Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005 film)

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Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Film puster
Directed by	Doug Liman
Produced by	Lucas Foster Akiva Goldsman Eric McLeod Arnon Milchan Patrick Wachsberger
Written by	Simon Kinberg
Starring	Brad Pitt Angelina Jolie Vince Vaughn Kerry Washington Adam Brody
Music by	John Powell
Cinematography	Bojan Bazelli
Editing by	Michael Tronick
Distributed by	Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation
Release date(s)	10 June 2005
Running time	120 minutes
Country	US
Language	English
Budget	$110 million (estimated)
Official website
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Mr. & Mrs. Smith is a 2005 American black comedy film, directed by Doug Liman and written by Simon Kinberg.

1 Cast
2 Plot
- 2.1 Missed clues
3 Unrated version
- 3.1 Differences between rated and unrated versions
4 Reception
5 Trivia
6 Television series
7 Rootkit warning
8 References
9 External links

[edit] Cast

Brad Pitt as John Smith
Angelina Jolie as Jane Smith
Adam Brody as Benjamin Danz
Vince Vaughn as Eddie
Kerry Washington as Jasmine
Keith David as Father
Chris Weitz as Martin Coleman
Rachael Huntley as Suzy Coleman
Michelle Monaghan as Gwen
William Fichtner as Dr. Wexler

[edit] Plot

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The action opens with John and Jane Smith, a couple who have been married for five or six years, attending marriage counseling. There, they tell the story of their first meeting in Bogotá, Colombia, where they met while both were secretly on the run from Colombian authorities. They quickly fell in love and were married.

Back in the present day, both John and Jane are revealed to be skilled assassins and both are assigned to kill a man named Benjamin Danz (AKA "The Tank"). Both are waiting for him in the same desert locale when they discover one another's presence. They both stopped each other from killing their target. The ultimatum: it's John vs. Jane, hired to assassinate each other.

[edit] Missed clues

Throughout the first half of the movie, John and Jane hide their true identities, though their behaviors are revealing to the audience and sometimes to each other. Here are some examples:

At a carnival, both of them engage in a sharp shooting game. Jane pretends to miss many shots to hide her identity/skills. John shoots very well causing Jane to want to try again. She hits the most difficult targets. They both call it beginner's luck while Jane is holding a big stuffed animal.
John throws a basketball into the air without looking. The ball goes into the basket across the street from him.
Jane is seen balancing herself on one leg of a chair.
John keeps all his equipment under his tool shed.
Jane keeps all her equipment in the kitchen.

[edit] Unrated version

A two-disc, unrated version of the film was released on DVD on June 6, 2006. On the original DVD version during a commentary with the director, he mentions that he was not able to use as much sex and violence as they had originally filmed to meet the PG-13 rating. The unrated version shows more sex and violence.

[edit] Differences between rated and unrated versions

In the rated version, Benjamin Danz receives his next assignment from Father. This scene is not in the unrated version.
In the rated version, Eddie wakes up to see that there's a bulletin for a $400,000 hit on John Smith and another $400,000 hit on Jane Smith. This scene is not in the unrated version.
In the rated version, after the first missions the viewer sees each Smith accomplish, there is an extended scene at the Smiths where they each get ready for their neighbor's party. In the Unrated version, this scene is replaced with a short one where both are walking up to their neighbor's house, and Jane is accusing John of going drinking while she was on business.
In the unrated version, John is seen breaking a plate intentionally.
In the unrated version, the dance scene is extended with sexual movements.
In the unrated version, after the fight scene, there is implied sexual penetration and cunnilingus.
In the unrated version, in the van before the Smiths want to capture Danz and are comparing records, John adds the comment "are you counting innocent bystanders?" removing some of the double-entendre from the previous conversation.
In both the unrated and regular DVD versions, when the Smiths almost crash head on with a Bud Light truck while in the van, the scene where it cuts to a slow-motion version of the van just narrowly missing the truck is gone.

[edit] Reception

The film was received amicably, scoring a decent 60% on rottentomatoes.com [1], an average 55 on Metacritic, and 6.5 out of 10 on IMDB (both as of February 13, 2006) The budget of the film had been 110 million dollars, and as of December 6, in the U.S. alone it had raked in 186 million dollars ($478 millions worldwide[2] ) making it a huge success at the box office.

On the other hand, the film was heavily criticized in Colombia due to the depiction it makes of its capital Bogotá. Less than four weeks after its release in Colombia, the General Secretary of the City Hall, Enrique Borda, sent a letter of protest to the director Doug Liman. In the letter he states that "It is evidenced, beyond any doubt, that the director and his production crew show a total level of ignorance by portraying (the city) as incipient (...), primitive, with scarce hotel infrastructure, dominated by poverty, depressed, disorganized, with high levels of violence; in conclusion, totally chaotic and not attractive at all". Borda also points out in his text that Bogotá was awarded with the title of "City of Peace" by the Unión de Ciudades Capitales Iberoamericanas (UCCI) and was declared "World Book Capital 2007" by UNESCO. Also, Bogotá is actually cold, not as portrayed in the film, were it is showed as a tropical city when Bogotá actually rarely passes the 18 grads (celsius)[3]

[edit] Trivia

Many of the scenes from the trailer were not in the movie, including Brad Pitt riding a bike while shooting, a bunch of gunned men jumping out of the back of an Ashley Furniture truck, and Keith David ordering someone to "bring in everyone," after finding out "it's the Smiths".
While Benjamin is being held captive, he is wearing a Fight Club t-shirt, a reference to a previous film starring Brad Pitt.
When John and Jane are revealing their true identities, John mentions he was the one to assassinate Jean Luc Gaspard. This character is taken from the film Ocean's Twelve.
The novelization of this film includes joking references to Mrs. Smith looking like some glamorous movie star (an allusion to Angelina Jolie), while Mr. Smith is said to resemble Brad Pitt.
Their house address number is 637, which is usually translated to "Always and Forever". 6 Letters in the word "always", 3 in "and", and 7 in "forever".
In the scene where Eddie receives two $400,000 bulletins for John and Jane Smith, it shows Brad and Angelina's real birthdays, height, weight, hair color, etc.^{[citation needed]}
During the aerial shot of the "HomeMade" store where the Smiths had the shootout, a "Kost Mart" can be seen next to it. "Kost Mart" was the name of one of the parody Costco and Wal-Mart that Dick applies for a job for in Fun with Dick and Jane.
Vince Vaughn and director Doug Liman worked together previouly on their mutual breakout film Swingers.
Vince Vaughn later started going out with Jennifer Aniston, who Brad Pitt was previously married to.

[edit] Television series

In January 2006, ABC announced that a television series was being produced based upon the movie. Writer Simon Kinberg and director Doug Liman were reunited to bring the hit to the small screen. Though Jolie and Pitt won't return for this version it was said that a "nation wide talent search" would be taking place to find the next duo. The show was officially ordered to pilot. Actress Jordana Brewster has signed on to play Mrs. Smith.^[1]

[edit] Rootkit warning

The German DVD release of Mr. & Mrs. Smith has been reported to contain a rootkit named Alpha-DVD by the company Settec. There have been no reports of this rootkit being a part of the American release of this DVD.

This rootkit news was reported at: