Luke Wilson in 'My Super Ex-Girlfriend'

Luke Wilson as Matt Saunders
Anna Faris as Hannah Lewis
Rainn Wilson as Vaughn Haige
Wanda Sykes as Carla Dunkirk





This is a horrible movie.

Drawings!

Architect Glasses!

Hard Hats!

Models!

"Our design integrates classic architectural ideas from the history of Chinese culture and transforms them into a contemporary 21st century aesthetic, but you can see clearly that funtionality has not been sacrificed, as you can see here by the the multiple entrances into the central courtyard area. And with the total capacity for...(stops talking as he sees his girlfriend fly by the window outside)"

Matt Dillon in 'You, Me and Dupree'

Matt Dillon as Carl Peterson
Michael Douglas as Mr. Thompson
Todd Stashwick as Tony






Matt Dillon, having already tried to a role where he is a character pretending to be an architect, now gets to try his chops pretending to be a character who is actually an architect. Here, he's married to his boss's daughter and has to deal with his best friend moving onto his couch.

Obligatory Drawing Shot

The first day back from his honeymoon, father in law Mr. Thompson takes Carl's proposal for a small 'eco-friendly' housing development and turns it into the largest, fast track development the firm has ever done. He also cuts out a few of the essentials...


Thompson: The Oaks at Mesa Vista, stunning, stunning...
Carl: You know sir, if we're not going to have any trees, maybe we should consider changing the name.
Thompson: No! no, no. I love the name. Names are important Carl.


When confronted with the model shown above, Carl doesn't like it.
Carl: What is this? Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? Is this some kind of a joke?
Tony: Carl, Thompson wanted more units. I thought it would work better as a wrap around.
Carl: Wrap around? Mesa Vista is not a wrap around.


Thompson: You see the preliminaries?
Carl: Yeah, I did. It is completely different from my original proposal.
Thompson: Goddammit Carl, would you stop fighting this? People buy homes, let the government pay for the parks, thats why we have taxes. The Oaks at Mesa Vista is a money train. You want to be on it?

Obligatory Standing in Front of Model Shot

Probably the best part of the whole movie is that Carl knows that the 'Bad Movie Design' is actually bad in real life. Although he states his opposition to the design, the movie never shows his original 'good design' thereby freeing our minds to believe that Carl might actually be good at what he does. Its a cheap trick, but it works...

Matthew Perry in Three to Tango

Matthew Perry as Oscar Novak
Oliver Platt as Peter Steinberg
John C. McGinley as Strauss
Bob Balaban as Decker





Matthew Perry as Oscar Novak is in Love with Neve Cambell, but everyone thinks hes gay! In fact out of the four architects in this flick, Novak is the only one who is straight. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Anyway, hilarity insues and they kiss in the end.

Not bad design, for a movie architect. Not that theres anything wrong with being that.

Novak and Steinberg make up the firm of Novak+Steinberg, a small firm that is vying for the 900 million dollar civic project that the firm of Strauss+Decker are also going for. The first scene in the movie is a set up of the bad blood that exists between the two groups.

Decker+Strauss Novak+Steinberg

Strauss: Oh look at this! Gilligan and the Skipper too.
Decker: What have you two studmuffins been up to lately? By the way, congratulations on the work you did on that men's room in the bus station.
Strauss: Yes, your use of mosaic in the urinal trough was vaguely reminiscent of the 90 foot mural we did in the lobby of the Hancock building.
Decker: Except people don't line up to piss on ours.
Steinberg: That is not true! We read the reviews.

D+S present the project to the developer by having him wear a virtual reality goggle set that was all the rage back in 1999.

The reviews were true

Struass: Sir, the Charles Newman Cultural center would redefine cultural life as we know it in this city. There would be a museum, an opera house, an international food court.
Decker: Picasso, Madame Butterfly, Burritos!

Well, the developer sets the two firms in a competition with each other for publicity. He tells them to build what seem to be quarter scale models for presentation to the public, where the winner will be decided and announced. So Steinberg and Novak set out to design and build their model, and they apparently set up a whole new office on the site of the design.

I really don't get why people think hes gay

At the office, a girls walks up to Steinberg, and after a brief condescending glance from the goatee'd architect, she runs away crying.
Novak:How much are we paying them?
Steinberg:They're interns. They're free.
Novak:Yeah, well, we're getting ripped off.
Steinberg: *nods yes

Modern Barbie Play House at Quarter Scale

Matthew Broderick in "The Cable Guy"

Matthew Broderick as Steven M. Kovacs








Steven M. Kovacs is an architect that does all the things we expect an architect to do when the job is just a means to show that a movie character is smart, hardworking and respectable. Once again, the job serves as the straight man to Jim Carrey's stooge (see post on Steve Martin in house sitter).

Steven Makes a Presentation that Everyone Loves!

Steven takes a Personal Call while at a Job Site!


Steven Takes his T-Square with him when he gets fired (see post on Jungle Fever)!

Steve Martin in "HouseSitter"

Steve Martin as Newton Davis
Roy Cooper as Winston Moseby
Peter MacNicol as Marty






The architect in a comedy is almost always the straight man. The definition of a straight man that comes from the wikipedia entry,

"A double act, also known as a comedy duo, is a comic device in which humor is derived from the uneven relationship between two partners, usually of the same gender, age, ethnic origin, and profession, but drastically different personalities. Often one of them, the straight man, feed or stooge is portrayed as reasonable and serious, and the other one, the funny man or comic is portrayed as funny, unintelligent or unorthodox."

Time in time again in funny movies, the architect takes this role. Matt Dillon was the straight man to Owen Wilson's funny man in You, Me & Dupree. Wilbur (an architect) was the straight man to Mr. Ed's funny horse. Although not usually the straight man (think Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Jerk, The Absent Minded Waiter) in HouseSitter, Steve Martin takes on Goldie Hawn, who as always is playing a free-spirited, fun loving, mischief making sexpot.

Inspired by Corbusier. Notice the piloti?
And Sears aluminum siding?

So, Newton builds the girl of his dreams, his high school sweetheart, a house and suprises her with it while proposing to her. She dumps him, he hops in bed with Goldie, has a one night stand, and then she finds a picture of the house on a napkin sketch that he did and moves in. Hilarity ensues.

Like Newton Davis, sketching on napkins is my preferred method of meeting strange women in bars.

When actors play against type, they usually include a scene where the actor will profess his believes, point of views or whatnot to show their character. Steve Martin does this early in the movie at the opening of a new skyscraper his firm designed. As Newton, he's chatting with his co-worker Marty (played by the guy who was the creepy art restorer from Ghostbusters II) and makes his views on the new building known.

Newton: "I still think its a boring building no matter how you look at it."
Marty: "The absolute best thing about this building in two words: billable hours."
Newton: "But did you have fun making it?"

The Jerk, AIA, is not a fan

Deep, Newton. Deep.
But it doesn't stop there. Soon they run into the head of the office, Winston Moseby. Marty is a seedy little guy who has no problem kissing ass. Newton on the other hand...

Marty: "Well, Mr. Moseby, congratulations on another beautiful job."
Winston: "Thank you Marty. I think everyone has a right to feel proud."
Marty: "Absolutely. You know, I don't know if its the champagne talking, but I want to say your leadership on this has been an inspiration to all of us on the project and... and I hope I haven't embarrasted you."
Winston: "Not at all"
Marty: "I dont know if you know Davis here from the firm..."
Newton and Winston Shake hands.
Newton: "The building...! Huh.... Wow! Its....(thinking)....there!"
Winston: "Yes?"
Newton: "You know that Boston Bank building you designed years ago? I have stood on the sidewalk for hours absorbing that structure. It still suprises me."
Winston: "Thank you Davis"
Newton: "Don't you think we should be going for that kind of originality? Instead of these same designs over and over... this... this cookie cutter architecture? Don't you feel sometimes like were just going through the motions?"
Winston: "We are the largest architecture firm in New England. Evidently some people like what we do (starts to walk away)."

Apparently for all his talk, Newton and Marty aren't that good of architects either. Perhaps its an early phase of design, but some of the one line zingers that are said between plot advancing conversations about women problems are just too good...

"The only entrance you have here is through the air conditioning duct."
&
"You have people exiting into a wall here."

Perhaps one of the lines that most stands out in the film isn't Newton proclaiming his thoughts and theories on the built environment, but on Goldie stating her thoughts on Newton. Perhaps its a fate Newton doesn't want to be condemned to, something that as a student he feared would happen to him. When they first get back to Goldie's apartment before said one night stand...

Goldie: "Well, this is my place."
Newton: "Cozy. I like what you did with the drape...thing."
Goldie: "Well, I'm no architect."
Newton: "Its nice. I like how you used...the negative...space."
Goldie: "I like you. You're just so.... average."