Perry Makes ‘Nine Yards’ Enjoyable

Would you question me if I said Bruce Willis is an actor with range? No, he’s not the best actor in the world, not by far; and yes, he’s done more than his fair share of shootem-up action flicks, but take a look at his work over the past year: “The Sixth Sense,” “The Story of Us,” and now “The Whole Nine Yards.” He’s been tackling new types of characters in different genres. These movies probably aren’t helping his career as much as a “Die Hard 4” might, but it shows a degree of integrity.

And then there’s Matthew Perry who, despite his renowned success on “Friends,” has never made a big hit on the silver screen. In “The Whole Nine Yards,” he finally finds his niche and makes the whole film more enjoyable.

Perry plays Oz, a dentist living in debt and misery with his tyrannical French Canadian wife. Oz fears the worst when his new neighbor turns out to be a former hitman, Jimmy (Willis).

Things take a turn for the worse when Oz’s wife sends him to Chicago to collect a reward from a bounty placed on Jimmy’s head by a foreign crime boss (Kevin Pollak, who should never work with an accent again). Oz just can’t get a decent break in this movie, not even when he finds true love - with Jimmy’s wife.

The plot is so predictable. Willis is a standard killer with a heart of gold, and Perry’s sense of physical comedy is great, but not very original, either.

Grade: B