There are murder‑for‑money black comedies, and then there’s Susan’s Plan, a film so aggressively dumb it feels like it was conceived during a poker game between people who thought “irony” was a fancy salad dressing. Directed and written by John Landis, this 1998 direct‑to‑video disaster (retitled Dying to Get Rich) promised cunning plotting and noir slyness—but delivers something closer to a slow Dutch oven of stupidity that never stops farting.
🪦 The Pitch‑Black Premise… Without the Black
Susan Holland (Nastassja Kinski) plots to off her wealthy ex‑husband Paul, so she and her insurance‑agent boyfriend Sam (Billy Zane) can live the high life on his life insurance cash. Sounds like a slick, Tarantino‑adjacent caper, right? Nope—it’s more like a toddler’s finger painting: messy, directionless, and vaguely upsetting.
Their plan is absurdly complicated and yet stupidly transparent. They hire two bumbling “crooks,” Bill (Michael Biehn) and Steve (Rob Schneider), who botch the hit so badly Paul ends up in the hospital. Susan doubles down and recruits a biker, Bob (Dan Aykroyd), who brings in a prostitute‑turned‑mole (Lara Flynn Boyle) to seduce the doctor—all of which unfolds in serialized incompetence until the police swoop in. It’s a murder plot that’s so dumb, it forgets it’s supposed to be simpatico with the audience.
🎭 Cast of Characters: Going Through the Motions
Nastassja Kinski plays Susan with clinical detachment—as if she knows the script is certifiably insane. She’s creepy, cold, and utterly lost, lacking even the faux‑gravitas that usually saves awful femme fatale roles. Billy Zane’s Sam is a slick talking point who’d make Reagan blush—but the script gives him zero interesting dialogue. He’s more like a malfunctioning GPS: always recalculating, never accurate.
Michael Biehn and Rob Schneider as the shooters seem embarrassed to be there. Schneider—yes, Rob Schneider—plays a character so forgettable he doubles as background noise. His lines walk into your brain and die of loneliness. Dan Aykroyd’s Bob? A washed‑up biker with a drag‑queen twist—equally inconsistent and bizarre. It’s like Landis raided his rolodex, picked names out of a hat, and mailed them scripts written in crayon.
Some peripheral cast members—Bill Duke as a detective, Thomas Haden Church as the helpful doctor, Lara Flynn Boyle as the hapless seductress—receive even less attention. They’d have better arcs if they appeared only in the credits.
🎬 Landis Seems… Bored
John Landis is a man who once curated chaos (Animal House, Blues Brothers, An American Werewolf). Here, his direction feels like he used to be obsessed with film—and now, he just wants a nap. The pacing is lethargic; none of the murders or mayhem bring tension, surprise, or even accidental hilarity. Instead, characters shuffle into frame, say bland things, then shuffle out.
Tone is non‑existent. There are crime thriller tropes—hit‑men, insurance scams, hospital seductions—but they’re so sterile and so lazily executed, you half‑expect tax accountants to burst in and demand receipts before someone can get interestingly killed.
💉 Comedy—or at Least a Few Snorts?
Apparently Landis wanted Susan’s Plan to tread that delicious line of dark comedy. Problem is—the jokes aren’t funny, and the “dark” part is just literal darkness in most hospital corridors. The film courts laughs by repeating failed attempts on Paul’s life—yet none of them land. Even the climax, where Susan and her cast are arrested on hospital cameras, isn’t tense enough to be exciting or ridiculous enough to be camp.
Only two patches of humor—Rob Schneider’s despairing admission that he wants paid even after failing, and a fantasy‑sequence breakdown of characters’ worst fears—provide mild intrigue . The rest of the film? Flat. Jokeless. Bleak—and not in a cinematic way.
🩻 Production Values: TV Drama by Way of Dying VHS
Shot on what feels like a shoestring TV budget, Susan’s Plan looks like a once‑prestigious soap opera left to rot in a paint locker. Dialogue is fluffed, lighting is grim, and even the “fancy” scenes—like hospital seductions and insurance agent offices—feel under‑lit and over‑priced.
No one looks polished. No scene feels carefully composed. It’s 89 minutes of uninspired frames wandering across generic sets. You might start to sympathize with the film’s characters just by wanting them to look less miserable.
🧟♂️ The Plot Collapse: When Murders Become Moodboards
Susan’s convoluted plan unspools in predictable beats:
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Susan hires crooks—they fail miserably.
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Susan hires Bob/biker—they botch things again.
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Susan’s ex‑wife and others creep into the money‑grab.
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Police arrive and arrest everyone (except one escapee) .
There’s no tension. No surprises. No emotional payoff. It’s a dark comedy where the light never comes on.
🎯 Verdict: A Plan That Kills All Interest
Susan’s Plan is a film that walks to the gallows with gusto—but forgets to check if it’s still funny or scary halfway there. Instead of sharp satire or thrilling crime noir, Landis gives us wooden people acting out an insurance fraud that’s more likely to get them a cameo on Judge Judy than a payday.
If you’ve got 90 minutes and a weak bladder, you might suffer through it just to see how badly it collapses. But better options exist for free—like watching paint dry, or chewing bacon fat and hoping for flavor.
Final Rating: ★☆☆☆☆ (1 out of 5 life insurance policies)
This plan isn’t murderous. It’s just murderous to the audience’s will to live.
