| Name | Cold Turkey |
|---|---|
| Caption | 1971 movie poster |
| Director | Norman Lear |
| Writer | Norman LearWilliam Price Fox Jr. |
| Producer | Norman Lear |
| Starring | Dick Van DykeBob NewhartPaul BenedictHelen Page CampBob ElliottRay GouldingVincent GardeniaEdward Everett HortonBarnard HughesGraham JarvisHarvey JasonJudith LowryTom PostonPippa ScottJean StapletonM. Emmet Walsh |
| Music | Randy Newman |
| Cinematography | Charles F. Wheeler |
| Editing | John C. Horger |
| Distributor | United Artists |
| Released | February 19, 1971 |
| Runtime | 99 min |
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
Cold Turkey features original music by Randy Newman including "He Gives Us All His Love", a ballad with a gospel influence that serves as the film's theme song. This was Newman's first film soundtrack.
The film was made in 1969, but was shelved for two years by the distributor due to concerns about its box-office potential.
It was only released on VHS and EP LaserDisc (1993) in the pan-and-scan format. On 3 May 2010 Cold Turkey was released on DVD through Amazon.com with manufacturing on demand and it is still occasionally shown on various cable and satellite channels.
A musical theatre version of Cold Turkey was workshopped at the Village Theatre in Issaquah, Washington in February, 2005.
According to Wren, the offer will generate Valiant worldwide free publicity and praise as a humanitarian gesture, but no town in America would ever be able to claim the prize, cigarette smoking being too addictive to stop.
The Reverend Clayton Brooks (Dick Van Dyke), a kindly but fearsome minister of the Eagle Rock Community Church, takes up the challenge as a spiritual call. He urges the economically depressed fictional community of Eagle Rock (population 4,006), Iowa, to go for the prize.
The town council has been trying to woo back the military ever since it closed a base a few years back, hoping its return would help the local cash flow. Families have been moving out almost on a monthly basis and the town center is almost deserted.
Reverend Brooks recruits every smoker in the town to sign up. Needled for not smoking himself (he used to but quit), he begins to find solidarity with his "flock."
At midnight, the challenge begins. For the next thirty days, no smoking is permitted, Eagle Rock being the only city in America that got all of its smokers to pledge.
The tobacco company sends Merwin to report the progress of the townspeople's commitment. The company needs just one person to fail. Among the weakest: alcoholic Edgar Stopworth (Tom Poston); the elderly Doctor Proctor (Barnard Hughes), who must always have a cigarette before surgery, and the anxiety-ridden wife of the mayor, Mrs. Wappler (Jean Stapleton), who counts the small gherkin pickles she eats as the hours pass.
Eventually, the attention of the nation's leading newscasters at the time (all played by the comedy duo Bob and Ray), turns the small community's efforts into a matter of highly-publicized failure or success. Soon the community is invaded by buxom "massage therapists," beer vendors, souvenir shops and more. Rev. Clayton appears on a Time magazine cover, which leads him to another epiphany: if he can save the town, he will be a hero.
Merwin is told by Valiant's board members to undermine the town's efforts at all costs, doing whatever he can to get someone to smoke before the thirty days are up, leading to hilarious results as the clock ticks down.
Crossing guard to little girl: Hey you! Where the devil do you think you're going? Did I give you the signal? Shut up, I don't give a damn what you've got to say - next time, you wait for my cigarette - uh, signal! Who the hell do you people think you are, anyway? Odie Turman: I'll tell that to a Communist when he H-bombs me! Before you H-bomb me, you go over to that man with a gun and get captured! (immediately followed in the uncensored version) You're a bullshit, Amos Bush! Odie Turman: He's a Communist - look at them cigarettes! Odie Turman: Sure, and I'm an unwed mother. Edgar Stopworth: The booze bone is connected to the smoke bone... Merwin Wren: Big clocks are never wrong! Merwin Wren: Repeat after me, gentlemen, in Wren we trust... TV director: I don't want his goddamn cuff links - get me a shot of the President! Natalie Brooks: We've become a pack of monsters! Do you know what that makes you? A monster-maker! Man on operating table: For God's sake, let him smoke! Mr. Candace (president of the United Tobacco Co. to David Chetley): Badly, very badly! Now you leave me the f(bleep)k alone! Mr. Candace, 11 days later (movie time) to Chetley: I told you to leave me the f(bleep)k alone!
Category:1971 films Category:American films Category:American screwball comedy films Category:Slapstick films Category:Satirical films Category:English-language films Category:Smoking cessation Category:Films set in Iowa Category:Films shot in Iowa
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