The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard (2009)

Used-car liquidator Don Ready is hired by a flailing auto dealership to turn their Fourth of July sale into a majorly profitable event.

Director:

Neal Brennan

Writers:

Andy Stock, Rick Stempson

Stars:

Jeremy Piven, Ving Rhames, David Koechner

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Jeremy Piven	...	Don Ready
Ving Rhames	...	Jibby Newsome
James Brolin	...	Ben Selleck
David Koechner	...	Brent Gage
Kathryn Hahn	...	Babs Merrick
Ed Helms	...	Paxton Harding
Jordana Spiro	...	Ivy Selleck
Tony Hale	...	Wade Zooha
Ken Jeong	...	Teddy Dang
Rob Riggle	...	Peter Selleck
Alan Thicke	...	Stu Harding
Charles Napier	...	Dick Lewiston
Jonathan Sadowski	...	Blake
Noureen DeWulf	...	Heather
Wendie Malick	...	Tammy Selleck

Storyline

In a desperate attempt to save his rapidly failing used car dealership, Ben Selleck hires a crack team of "car mercenaries" to ramp up sales during the Fourth of July weekend. Led by the fast-talking, foul-mouthed, self-assured Don "The Goods" Ready, the group has three days to sell over 200 cars. But as Don undertakes his newest mission, and quickly falls for the boss's daughter Ivy, he realizes he'll have to trust more than his cars and his crafty skills in deceit to make a success out of the daunting weekend.

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Plot Keywords:

younger version of character | vomiting | woman on top | sex scene | fourth of july | 

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Genres:

Comedy

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for sexual content, nudity, pervasive language and some drug material

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

14 August 2009 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Goods: The Don Ready Story

Filming Locations:

Alhambra, California, USA

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$5,642,137, 16 August 2009, Wide Release

Gross USA:

$15,102,127, 27 September 2009

Company Credits

Production Co:

Paramount Vantage, Gary Sanchez Productions, Kevin Messick Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

89 min

Sound Mix:

SDDS Dolby Digital DTS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Paxton (Ed Helms) shared the same name with Ed's real-life brother, Paxton Helms.

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Goofs

During the scene where Don is making a tandem skydive into the Selleck dealership, there are a number of obvious mistakes regarding the parachute gear: You can see there is no main parachute connected at the "three ring circus" connector point on the main harness as the two are in the aircraft doorway; There is no drogue parachute used during the freefall; Under canopy, there are only 5 or 6 straight cords connecting the parachute to the harness, instead of 10 to 12 split lines; The parachute the two land under is very small (less than 200 square feet), instead of the 400 - 500 square feet required for a tandem rig; and when Cessna Jim pulls his parachute up after landing, it is not connected anywhere to the harness.

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Quotes

Teddy Dang: Mr. Selleck, I think i made a sale.
Ben Selleck: Terrific, good job Teddy!
Teddy Dang: And he wants to pay in cash, non sequential unmarked bills, neatly packed in this canvas bag.
Ben Selleck: well thats a bank bag Teddy...
[bag full of blue dye packs explodes in Teddy's face, customer speeds away]
Teddy Dang: Ah! My eyes, My eyes! My Lasik!
Ben Selleck: Awe shit somebody call the cops.
Teddy Dang: It Burns!
Ben Selleck: Teddy go flush your eyes out.
Teddy Dang: I feel like a smurf just jizzed in my face!

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Crazy Credits

After the credits there is a scene with Don Ready and Ivy Selleck set to music.

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Connections

References Star Trek (1966)

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Soundtracks

Bald Medusa
Written by Jim Peterik & Michael Borch
Performed by The Ides of March
Courtesy of Ides Music

User Reviews

The Goods sells big laughs

It seems like every week i'm saying there is a new "funniest movie of the year." "Funny People" is my current favorite but "The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard" is it's non-dramatic equivalent.

First off this is a great role for Jeremy Piven, very much in Ari Gold-form as Don Ready, a car salesman-for-hire who travels around America with his crew helping out lackluster dealerships. Don is the type of character you immediately love, a born talker who not only manages to smoke on the plane ride over to Temecula, CA, he turns it into an all-out orgy complete with live mariachi band.

Why go to Temecula? The car dealership owned by Ben Selleck (James Brolin) is in trouble, struggling with rag-tag salesman, poor sales returns, and as Babs (Kathryn Hahn), one part of Don's crew points out, the place looks like a "refugee camp for dirty men." Along with his other two sidekicks, Brent (David Koechner) and Jibby (Ving Rhames), Don must sell all the cars off the lot or the dealership faces being sold to Stu Harding (Alan Thicke), another more successful dealer.

His son is Paxton Harding (Ed Helms), a late-30's man whose real dream is for his boy band to finally get off the ground. Paxton is engaged to Selleck's daughter Ivy (Jordana Spiro), who Don also finds attractive. Soon Ivy, plus a long-lost son Don fathered when he was 10-years old, encourages him to think about finally settling down. Wall to wall ridiculousness ensues.

Directed by Neal Brennan (a former writer on Chappelle Show) and written by Andy Stock and Rick Stempson, this is an offensively rude, crude, profane laugh machine from first scene to last. There are a few really good lines and the supporting cast gets some of the most hilarious material i've seen this year. The Daily Show's Rob Riggle as Selleck's son Peter, a 10 year old with a pituitary problem that makes him look 40. Kathryn Hahn as Don's sexually abrasive partner, using porno to sell cars and lusting after the innocent but very hunky Peter. Charles Napier as an older salesman who pines for the olden days and gets crazily angry and offensive to women, gays, Asians, and just about everybody really. Ving Rhames, playing a character who's had sex with thousands of women but has never "made love". Ed Helms, with his pot-belly and spiky hair-do, does nice work with the boy band stuff. James Brolin has a running gay gag with David Koechner that never gets old, and Brolin's car commercial, where he guilt-trips everyone to buy because he is dying of ball cancer, had me in tears. And like I said, I'm trying not to give too much away but Will Ferrell gets a cameo that single-handedly makes you forgive the atrocity that was "Land of the Lost."

This is all just the tip of the iceberg of this insanely hilarious movie. You just want to start listing funny thing after funny thing, its that good.