You got the director of Sorcerer, you got Chevy Chase, Sigourney Weaver, and Gregory Hines, and a contemporary Dr. Strangelove story, man, it's gonna be something great!Well, unfortunately it is something great. A great pile of crap. I don't know what happened, but the movie bombed because it was savaged by critics and ignored by audiences, and for good reason. The film fails to ignite the outrageous Dr. Strangelove storyline. I think Friedkin was out of his comfort zone and into unknown territory. Honestly, Friedkin is not the kind of director you call for comedies. It's not his forte. Although the film is total crap as a whole, I will say there are elements of genius in there, not much, but it's there. One interesting note is that Friedkin completely throws away his unique induced documentary style and goes classical and traditional for the second time in his career. The first time was on The Brink's Job in 1978. Some of the action sequences are pretty raw and realistic. The jokes are amateurish and sophomoric. Friedkin should have never made this film. If anyone is contemplating if they should view this film, well my answer to you is absolutely no. I really mean it. Not even Friedkin would watch it. I think he would burn this film if he owned the negative. Watch Lord of War (2005), it has a similar story and concept, but only slightly better or just watch great films about this same concept like Wag the Dog (1997) or Dr. Strangelove (1964) and Charlie Wilson's War (2007).

Eddie Muntz is a pervasive black market arms dealer who after a missed sale, meets a fellow salesman Harold in the same field for the US Luckup Corporation while in South America. After he commits suicide with the stress of waiting by the phone for the government dictator to ring him back to complete the deal. Eddie answers and takes over the deal which involves a new high-tech, non-pilot plane known as the Peacemaker. Soon enough everybody wants to get on this multi-million dollar deal. Eddie's work pal Ray has found god, and he's doing his best trying to keep him on the job and Harold's icy widow Catherine wants her share of the prize.William Friedkin's "Deal Of the Century" is somewhere in between a black comedy and frank pot-shot on the international arms trade. It never distinguishes itself either way, but I think that's the point. Especially how nervously bizarre this turns out to be. I certainly enjoyed this misunderstood satirical item on an interestingly flavorers topic and the sardonically dark humour was neat treat to the senses. Those looking for a laugh-out-loud affair will only get humour that's rather broadly downbeat in tone, despite how over-blown they turn out to be. While, it didn't constantly make me laugh, it got some grimaces out of me. It can feel like a Chevy Chase vehicle most of the time, as the rest of the cast do pale in comparison. That's not their fault, because their characters don't have the material to lift them out of Chase's shadow. Chase is one of my favourite iconic 80's comedians and he immediately fits the role with his causally dry and quick-witted personality. Sigourney Weaver is there to look good in her steely firebrand performance and Gregory Hines doesn't look too interested throughout. There's a short comic performance by Wallace Shawn too.The freshly ammo-packed story by Paul Bickerman is complicatedly knotty and obvious with its attacks. Creeping in were oddball situations and a surrealistic air on the worrying subject at hand. The snappy script works up a creative novelty, smearing it with sneering gags, spicy irony and that of Chase's slyly gruff voice-over narration to string scenes together. Super weapons to ensure peace, nicely put. As for William Friedkin's direction, well at first I didn't even know that this was on his resume. His style is extremely random and kinetic in just what's going to happen, but this unfocused mark goes on to morph its way into the premise. The interestingly high octane climax springs to mind. The production does look cheap, but the sweeping musical score creates the right vibe and there's strikingly framed camera-work. Explosions make there way in and the effects for the plane look rather hokey when its up in the air, but decent enough when on the ground.While, I don't see too much love for this offering. It isn't significantly great and it can be clumsy, but I don't see it as a piece of absurd garbage that it's made out to be. Simply a delightful, if farcical romp that kept me highly entertained.

"Deal Of The Century" was director William Friedkin's attempt to create a "black comedy" satirizing the armaments industry, in much the same way as Stanley Kubrick satirized the nuclear balance of power in "Dr. Strangelove." Unfortunately, it falls short of that ambitious goal.The movie concerns an arms dealer, Eddie Muntz (Chevy Chase), who gets an opportunity to take over the sale of an ultra-advanced pilotless combat aircraft to a dumb South American dictator when the original salesperson dies unexpectedly. Friedkin clearly thought he was making a great movie here, in the way he diligently employed many of the same elements as "Strangelove": verisimilitude in the names of arms companies and weapon systems, blatant phallic symbolism, sex-obsessed characters, sight gags, and a basically bizarre, unreal plot. Unfortunately, all Friedkin ends up doing is showing that he is no Kubrick (at least not after "The French Connection" anyway), Chevy Chase is no Peter Sellers, and in general those associated with this movie just aren't in the same league as those who made "Strangelove." Many of the lines and sight gags just aren't that funny, and the satirical point about the armaments industry gets lost in a meandering plot with an irrelevant subplot about Muntz' romance with the dead salesman's widow (Sigourney Weaver). An actual romance tended to dilute the satirical effectiveness of the sexual obsessions of the major characters.

Sit in a hard chair if you intend on staying awake through all of Deal of the Century. This movie is just plain boring. It deals with Chase, Weaver, and Hines trying to sell a bunch of pilotless planes to a dictator who looks like Saddam Hussein's chipper twin. There are a few funny lines. Overall you'll just wonder what on earth is going on but won't care enough to rewind and try to find out. Wallace Shawn is the only bright spot in this mess, but he's eliminated quickly.