History Film / TradingPlaces

Louis Winthorpe III (Aykroyd), a [[UpperClassTwit privileged commodities broker]], has a nearly-perfect life: he owns a big house, has a beautiful rich fiancée, and exclusive country club memberships. During the opening minutes of the film, Winthorpe runs afoul of [[LazyBum supposedly homeless con man]] Billy Ray Valentine (Murphy), and an unfortunate mixup (helped in part by Winthorpe's prejudice against blacks and poor people) gets Valentine arrested for trying to steal Winthorpe's briefcase.

* AffablyEvil: The Dukes.

* ClusterFBomb

* DoubleAesop: A quadruple one...

** Randolph: [[spoiler: Learns that even though he was right about his "nurture" theory, it is wrong to bankrupt a man's life ForTheLulz.]]
*** [[spoiler: Quintuple, if you count that Winthorpe learns that financial success is much sweeter when you earned it all through your own hard work instead of just being born into it.]]

* EvilCounterpart: Beeks to both Billy Ray and Winthorpe. His greed and indifference to others mirrors Winthorpe's at the beginning of the film, and his skill at pickpocketing and bribery, and mismatched suit during the Heritage Club meeting, suggest that he has a poor and criminal background like Billy Ray.

* FromBadToWorse: Winthorpe's life has been ruined, his suicide attempt backfires and he finds out it's all been for a bet. THEN he finds out the bet was [[spoiler: only one dollar.]]

* LyricalDissonance: Listen to the lovely ''a capella'' song that the {{Upper Class Twit}}s perform for Penelope and the other girls in the scene where Louis tries to borrow money. The song's about how all the girls are complete sluts.

* MsFanservice: Come on, people, JamieLeeCurtis in lederhosen... and topless!
* MurderIsTheBestSolution: Or extreme violence, anyway; upon learning of the plan to ruin his life, Winthorpe initially decides that the most appropriate course of action is to kneecap both of the Duke brothers with a shotgun, before Valentine and the others suggest a more... creative way of getting back at them.

* ObfuscatingDisability: Billy Ray starts out as this, pretending to be a paraplegic Vietnam veteran to enhance his begging revenue. And occasionally, when he remembers, blind too.

-->'''Mortimer:''' Well, that's ridiculous! Unless that crop report...

** Subverted with the good guys in the train car with Beeks. Their disguises are so pitiful and Beeks already knows what they all look like (especially Winthorpe and Ophelia) from prior encounters, so he figures them out almost immediately.

* PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: The Duke brothers.

* PrecisionFStrike: Mortimer Duke. So precise that actor Don Ameche didn't even want to say it (he abhorred swearing) and did only one take of the shot.

** And then RagsToRiches: Billy Ray was hustling change on the streets and Ophelia was a hooker. Not by the film's end. To really bring the point home, it looks like Coleman is still the butler taking orders from Winthorpe; until he turns to ''his'' own butler and places the order.
* RippedFromTheHeadlines: The Dukes' attempt at cornering the frozen concentrated orange juice market was inspired by the "Silver Thursday" crash of March 27, 1980, when the Hunt brothers of Texas tried to corner the silver market and failed to meet a $100 million margin call.

* UpperClassTwit: Winthorpe fits this at the beginning of the story.

** Also Jamie Lee Curtis undressing in front of Winthorpe (twice!).

* BatmanGambit: The ending, big time. So complicated that people routinely have to do research away from the source material to understand it, but [[ItMakesSenseInContext it makes sense if you're familiar with Wall Street tactics]]. Also, the Dukes' various schemes could be seen as failed examples.
** Winthorpe & Valentine got the real crop report, which said that the orange harvest would be good (and therefore the price of FCOJ would go down). They waited for the Dukes to drive the price up (based on the false crop report), then "shorted" FCOJ by selling shares they didn't have (this is commodities, you can do that as long as you can supply the commodity in sufficient quanity when you need to). Winthorpe & Valentine racked up a huge profit, then bought back FCOJ at a bargain price.

** And then RagsToRiches: Billy Ray was hustling change on the streets and Ophelia was a hooker. Not by the film's end. To really bring the point home, it looks like Coleman is still the butler taking orders from Winthorpe; until her turns to ''his'' own butler and places the order.

* TimeMarchesOn: Modern commodities markets have "breakers" that prevent prices from changing as rapidly as depicted in the film, precisely to avoid the sort of mess the Dukes tried to cause and profit from, as well as the kind of mess they ended up getting themselves into. These limits were added a few years after the film was made. The law that changed this is even informally known as the "Eddie Murphy Rule", though it may have had more to do with the real-life events that inspired end of the film (see RippedFromTheHeadlines).

** AlFranken and Tom Davis of ''SaturdayNightLive'' fame play the Amtrak baggage handlers. Stephen Stucker, the goofy guy from ''{{Airplane}}'' ("Rapunzel, Rapunzel!") is their supervisor.

* ShotgunsAreBetter: Winthorpe believes this for his RoaringRampageOfRevenge. The clear-headed Valentine reminds him he'll go to jail for years for attempted murder alone.

** [[EveryoneRemembersTheStripper She's topless twice...]]

** Winthorpe & Valentine got the real crop report, which said that the orange harvest would be good (and therefore the price of FCOJ would go down). They waited for the Dukes to drive the price up (based on the false crop report), then "shorted" FCOJ by selling shares they didn't have (this is commodities, you can do that as long as you can supply commodity in sufficient quanity when you need to). Winthorpe & Valentine racked up a huge profit, then bought back FCOJ at a bargain price.

* ItGotWorse: Winthorpe's life has been ruined, his suicide attempt backfires and he finds out it's all been for a bet. THEN he finds out the bet was [[spoiler: only one dollar.]]

* HypoctiticalHumour: "The Heritage Club - With liberty and justice for all - Members only"

-->'''Even Bigger Black Guy:''' ''Where are your bitches, [[SarcasmMode ''Mr Big Time Pimp?]]''

* HistoryMarchesOn: Modern commodities markets have "breakers" that prevent prices from changing as rapidly as depicted in the film, precisely to avoid the sort of mess the Dukes tried to cause and profit from, as well as the kind of mess they ended up getting themselves into. These limits were added a few years after the film was made. The law that changed this is even informally known as the "Eddie Murphy Rule", though it may have had more to do with the real-life events that inspired end of the film (see RippedFromTheHeadlines below).

--> '''Even Bigger Black Guy:''' ''Where are your bitches, [[SarcasmMode ''Mr Big Time Pimp?]]''
--> '''Big Black Guy:''' ''[[BigYes YEAH!]]''

* ViewersAreGeniuses: The movie does not give a [[InfoDump long-winded explanation]] as to how the ending scheme at the Commodities Exchange works, trusting that the audience could either follow what happens or figure out that things are going well for the heroes. The scheme works like this:

* ObfuscatingDisability: Billy Ray starts out as this, pretending to be a paraplegic Vietnam veteran to enhance his begging revenue.

* MadMagazine: ''Trading Races''.