hey , i've got a great idea for a movie ! ok , here it is : we'll get tim allen to pull angry faces for about two hours or so ! what's that ? sounds too boring ? ok , how about this then : we still have tim allen pull faces for about two hours , but half of them are angry looks and half of them are " i'm in pain ! " looks ! what's that ? that still doesn't sound funny to you ? how about if we through in some " ewwwww ! " looks ? still not funny ? if you answered " no , that doesn't sound funny " , then ( ding ding ding ! ) you're absolutely correct ! for richer or poorer is a moronic farce about a rich married couple ( played by tim allen and kirstie alley ) who seek refuge in an amish community after their bumbling accountant ( wayne knight , best know as newman on tv's " seinfeld " ) gets them in trouble for tax evasion . what ensues is a badly scripted and horribly directed 114 minutes of cinema hell . what makes this all wrong is that nobody seems to have what the film needs . . . namely , talent ! backing up , the married couple is brad and caroline sexton ( allen and alley ) , a popular snobby duo who seem totally in love to everyone else , but in reality are on the brink of divorce . just as their marriage seems to be hanging from it's final thread , brad discovers that his accountant , bob lachman ( knight ) , has been engaging in illegitimate deals in the sexton's names . the irs catches on , but since everything points back to the sexton's and not lachman , there is nothing much to do . . . except run away and join an amish community . first time screenwriters jana howington and steve lukanic give us a couple of chuckle-out-loud moments , and even some decent laughs here and * way * over there , but there is so much to cringe at in this horribly made film that you'll likely miss the laughs while regurgitating popcorn . alley is absolutely unwatchable , and the chemistry between her and allen is about as believable as my chemistry homework from tenth grade ( which , i inform you , was total b . s . ) . allen and alley are in no way convincing as tycoons , nor are they very convincing as an amish couple ! this entire movie is one bad ill-conceived notion that should have been curtailed from the very beginning ! the amish in this movie are also flimsy and unconvincing . it's such a trite , stereotypical script that i imagine the actors that were cast ( noticing that they're all predominantly tv figures ) were probably the only ones they could get ! bryan spicer's directing doesn't help one bit , either . in fact , listing spicer's filmography ( which includes the first " power rangers " movie and the big screen adaption of mchale's navy ) is more of an insult than a r ? sum ? ! now that i've pretty much run for richer or poorer into the ground , i will let you in on the best thing about it . it bumped seven films up a notch on my " worst of " 1997 movie list . that's right , thanks to this film ranking at number 3 for the year's worst , six films are now not seemingly as bad , and a smile like yours , previously inhabiting the number ten spot , now doesn't have to suffer the ridicule of making my bottom ten list . if you look at it in that respect , for richer or poorer will end up making someone happy after all !
