Now Available - The Retrievers

[Pak-Man]

The Retrievers

Feature film · 2022

Tom Cathral is trying to publish a book, but standing in his way is a secret paramilitary group that will stop at nothing until Tom is dead and every copy of the book is destroyed.

With Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

See it on RiffTrax

Tom Cathral is trying to publish a book. There's just one thing standing in his way. No, not reduced adult attention spans contributing to the overall decline of print media — we're talking a secret paramilitary group that will stop at nothing until Tom is dead and every copy of the book is destroyed. Audiences have one question: Why couldn't this have happened to Dan Brown?

Tom joins a covert organization known as The Retrievers. When it turns out The Retrievers are more about "killing people" than "fetching tennis balls in the park and being told they're a good boy," Tom quits. But not before obtaining a shocking manuscript written by a former Retriever that  will bring down the entire gang. That manuscript? Diary of a Wimpy Kid #7: The Third Wheel.

Many more people will die as Tom searches for a publisher. It's like The Expendables meets A Thousand Words (an Eddie Murphy movie that is one of the top results when you google "movies about book publishing.") Join Mike, Kevin, and Bill for The Retrievers. You'll never look at a paper bag full of apples the same way again.

Written by: Mike Nelson, Conor Lastowka, and Sean Thomason

Contributing Writers: Jason Miller and Zach Shatzer

[eegah]

I'm pretty sure that's Katey Sagal, aka Peggy Bundy from Married With Children and Leela from Futurama, singing the theme song at the end. Her name is in the the credits and it sure sounds like her. Plus, she had a musical career and sang on other movies during that time. She doesn't get credit on IMDB, but her misspelled name is in this trivia and soundtrack for this movie. I submitted a fix.

[Pak-Man]

Be sure to keep an eye on those end credits for some character names that would not fly today. (And really shouldn't have flown in '81.)

[Pastor of Muppets]

Be sure to keep an eye on those end credits for some character names that would not fly today. (And really shouldn't have flown in '81.)

Wow.  They used an honest to goodness ethnic slur to describe those Latino day laborers they picked up to run the publishing equipment.

Speaking of the publishing, that first insert shot of the manuscript showed it was riddled with spelling and punctuation errors, and tons of proofreading marks.  When did they get time to edit all those before printing off a couple hundred copies of a fresh hardcover?

[dbsommer]

I can't figure out exactly what it was about this movie that made me watch it, yet not really remember it. It's stupid, but kind of meandering stupid. I think both the hero and villains were too generic. Everything happened, but not in a memorably stupid way.

Contrast this with 'Pressure Point', where everyone was sillier, yet more memorable. I would contend Edgewood did the same kind of movie with more heart. Weird, I know, but I stand by it. The guys did their best, but it was still so-so.