SummaryJoe's a car salesman with a problem. He has two days to sell 12 cars or he loses his job. This would be a difficult task at the best of times but Joe has to contend with his girlfriends (he's two timing), a missing teenage daughter and an ex-wife. What more could go wrong ?.. a lot, enter a crazy jealous husband with a machine gun..
Directed By:Roger Donaldson
Written By:Ken Friedman
Cadillac Man
Metascore
Mixed or Average
50
User score
Generally Favorable
6.2
My Score
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Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or Average
50
33% Positive
7 Reviews
7 Reviews
57% Mixed
12 Reviews
12 Reviews
10% Negative
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
100
As good as the supporting players are, Cadillac Man is Robin Williams' show. He gives the production its pace, its zest and its heart. Without him, this movie is unimaginable. With him, it's consistently entertaining. Williams knows what every successful salesman knows: Sell yourself, and you'll sell the product. [18 May 1990, p.20]
67
Cadillac Man, like the recent I Love You to Death, starts out as comedy on a human scale and turns into canned farce. For an actor like Robin Williams, that’s the movie equivalent of being muzzled.
User score
Generally Favorable
6.2
45% Positive
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
45% Mixed
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
9% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
Dec 1, 2021
8
Cadillac Man is an obvious choice to review because Robin Williams is dead, the film is not a box office success and it's a rip-off of Dog Day Afternoon which is unexpected. Robin Williams is Joey O'Brian the car salesman who loves women and loves his job. Tim Robbins is Larry has taken people hostage to find out that his wife Donna is having an affair with someone. So the police surrounds the car dealership. To be honest I don't get the hate but I do get why people hate it cause it's a comedic version of Dog Day Afternoon starring Al Pacino. Robin Williams is funny as always and too bad that he's dead. For all I know, Cadillac Man is good movie to check out if you are a huge fan Robin Williams and don't mind that's it's a comedic version of Dog Day Afternoon. Good film but it was a box office failure.
Oct 11, 2025
4
C’est l’homme à la Cadillac (une désormais bien rare, élégante Allante, dessinée par Pininfarina, excusez du peu…) et ce dernier est surtout un vendeur de bagnoles… et il a fort à faire et à fourguer, vu qu’il doit entretenir son ex-femme et ses deux maîtresses… sans compter le prêt consenti par un mafieu… Et tout-à-coup, paf ! et re-paf !… ah non, je confonds avec Louis de Funès, quoique Robin Williams volontiers grimaçant et agité n’en est pas loin… et donc, prise d’otages du garage par un demeuré en la personne de Tim Robbins, ce dernier s’avérant peu convaincant (ou alors, il fait trop bien le débile hystéro-bouffon ?). En tout cas, cette prise d’otages au bout de 40 mn coule à peu près le restant du film jusqu’au fond de la médiocrité, pour ne pas dire de la simple nullité. Le film devient en effet d’une hystérie bouffonne incontrôlée particulièrement stupide et affligeante, presque tout du long, jusqu’à la fin qui se récupère à peine. Néanmoins, ces premières 40 mn se révèlent étonnantes et… oui, étonnamment plaisantes en vérité (on ne s’y attendait pas) : le rythme reste élevé et les situations surfent sur le fil d’une gentille mais agréable caricature… puis, au delà, c’est le drame : patatrac, tout se casse la gueule ! (je viens de jeter un coup d’oeil : l’Allante se touche à bien moins de 20 000 euros de nos jours, c’est étonnant !).
50
A canny buyer will beware the blandishments of car salesmen, but it's a mystery why Robin Williams bought the inane script for Cadillac Man. [18 May 1990, p.E3]
50
Like Larry, Cadillac Man doesn't know quite what it wants to do. At first the film seems to be a low-key comedy about a small-time hustler, then it becomes a kind of Dog Day Afternoon-style melodrama. Ultimately it is an uneasy mix of the two.
50
Somehow I kept waiting for the movie to get back on track - to get back to the zany comedy I thought I'd been promised. My problems with Cadillac Man were probably inspired more by false expectations than by anything on the screen.
40
Even worse than it sounds.
38
Williams is an actor of protean gifts, a super pitchman when it comes to putting across flimsy material (Dead Poets Society). But even he can't palm off this lemon as a peach. When it's not being offensive, Ken Friedman's screenplay is merely oafish.
Jul 8, 2018
4
This comedy focuses on Joey O'Brien, a proud car salesman who, however, needs to sell twelve cars in twenty-four hours to keep his job. To make matters worse, her love life is in chaos, with several lovers and girlfriends, plus an ex-wife with a missing teenage daughter, probably running away with a boyfriend. Can things get worse? They can... on the day he had to sell like he never sold, the jealous and stupid husband of one of the store clerks decides to kidnap everyone until he discovers the identity of his wife's alleged lover. This is the typical non-sense comedy, where everything is crazy and all the characters are histrionic and stereotyped. Everyone shouts, everyone behaves in a half-insane way and there's really no character in this movie that really pays off or befriends us. This includes the main character, who is the typical smart guy, a trickster who thinks he gets away easily from all the problems he gets into. This will cause serious problems to us to like this movie. Another problem here is the lack of humor. With the exception of a few good jokes from Robin Williams and some situational humor, this is not the kind of movie that makes us cry with laughter. The remaining cast doesn't stand out nor deserve positive mention, with the exception of Tim Robbins, who seemed to do an interesting job in the role of the jealous idiot husband. In short, this film is highly histrionic, absolutely insane, full of screaming people and a weak and misdirected cast. It's a long way from being a good movie.
