Other People's Money

1991 Drama/Romantic Comedy staring Danny DeVito and Penelope Ann Miller. Lawrence Garfield, a/k/a "Larry the Liqudator," (DeVito) is an apparently heartless, but secretly lonely, corporate raider launching a hostile takeover of a company that makes wire and cable. The founder of the company reaches out to Kate (Penelope Ann Miller), to stop him. Larry soon becomes enamoured of her (seeing as how she's, you know, Penelope Ann Miller--click the link under Male Gaze), leading him to try to beat her and woo her at the same time.

Tropes used in Other People's Money include:

• Ambiguously Jewish: In the original play, Larry's last name is the very Jewish-sounding Garfinkle. In the film, it's changed to Garfield, possibly to avoid Unfortunate Implications.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension
• Hello, Attorney!- Kate. See also Male Gaze
• Japan Takes Over the World - This is what Larry claimed to be worried about when he said he encouraged his employees to learn Japanese.
• Know When to Fold'Em - This is essentially Larry's argument to the stockholders in the climax; the company's dead, it's going to be dead with or without him, so they might as well get out with a bit of money by going with him rather than the nothing they'll get when it eventually does fold for good.
• Male Gaze- Their first meeting (literally, a Hello, Attorney!).
• Pet the Dog- Larry tells Kate over dinner how a cheerleader broke his heart in high school.
• Stalking Is Love
• Straw Man Has a Point: A rare in-universe example. Larry is seen as the villain by most of the characters in the film, because he's ruthless and rich and trying to make money by breaking up a small, old-fashioned business. But when we actually listen to him, he makes the very good point that the company, though well-intentioned, has been losing it's stockholder's money for years, it will eventually go bankrupt anyway, and this is the only way for the stockholders to get some of their money back.
• Title Drop- Larry uses a shell corporation in his takeover schemes called OPM. Which stands for...
• Ugly Guy, Hot Wife- Or at least hot love interest, as we're supposed to think that Penelope Ann Miller might fall for Danny DeVito.
  • In the original play, they do get married.