Michael Caine played second fiddle to Jim Belushi in the tepid 1990 comedy, Mr Destiny. As part of our ongoing Caine season, a detailed look back: The 1990s were Caine’s last decade as a consistent leading man before he moved more permanently into supporting actor elder statesman territory. This decade features some of his most ... The 1990s films of Michael Caine: Mr Destiny (1990)
Michael Caine played second fiddle to Jim Belushi in the tepid 1990 comedy, Mr Destiny. As part of our ongoing Caine season, a detailed look back:
The 1990s were Caine’s last decade as a consistent leading man before he moved more permanently into supporting actor elder statesman territory. This decade features some of his most forgotten work, but it also contains one of his most beloved and enduring roles as Scrooge in The Muppet Christmas Carol, his second Best Supporting Actor Academy Award win for The Cider House Rules, a return to his iconic spy character Harry Palmer for two TV movies, the villain role opposite Steven Seagal in Seagal’s directorial debut and the role he was born to play, yes, Joseph Stalin.
Join me as I delve into Caine’s 1990s to see what gems I can unearth and what’s perhaps best left hidden.
NB: Spoilers for Mr Destiny lay ahead.
Directed by: James Orr (Breaking All The Rules, They Still Call Me Bruce, Man Of The House, Christmas In Wonderland)
Tagline: Would you give up everything you have…for everything you ever wanted?
Other Featured Geezers: James Belushi as Lawrence Burrows, Linda Hamilton as Ellen Jane Burrows/Robertson/Ripley, Jon Lovitz as Clip Metzler, Hart Bochner as Niles Pender, Rene Russo as Cindy Jo Bumpers/Burrows, Courteney Cox as Jewel Jagger.
What’s it all about, Alfie?: Larry Burrows (James Belushi) is turning 35 and life isn’t quite as he’d hoped. He’s out of his favourite breakfast cereal (Wheaties, in case you were curious), his wife Ellen (Linda Hamilton) seems to have forgotten it’s his birthday. He’s getting into trouble at the office, the workman paving his driveway is fobbing him off, and to top it all, his car has just stalled outside a mysterious bar.
Perhaps everything would have turned out better if he had just won that pivotal high school baseball game?
Thankfully, a mystical bartender, Mike (Michael Caine), is there to whisk him away to this alternate universe where Larry is rich and powerful, with seemingly all he could ever wish for.
However, he’s now without Ellen, who is married to another man, and also without his best friend Clip (Jon Lovitz) who, no longer the fun-loving goofball, is now threatening to jump off tall buildings. Even Larry’s dog is AWOL.
Suggested product
Issue #60 Magazine Bundle (3x Covers: A Scanner Darkly Magazine + 1991 + Roger Deakins)
£14.99
Perhaps Larry already had everything he needed? But is it now too late to return to his former life?
Caine-ness: This is a small supporting role for Caine; he features for less than 15 minutes in a nearly two-hour movie.
Mr. Destiny is arguably Caine’s most trivial and inconsequential film role since the start of the 1960s, and it’s right near the bottom in terms of screentime.
Since his breakthrough in 1964’s Zulu, he’s consistently been a leading man, with the few exceptions being his parts in massive ensemble movies (Battle Of Britain, A Bridge Too Far), when he’s the antagonist (Harry And Walter Go To New York), or in a comedic anthology (Woman Times Seven).
In the 1980s he only had two small supporting roles: Sweet Liberty (in which he’s very funny) and Mona Lisa, in which he gives one of his best, most sinister, performances and one which is integral to the film.
Read more: The 1990s films of Michael Caine: Bullseye! (1990)
Although Mr Destiny’s Mike isn’t an important role, it was an important milestone for Caine’s career. This was apparently around the time that Caine realised he was no longer part of the Hollywood A list, and it convinced him to return to the UK where he was still getting interesting job offers (and better wages). Rather than continuing as a small fish in a big pond, it was time to return to the smaller pond of jolly old Blighty where he was the big fish.
In the following decades there would still be plenty of great leading roles for Caine, and many excellent supporting turns, too, but this was the first of what would slowly become more common for him: thankless extended cameos and being forced to play third, fourth, or even fifth fiddle to less charismatic leads.
We first see Caine 22 minutes in, tending an empty, neon-lit bar. There’s a slightly off-putting Lloyd the bartender from The Shining vibe about him, but once he starts chatting, he reveals himself as a kindly, non-threatening gent and definitely not a murderous ghost.
He instinctively, perhaps supernaturally, knows Larry’s drink order: “light beer, no glass”, something which impresses Larry, in spite of the fact that it’s not particularly remarkable to guess that a generic looking 35-year-old white American man may order a light beer in a bottle. If his tipple of choice was Um Bongo with Malibu and a twist of lime (on the rocks obviously) then it would have been a more noteworthy party trick.
Mike then kicks the plot into gear by offering Larry “a little something of my own design”, what he calls “a spilt milk” – the “one drink there’s no use crying over.” And it’s this concoction that transports Larry to his new life.
This role isn’t a stretch for Caine; his character is even named Mike, saving him the burden of having to remember what he’s meant to be called.
Mike is gentle and softly spoken throughout – there’s no shouty Caine to be heard here – and his signature accent has the rougher Cockney edges softened. Mike’s limited role is to calmly and confidently deliver exposition for Larry, and the slower members of the audience. Occasionally, his finger lights up, E.T style, to help him illustrate his points about destiny.
Then, he fades away accompanied by a tinkling sound effect, in a fairly naff lo-fi manner, before popping up now and again to do the same sort of routine in various low-effort guises such as cab driver, suited party attendee, or worker in a jumpsuit.
Twice, during the limited times that we see him, he’s munching on something; caviar at Larry’s fancy birthday party and meatloaf in the work cafeteria. “You really must do something about this meatloaf Larry,” he says with his mouth full. “It is absolutely inedible.” I’m assuming it was in Caine’s contract that they gave him dinner on the go so that he could get home in time.
It’s unclear exactly what manner of mystical being Mike is. When asked by Larry if he’s an angel, Mike responds, “Not exactly” followed by, “Have you ever been faced with a decision and you’re not sure what to do? And then something inside you made you choose one direction over another. So, that’s me. I make the suggestions and you make the choices, that’s how destiny works Larry. Very subtly.”
I assume him mentioning One Direction here is Mike admitting that he tried to use his powers to fix The X Factor. But even those godlike powers weren’t enough to stop the juggernaut of Matt Cardle.
Is Larry the titular Mr Destiny or is Mike? This is unclear. Wikipedia credits Caine as playing “Mike/Mr Destiny” but the film’s credits do not.
Regardless,, Mike could be excised from the film without it massively altering the plot. An unseen entity or magical inanimate object, like Big’s Zoltar machine, could have granted Larry’s wish. The audience, and Larry, doesn’t really need Mike’s exposition to explain what’s going on as it’s fairly obvious to anyone with even the mildest sense of media literacy.
It’s the kind of avuncular role that Caine could perform in his sleep. He’s not bad, it’s simply hard to write too much about his role. Caine showed up, did exactly what was needed of him, got to eat some caviar and meatloaf, and took a pay cheque home. He’s perfectly serviceable but doesn’t bring a whole lot to his performance.
The main thing that I took away from his appearance in this film, and his legacy from being in it, is that his hair looked particularly curly.
Caine-nections: Caine is seen making a strange concoction out of various colorful liquids, just like he did in Jekyll And Hyde (1990).
Best Non-Caine Actor: Unfortunately, James Belushi is the lead here rather than Caine. Belushi has never received much respect as an actor, often taking flak for perceivably riding on his late brother John’s success, but I’ve never had a problem with him.
I’m not going to argue that K-9 or Red Heat are underrated classics, but I enjoy them and Belushi works well in them, and he has given some genuinely great supporting performances in more recent years in projects as varied as Twin Peaks: The Return and Song Sung Blue.
In Mr Destiny, however, Belushi is a charisma vacuum. He neither goes broad enough, committing to a big comedic performance, or small enough, for a more nuanced turn that could sell the emotional edge, and so instead he’s acting in an uneven middle ground where he’s neither funny enough nor serious enough.
There are plenty of moments ripe with comedic potential, such as Larry in the alternate dimension turning up to his old house to find a burly cop living there, that fall flat.
I could picture Jim Carrey going to town in moments like this, and elevating otherwise undercooked scenarios to a greater comedic height, but Belushi plays them with such a laid-back energy that any comedic tension diffuses.
In an early scene where Larry finds that there is no hot water for coffee in the office and, decides to instead eat a spoonful of dried coffee powder, Belushi doesn’t sell it in a funny way, and so it just makes Larry look like he has something seriously wrong with him.
It also doesn’t help that many of the basic jokes that he’s given are so weak. Like when he’s given a big hunk of cheese for his birthday:
“It’s Stilton LJ!”, the gift giver says.
“Well thank you, Mr Stilton,” Larry replies.
Was stilton really such an obscure cheese in 1990 that Larry would think it was the man’s name? Again, it just makes Larry look like an idiot, but that’s not the joke of the film: he’s otherwise depicted as a fairly normal bloke.
There’s also the boring and cliched joke of “foreign food is so weird, isn’t it?”. When Larry and Ellen are at a fancy French restaurant, being served small, exotic looking portions, and after finding out they are eating “calf brains”, they go to Mr Pizza Restaurant instead.
(A side note: this was a disappointing missed opportunity for them to give Caine a double role as Mr Pizza.)
Then there are moments that, on paper, should be easy marks for sentimentality and audience sympathy, but again Belushi misses the mark.
Larry’s dog, who is a stray in the alternate universe, is run over during the climactic car chase. When Larry goes over to the dog’s lifeless body, saying, “I’m sorry, it’s all my fault” as he rubs the mutt’s fur, it’s nowhere near sincere or emotive enough, and neither is his subsequent joy at later finding himself back in his former life.
Caine himself would sell genuine heartbreaking emotion over the death of a little felt frog puppet in just two years’ time in The Muppet Christmas Carol, but Belushi can’t sell the feeling of a man being distraught after accidentally killing his beloved dog.
I will end my Belushi discussion here with these important nuggets of trivia that I believe help contextualise the man.
In 2011 Belushi, became a spokesman for the “Check Out Your Gout” campaign, having been a recent gout sufferer himself. He also once made the cover of Cigar Aficionado magazine and now runs a marijuana farm. A true modern-day Renaissance Man.
The female lead is Linda Hamilton as Larry’s wife Ellen Burrows, née Ellen Ripley. Yes, Ellen Ripley, like the famous character Sigourney Weaver plays in the Alien franchise. It’s distracting to name someone after such an iconic character and no one comments on it. It’s like if Belushi’s character just happened to be called Hannibal Lecter.
Potentially, it was an in-joke about her being in The Terminator, and James Cameron having also directed Aliens, but this seems tenuous given that this was one year before Hamilton returned to playing Sarah Connor in Terminator 2: Judgment Day and before she was in a relationship with Cameron, and so the link is less defined. But surely it couldn’t have just been an accident that they used that name? This mystery is arguably the most interesting thing about the film.
Anyway, Hamilton doesn’t get much to do, but she’s much more genuine and likeable than Belushi and does manage to create a believable chemistry between them.
Jon Lovitz, as Larry’s practical joke-loving best friend Clip Metzler, brought a weird energy that I appreciated (he walks in with a ream of toilet paper dangling out of one nostril at one point).
Bill McCutcheon as Leo Hansen, the elderly owner of the company where Larry works, similarly had an interesting presence. His gentle befuddlement seemed like he could have been an actual confused elderly person who happened to wander onto set and who they decided to film for the vibes.
Die Hard’s Hart Bochner is typecast again as a punch-able yuppie called Niles, a pre-Friends Courteney Cox is a gun toting femme fatale called Jewel Jagger (the most creativity in the film seems to have gone on naming her character), and Rene Russo is also here as Larry’s rich wife in the new reality.
Douglas Seale, who played Larry’s butler, had an interesting filmography as he was the voice of the Sultan in Disney’s Aladdin, played Santa in Ernest Saves Christmas and his final film role was, suitably, credited as Old Man in Palookaville.
My Bleedin’ Thoughts: I love a light 1990s comedy and so was looking forward to this one in spite of never having heard of it before (usually not a good sign) but found it a real slog to get through.
This is, on a technical level, a better constructed movie than Caine’s previous comedy disaster, Bullseye!, but whereas that was so odd and unpredictable that it kept my attention throughout, Mr Destiny is a real snooze.
Roger Ebert, in his contemporary review, noted the film’s “curious passivity” and its “slow march through foregone conclusions.” I agree with Ebert’s sentiments: there’s a sluggishness to what should be light and zippy fun and thus it more than overstays its nearly two-hour runtime. This type of light comedy shouldn’t be any longer than 90 minutes unless it can really earn it.
It’s obvious that Larry will pine for his old life and try to get it back. Larry’s life isn’t even that bad to begin with. He has a loving wife, a nice house and a nice dog, a best friend and a decent job. “It’s not that bad, it’s just ordinary,” he admits while still wishing for something better. It doesn’t exactly endear you to Larry, who comes across as simply ungrateful.
That wouldn’t have mattered if the film had at least been funny or romantic.. It’s certainly not helped that Belushi seems unable to elevate a lacking script and instead sinks beneath its flaws.
The film’s last third takes an unearned and unexpected dark turn when Niles, who is intending to kill Larry, accidentally murders the elderly Leo Hanson instead and frames Larry for it. This is followed up by the spurned Jewel Jagger shooting at Larry and the police in a car park, seemingly intending to commit suicide by cop, and this all ends with Larry hitting his dog with a car. Comparing again to Carrey, Bruce Almighty also takes a darker turn towards the end, but it’s actually funny and invests you in the characters beforehand.
The director, James Orr, never had any notable critical or commercial cinematic success outside of his writing work on Three Men And A Baby and Sister Act 2: Back In The Habit (a film that I have a soft spot for). The only one of his other directorial efforts that I’d heard of is Man Of The House (1995) and that’s simply because I like Chevy Chase comedies. But even as a Chevy fan, actually sitting down and watching Man Of The House seemed a step too far.
I’ll end on a positive. I always enjoy hearing the Spencer Davis Group song Gimme Some Lovin’ which plays at length during the montage where Larry and Ellen have a date at a culturally insensitive Mexican-themed crazy golf course called Golf of Mexico.
Trivia (Courtesy of IMDB): This is taken verbatim: “When Larry and Ellen are playing mini-golf you can almost make out the side of an old a-frame house in the background. The mini-golf terrain was constructed on an overgrown thatch of land at the end of Patterson Avenue in an old neighborhood which was notorious for alcoholics and other nefarious types. Police and security camped out over the course of the shoot to ensure none of the golf structures were carried off.” This curiously sounds like a local resident who has beef with Patterson Avenue has decided that the best place to air their grievances against those “alcoholics and other nefarious types” is the Mr Destiny IMDb trivia page.
Rating: 1/5 Spilt Milks
Overall Thoughts: A dull, laugh-free comedy with a perfunctory supporting role for Caine. Definitely one to skip.
Where You Can Watch This: This is currently available to rent or purchase digitally from the usual locations but seems to be out of print on physical media in the UK.
Up Next: It’s Peter Bogdanovich’s adaptation of the iconic British stage farce Noises Off, where Caine is joined by a great cast including Christopher Reeve and Denholm Elliott. But will this theatre classic translate to the cinema screen and, most importantly, how many trousers will fall down?
