Modern Problems

Max Fiedler (Chevy Chase) is an air traffic controller at New York's Kennedy International. Airport whose life is slowly going down the drain. His girlfriend, Darcy, has just left him because of his jealousy and negativity. Now, everywhere he goes he seems to run into her with Barry, her narcissistic old friend, which drives Max crazy. One night while he's driving home from a party that turned out being at a gay nightclub in Lower Manhattan, a tanker truck spills nuclear waste onto his car and through his open sunroof, covering him with glowing green goo. The next day, he notices that he has developed telekinetic powers. With this newfound discovery, Max decides to put his powers to use by striking back at his tormentors - primarily by ruining Barry's attempts to woo Darcy. With newfound optimism & confidence, he slowly begins to win back the love of Darcy.

Things come to a head, however, when Max is asked to spend the weekend at the summer beach house of Brian (Brian Doyle-Murray), a paraplegic friend, who is now living with Max's ex-wife Lorraine. Brian invited others as well, including self-confidence author and womanizer Mark Winslow (Dabney Coleman), who immediately has designs on Darcy. Winslow constantly demeans and derides Max, while trying to seduce Darcy (although his egomanical bragging and unabashed nudity just seem to alienate her). With his new confidence waning, Max finally cracks, using his powers to humiliate Winslow while also freaking out the other guests. Finally, he sees himself becoming a monster, and by a fortuitous stroke of lightning his powers are transferred to Dorita (Nell Carter), the voodoo-practicing maid. Now understanding his odd behavior, Darcy forgives him and Max finally realizes that she truly does love him.

• Chevy Chase as Max Fiedler
• Patti D'Arbanville as Darcy Carson
• Mary Kay Place as Lorraine
• Nell Carter as Dorita
• Brian Doyle-Murray as Brian Stills
• Mitch Kreindel as Barry
• Dabney Coleman as Mark Winslow

Michael Shamberg and Doug Kenney had a deal with Ken Shapiro to make a film—Kenney had a title, Teenage Communists from Outerspace and Shapiro wanted to make a film about telekinesis. This led to Modern Problems.[2]

Filming started in July 1980.[3] It was Chase's fifth movie in two years following Caddyshack, Seems Like Old Times, Oh Heavenly Dog and Under the Rainbow.[4] "There were problems doing the film," said Chase later. "There were times when I wasn't happy at all with the way things were going. Though I'm bound to say considering it was Ken Shapiro's first film as director he's come up with a very funny film."[5]

Chase was nearly electrocuted while filming a flying scene involving wires and had to spend several weeks in hospital.[5]

The film's release was complicated by the 1981 air traffic controller's strike.[6]

The film was recut prior to release to get an R rating which upset the writers who felt the film's best laughs were lost.[7]

The film was released on Christmas Day without advance screenings to the press. "I'm really happy with Modern Problems," said Chase prior to release. "I don't pretend to know why Fox isn't showing it to the press. I can only suppose it's because they don't want to take the chance of getting bad reviews."[5]

The New York Times said "it's not that Modern Problems is so bad, though it is incredibly sloppy, but that it's the kind of movie that doesn't need reviews to find its audience. The members of that audience, whose inner clocks are set by their television habits, don't worry much about consistency or point of view. And, having short attention spans, they immediately forget the long dull patches that separate the truly funny sequences."[8]

• List of American films of 1981

• Modern Problems at IMDb
• Modern Problems at AllMovie
• Modern Problems at the TCM Movie Database
• 56657 at the American Film Institute Catalog
• Modern Problems at Rotten Tomatoes
• Modern Problems at Box Office Mojo