for a meet, where they are ambushed by the Feds. We have an early glimpse of the humour here when a cow gets too close to the Don’s car and one of the gunmen pulls a gun on it, telling it to get away or he’d pump it full of lead. De Niro’s father, who was a mobster before him, excaped the showdown by kidnapping a tractor and making his big break for it.
We’re then brought right up to date in modern times America and the introduction of De Niro and Crystal. De Niro is the victim of an attempted hit by his rival, Primo Sindone which wipes out one of his associates. Immediate switch to the sight of Crystal as a shrink in counselling sessions with one of his patients. He is coming up to a holiday and a wedding to his fiance, Lisa Kudrow. He’d like to tell his clients what he really thinks but is prevented by his ethical code. We’ve got the amusing scene of what Crystal would like to say, followed closely by what he actually says.
They’re two opposite extremes of the spectrum here, De Niro and Crystal, and there’s a certain riotous chemistry between them and the repartee and quick put downs are symptomatic of a wonderful screen pairing. I hope they don’t try and recreate the magic in another film, because it’s doubtful whether they’d ever quite be able to manage the perfection they build here. It’s built around a juxtaposition of extremes that somehow gels perfectly and allows the dynamic duo to turn in vituoso playing.
Moving on, Crystal is caught in a traffic jam on the way to see his parents. He is trapped in his car with his large teenage son who continually tells Crystal how great his own father, also a shrink is and you can see the tension and irritation in Crystal’s eyes and the generation gap that will be a key feature in this tale of the relationship between two men and their fathers. Anyway, Crystal gets distracted and runs into the back of a car driven by De Niro’s right hand man, Jelly, played by Joe Viterelli. There’s a body in the boot and they’re keen to avoid any trouble or visits by the police so they tell Crystal to forget it. He gives Jelly his card and that’s when his problems begin.
Undeterred, Crystal drives on to a party at his father’s only to be told that they’re not coming to the forthcoming wedding because his father has to attend a book signing which clashes with it. There’s great sparring between father and son and a clear tension there.
Elsewhere, De Niro has started to experience panic attacks and hyperventilation. He has to hurriedly rush out of a meeting. He puts the chest pains down to heart problems and they rush over to the local hospital. The doctor who checks him out assures him that is heart is fine. De Niro: “What do you mean, my heart is fine, do I look fine? I’ve had eight heart attacks in the last two weeks.” “It’s just panic attacks.” “Panic attacks, panic attacks? Do I look like a guy who panics?” The affrontery of the man! De Niro’s assistants try to explain the error of his ways to the doctor as the screens are pulled across in classic fashion.
Despite this show, however, De Niro takes the commenst to heart and asks Jelly to find him a head doctor. “What, you need plastic surgery?” “No, my head, but it’s not for me, it’s for a friend.” “Boss, can I ask one question – this friend? Is it me?” Jelly has Crystal’s business card and decides he is to be the one privileged to be called to De Niro’s assistance. Lucky fellow.
From the very first meeting, they’re off. De Niro: “Do you know me?” “Yes.” “You don’t know me.” “No.”
“You seen my picture in the paper?” “Yes.” “No, you ain’t.” “You’re right, I don’t even get the papers.”
“Why don’t you tell me why you think you need thereapy?”
“I told you, I don’t need therapy. One more thing, if I talk to you, and you turn me into a fag, you die.”
Against all his better judgement, Crystal agrees to help De Niro, but his problems start to impinge more and more on Crystal’s life and his upcoming wedding, such that a body falling ten floors out of a hotel window ends the first ceremony.
I won’t go too much further into this, save saying that the quick and witty interplay between the two men and De Niro’s masterful parody of a Mafia hood are classic and make this a marvellous, wonderfully funny film. It never lets up, although it peters off quite poorly towards the end when Crystal deputises for De Niro at the Mafia meet and starts to play the big mobster. This is a pretty embarrassing scene and shows what could have happened with this film if Ramis hadn’t been quite as skilful. Crystal takes a fine, understated role when he’s being dominated in the scenes with De Niro, but that’s because he just gets the sniping asides – when he has to carry the plot and the action and take centre stage, he’s not half as appealing and is actually quite annoying. That’s one of the reasons I disliked him in When Harry Met Sally and his other cinema vehicles. However, that’s only a minor lapse and is easy to excuse and overlook when you’ve got the rest of this wonderful epic.
De Niro is far and away the outstanding talent here and dominates this film, but there’s a witty and clever film and the timing and playing of the two leads AS A UNIT is a wonder to behold. Heartily recommended.
Advantages: De Niro Steals the Show, Crystal is fairly good, works well between them both. Disadvantages: Lisa Kudrow has been typecast into her Phoebe from Friends role again.
...along with the follow up Analyze That, De Niro and Crystal seem to have built up quite a partnership during this film, which I think really shows through during their time on screen together. This really is a must see if like me you are a De Niro fan, or if your not it’s a whole new side to the man who continues to make good films. ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Crystal and De Niro together Disadvantages: See opinion
~ ~ This comedy was released in 1999, and brings together two unlikely talents in Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal.
I say unlikely, as De Niro would not exactly have been an obvious first choice for a comedy film of this type.
The film is directed by Harold Ramis, who also directed Caddyshack, Ghostbusters and Groundhog Day.
~ ~ It starts out as though it’s going to be another regular gangster drama, and the opening shots are of a big “Family” ... ...meeting goes dramatically wrong when it is busted by the F.B.I., and there has not been another meeting since. Until now.
We are then introduced to De Niro’s character, Mafia boss Paul Vitti, who doesn’t feel any too happy about this planned new big meeting, and whose growing feelings of anxiety and insecurity are intensified when he narrowly escapes death from assassination.
Billy Crystal plays psychiatrist Ben Sobel, who quite literally ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Great acting and very funny Disadvantages: None
This DVD was another of my bargain buys to watch during the football. Me and my hubby were both very impressed with it. THE FILM
The film involves Paul Vitti,. Played by De Niro who is involved with the mob, he has been suffering panic attacks and seeks the help of a shrink so he can get better for a big meeting which is taking place with all the main men of the gangs. Ben Sobel, played by Billy Crystal is the unlucky shrink who Vitti chooses to ... ...he is unable to treat him for 2 weeks as he is going on vacation and getting married, his wife to be is played by Lisa Kudrow. As he sets off on vacation Vitti follows him. Ben is finding that everywhere he goes Vitti is there and in need of help. Ben's wedding day arrives but all does not go to plan, did Vitti have anything to do with it? Ben finally agrees to give Vitti the help that he needs but all does not go to plan and the FBI and other gangsters ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Great interplay between De Niro and Crystal with some hilarious stereotyping Disadvantages: Sorry, but Lisa Kudrow IS Phoebe Buffay wherever she goes
I watched this movie last night on Sky when there was not much else on, and I must admit I was pleased that I did. When the trailers were out for Analyse This and when it came out on video, I wasn't that bothered (even though I'm the girl who's seen practically everything in Blockbuster, I hadn't seen this). The comedy between De Niro and Crystal is fantastic as they are both remarkable actors in their own right. Lisa Kudrow, I must say, was not ... ...outlandish character (Ms Buffay of Friends) for so long then it's hard to get the public to see you as otherwise. Of course, it's not that she wears the odd clothes and eccentric hairdos (she plays an anchorwoman in the film), but it doesn't help that she plays Billy Crystal's fiancee with many of the same mannerisms and speech patterns as the character of Phoebe.
Anyhow. The story is good and catches you a couple of times when you think it's over, ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: De Niro and Crystal in good form, Very funny, Great dialogue,Original Disadvantages: Might not be everyone's cup of tea
Whether you be a fan of Mafia films or you simply enjoy comedy then this film is definitely worth a try. If you like both, all the better! There are just two main characters, a great move :
Robert De Niro ------------ Paul Vitti, the mob boss Billy Crystal ---------------- Ben Sobel, the psychiatrist Lisa Kudrow also plays a broadcaster who is engaged to Ben Sobel. Disappointingly she is very similar to her character from the show "Friends". Luckily, ... ...The film starts with Ben Sobel literally running into Paul Vitti-a rather innocuous car accident. However Vitti's boot opens in the crash to reveal an animated, gagged body (fair enough really-would you be happy in there?). Understandably, Vitti is in a rush to leave but Sobel insists on giving him his business card for insurance purposes. Soon after the violent mobster suddenly realises he may have a few problems inside his head and so the comedy ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Good acting, 1 fanatstic movie Disadvantages: 1 disappointing movie, a loss of direction
...Oh no, another DVD review by Iama, what a shame as they all suck... >>
Anyway, I got Analyzethis/Analyze that from Morrisons for £5 recently and watched them the following few nights (whilst admittedly mildly drunk). Despite wanting these for a while it took me around 18 months to finally decide to actually get the bloody things (and at that sort of a price who can refuse?)
The movies order is AnalyzeThis then Analyze that (if you want to watch them chronologically anyway), so thats the way I'll review them.
Analyzethis-
The movie opens with a shoot out between rival mobsters and quickly introduces you to Paul Vitti (Robert DeNiro) and the overall ganster themes that the series has.
Then the movie introduces us to psychiatrist Ben Sobel (Bill Crystal) talking to a client and introduces us to some of the surreal humour...
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What happens when the worlds of the Mafia and psychiatry collide
Languages
Main Language: English
Subtitle Language: Arabic, Bulgarian, English, Romanian
Hearing Impaired Language: English
Technical information
Special Features: Audio Commentary With Robert De Niro And Billy Crystal, Unseen Takes, Gag Reel, Full Chaptered Scene Access
Aspect Ratio: 1.33 Full Screen, 1.85 Wide Screen
Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
Dubbing Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1 English
Professional reviews
Review: "...A funny title, an even funnier premise and inspired odd-couple casting that's enough to prompt laughter just on the basis of the two-shots in its ad campaign. Think of it as an offer you can't refuse..." (New York Times, p.E12, 05/03/1999)
"...[ANALYZE THIS] has a good, profane edge that's never abrasive..." (Sight and Sound, p.40-1, 01/09/1999)
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