Murphy film great for holidays
‘Trading Places’
Starring: Denholm Elliott and Dan
Aykroyd
By Serena Markstrom
Oregon Daily Emerald
If you’re looking for a healthy
heap of holiday cliches, I recom
mend steering clear of 34th street
and kissing a wonderful life good
bye. For holiday cheer without the
“I’d like to puke all over this movie”
feeling, watch the 1980s classic
“Trading Places. ”
My first best friend, Megan, and I
used to watch it all the time. It was
one of the few movies we had on
tape, and we loved seeing how close
we could come to memorizing the
whole thing.
Our favorite line is still the one
when the large jail inmate walks to
ward Eddie Murphy, after he brags
about having a limousine. Thick
arms hanging over his love handles
and a tough “yes man” at his side,
he says, “It ain’t too cool being no
jive turkey so close to Thanksgiv
ing.”
That’s funny, you have to admit.
And as an added tickler, his yes man
always says “yeah” in a low Barry
White voice after everything the fat
one says.
The plot is simple. Murphy plays
a disadvantaged-but-bright street
person called Billy Ray Valentine.
Dan Akroyd plays a Harvard-bred
snob born with a silver spoon up
his, er, in his mouth. Winthorpe
Louis III is his snobby name.
Louis III leads a delightful life.
He’s successful in his job managing
a commodity brokerage firm, he has
a prissy fiance with shiny hair and
he is a member of the all-white “her
itage club.”
We don’t know if Murphy is home
less, but we first meet him rolling
around Philadelphia on a makeshift
wheelchair, pretending he was
wounded in Vietnam and asking for
donations or a slice of ham.
The two literally bump into each
other, and then the fun begins. Louis
III thinks Valentine is trying to rob
him, and when Valentine tries to
give his briefcase back, confusion is
in the air and cops are closing in on
him. So he escapes into the Duke
and Duke building.
The Dukes are rich white guys
who like to mess with people’s
lives. After the scene, Mortimirbets
Randolfe that the homeless Murphy
could run the company just as well
as the snob if given the right circum
stances, and that Louis III would re
sort to crime if all his cushy privi
leges were removed.
They trade places. It’s an experi
ment of heredity versus environ
ment. Randolfe wants to believe
that success is in the blood.
He says some classically racist
lines, such as: “He’s a Negro. He’s
probably been stealing since he
could crawl.”
Mortimir wins the bet when
Valentine loses his scheming ways
and Louis HI resorts to crime — but
he really is just trying to kill Valen
tine because in his mind the “terri
ble Negro” is responsible for all his
woes.
The Dukes’ experiment backfires
when Valentine (with a joint burn
ing the inside of his mouth) gets hip
to their bet.
He finds Louis IE, and they con
spire along with the butler and the
hooker who have been housing
Louis III until he can get back into
his wing-tips and his previous life
of luxury.
“It occurs to me that the best way to
hurt rich people is to turn them into
poor people,” Valentine astutely
points out before they hatch a plan.
The plan works, the Dukes lose
all their money, and the team of
“low-class” people takes a vacation
on a nice island and has that little
guy who used to say “da plane”
serve them lobster.
For Valentine it’s a rags-to-riches,
in a matter of weeks, tale.
The Dukes didn’t really prove any
thing because Valentine was never a
thief and the crime Louis in resorted
to was for revenge and not survival.
Obtusely, it’s a defense for affir
mative action. Valentine ended up
in a higher economic class and was
better able to capitalize on his natu
ral abilities because he wasn’t wast
ing his wiles trying to stay alive.
Louis III ends up in a romance
with a pre-Julia Roberts noble hook
er who doesn’t do drugs or see many
opportunities other than selling her
body. He’s still wealthy at the end of
the film, but he will most likely nev
er return to the preppie, soulless
fakes he previously hung around.
He gets to learn about loyalty when
“senorita shiny hair” dumps him at
the first sign of adversity.
The movie gives us wealth versus
poverty, good triumphing against
mischievousness, and it’s all in
front of a backdrop of a holiday sea
son in Philadelphia.
“Trading Places” is a photo-ma
nipulated snapshot of American so
ciety with classic Eddie Murphy
lines such as, “Jacuzzi? Man, when I
was a kid and we wanted Jacuzzi,
we had to fart in the tub. ”
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