fun with dick and jane

"Fun With Dick and Jane" is a remake of the 1977 comedy starring Jane Fonda and George Segal, true to its storyline. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to remake it. This proves true in this comedy starring Jim Carrey as Dick and Tea Leoni as Jane. Dick is an executive of a mega corporation (think Enron), who is promoted to vice president in charge of communications, just in time to be its spokesman on live cable news as the corporation's stocks melts down to pennies a share. Jane, on the morning of his promotion quit her job. After the embarrassing meltdown on national TV, Dick is left jobless, and so is his wife.

What turned out to be a glorious affluence turned sour. They have to sell their possessions to get by. After running out of possessions, they then turn to robbery - first convenience stores and head shops, later private homes and banks - and while that pays the bills and their kid's birthday party, Dick is brewing a brilliant scheme. Namely, revenge on his old boss Jack McAllister (Alec Baldwin), the corporate shark who tanked the company, Globodyne.

McAllister has already looted whatever assets ever existed in the company, leaving with hundreds of millions while his employees face a financial meltdown. This is a typical turnout of the corporation being a separate legal entity. The fact that the company is an entirely separate entity, the directors do not have legal obligations to bail out the company or reduce their pay to help the company survive. While the helpless ex-employees are out there slaving their way through daily survival, McAllister enjoys his looted luxuries with no remorse. Come to think of it, there's the Salomon principle to be blamed for the frauds and criminal activities. Without it, none of this fiasco would have ever happened. The fallouts of Enron and WorldCom would not have taken place. Perhaps this is a time to start re-evaluating the principle so that directors would not be exempted from the meltdown of their corporations.