Line #16 Film/Duplex


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8	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/img_0835.JPG]]
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10	''Duplex'' is a 2003 BlackComedy film directed by Creator/DannyDeVito, starring Creator/BenStiller and Creator/DrewBarrymore.
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12	It features a young couple, Alex (Stiller) and Nancy (Barrymore), who move into a brownstone duplex in Brooklyn, where an elderly tenant named Mrs. Connelly (Eileen Essell) starts giving them hell. She sends both of them on a myriad of errands, keeps them up all night (every night), gets them fired from their jobs, and lowers the value of the property with each passing day.
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14	Since they can't get rid of the sweet old lady because of rent control, Alex and Nancy try to coerce her out of the apartment, eventually turning to less friendly methods... and getting clumsier and clumsier the more they escalate.
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17	!!This film provides examples of:
18	* BadCopIncompetentCop: You start with Officer Dan who you think is just a [[PoliceBrutality unnecessarily violent]] JerkAss, but later you find it out it's [[spoiler:[[DirtyCop intentional]] to scare Alex and Nancy into leaving]].
19	* BitchInSheepsClothing: Mrs. Connely. Not only is she a high-class slave driver that constantly pesters for help, but [[spoiler:then it turns out that she is part of the scam... maybe even the leader.]]
20	* ButtMonkey: Alex gets the absolute worst of the physical punishment amongst the couple, up to and including getting nearly shot with the spear gun. Well, he IS played by Creator/BenStiller.
21	* TheCon: The endless misery Mrs. Connelly has driven the couple through is [[spoiler:a real estate scam, and her son Kenneth (the man who sold the titular duplex to the couple) and RabidCop Officer Dan (who turns out to be not only a DirtyCop, but ''Kenneth's gay lover'') are in on it.]]
22	* CoolOldLady: Mrs. Connelly is an Irish seaman's widow with a parrot and a spear gun.
23	* CringeComedy: From the moment they get into the house, it's [[KafkaKomedy a barrage of misery so unending]] that they quite willingly decide to hire a hit-man to kill Mrs. Connely, [[GodzillaThreshold because as long as she's alive and being a center point of said misery, it just doesn't looks like any options can really make it any worse.]]
24	* HarmlessElectrocution: Barrymore's character, Nancy, tries to fix a faulty power plug on Mrs. Connelly's flat and gets electrocuted for it with the typical funny fro and being tossed a few feet backward. In her defense, she ''did'' asked Mrs. Connelly to shut down the power while she worked on it... only for her to turn it back on without warning Nancy.
25	* IShouldWriteABookAboutThis: The main character is trying and failing to write a book throughout the movie, mostly due to his upstairs tenant. The end of the movie shows his published novel, also titled ''Duplex'', presumably about the events he experienced during the movie.
26	* MarketBasedTitle: The UK title is "Our House".
27	* MostWritersAreWriters: Alex is a writer. The horrors he suffers not only provide him a hefty amount of writer's block, but when he actually manages to power through Mrs. Connelly's constant pestering to finish his book, [[spoiler:Mrs. Connelly accidentally tosses his laptop to the street where it gets run over by a truck, and he is unable to even try to get it fixed before his deadline, which gets him fired by his publisher.]]
28	* {{Narrator}}: Creator/DannyDeVito, who also directed the movie, is narrating it.
29	* {{Oireland}}: Mrs. Connelly, complete with bad Irish accent and one scene where she annoys Alex and Nancy by performing river dance upstairs.
30	* OneWordTitle: In combination with ThePlace, one of its known titles is ''Duplex'', about the duplex the characters live in.
31	* ThePlace: In combination with OneWordTitle, one of its known titles is ''Duplex'', about the duplex the characters live in, and the UK title is ''Our House'', which is an example of this trope.
32	* PoliceAreUseless: Every time that Alex and Nancy call the police to file a complaint about Mrs. Connelly (noise, whatever), it's Officer Dan who arrives and [[SelectiveEnforcement gives them the third degree about supposedly harrassing a feeble old lady]]. [[spoiler:The eventual reveal is that all of the horrors the couple suffered were part of a con pulled by Mrs. Connelly and her son Kenneth, and Officer Dan [[DirtyCop is in on it]] because he's Kenneth's lover.]]
33	* ProfessionalKiller: Chick the hitman, who has a legitimate job as a pornographer. He becomes important to the plot at the end when Alex and Nancy, fed up with Mrs. Connelly and seriously thinking it can't get any worse, sell all of the stuff they have remaining and drain their (critically low, thanks to Mrs. Connelly) bank accounts to be able to afford his fee.
34	* TheReveal: [[spoiler:Mrs. Connelly is discovered to be both alive and in fact she is the mother of Kenneth, the Duplex real estate agent, and in fact it's a [[TheCon real estate scam]] to make them sell the house cheaper then they bought it]].
35	%% * SpiritualSuccessor: Often said to be so to Danny [=DeVito's=] own ''Film/ThrowMommaFromTheTrain''.

Context Film / Duplex