As Hollywood gathers Sunday for the 87
th annual Academy Awards, we’re asking brokers: what movie best describes the insurance industry?
Here is a list of 10 classic movies that feature insurance – go to our
Poll Question on the home page and tell us which one you feel best describes you, or the industry itself.
The Apartment (1960)
Lonely bachelor C.C. "Bud" Baxter (Jack Lemmon) works long days at a New York insurance company but spends longer nights pacing the streets of Manhattan while his superiors use his apartment for trysts. Baxter quickly rises up the corporate ladder to become the assistant to head honcho Jeff Sheldrake (Fred MacMurray). But when Baxter learns Sheldrake has been using his digs to entertain Fran (Shirley MacLaine), the elevator operator with whom Bud is smitten, things get complicated.
Cedar Rapids (2011)
Small-town Iowa insurance agent Tim Lippe (Ed Helms) winds up in "Hangover" territory when he's dispatched to a regional insurance conference in the "metropolis" of Cedar Rapids. Lippe's assignment: Bring home the coveted Two Diamond award previously won by a senior partner who recently hanged himself. Insurance veterans Dean Ziegler (John C. Reilly) and Joan Ostrowski-Fox (Anne Heche) do the corrupting, but it's Lippe who clings to his principles and ultimately prevails, redeeming himself and the entire insurance profession.
Sicko (2007)
The poster for "Sicko" says it all: a photo of filmmaker Michael Moore donning a rubber glove with the warning, "This might hurt a little." And indeed it does for America's for-profit, non-universal health maintenance organizations, or HMOs, which come up dismally short as Moore compares them to the non-profit, universal health care available in Canada, England and France.
The film traces the origins of the 1973 act that created HMOs to a taped White House conversation between Richard Nixon and assistant John Ehrlichman in which Nixon approves of Ehrlichman's assessment of HMOs: "The less care they give them, the more money they make."
Groundhog Day (1993)
Misogynist TV weatherman Phil Connors (Bill Murray) loathes his annual obligation to cover the emergence of Punxsutawney Phil from its Pennsylvania burrow every Groundhog Day. Unfortunately, the fates decree he'll experience the same Feb. 2 again and again until he gets it right with the help of his news producer Rita (Andie MacDowell). It is an old high school classmate of Connors, Ned ‘Needlenose’ Ryerson (Stephen Tobolowsky), who now sells insurance but remains the same twerp he was in school, badgering Connors with “remember when” stories.
The Rainmaker (1997)
Newby Memphis, Tenn., lawyer Rudy Baylor (Matt Damon) and his streetwise partner Deck Shifflet (Danny DeVito) take on Great Benefit Insurance over a denied claim for a bone marrow transplant on a 22-year-old man dying of leukemia. They're up against Great Benefit's formidable attorney Leo F. Drummond (Jon Voight), whose clubby judicial ties would ordinarily see the case dismissed out of hand. But when the presiding judge dies suddenly, his successor (Danny Glover), a former civil rights attorney, allows the case to continue. (continued.)
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Double Indemnity (1944)
Los Angeles insurance agent Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) falls under the spell of Phyllis (Barbara Stanwyck), the seductive wife of a client. Together, they trick her husband into signing a life insurance policy then orchestrate his death to look like an accident, so Phyllis will collect twice under the double indemnity clause. Just one catch: Neff's mentor Barton Keyes (Edward G. Robinson), the insurance company's claims adjuster, smells foul play.
The Incredibles (2004)
Bob Parr (voice of Craig T. Nelson) and his wife Helen (Holly Hunter) used to be the world-saving crime fighters, Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl, until such super-heroics were outlawed due to public outrage over the collateral damage. Fifteen years later, suburbanite Bob is pacing his boring cubicle at Insuricare where the closest he gets to super feats is guiding little old ladies to beneficial loopholes in their insurance policies. A mysterious summons to a remote island changes all that, and soon the crime fighters get their groove back while saving mankind from the evil Syndrome (Jason Lee).
Save the Tiger (1973)
Harry Stoner (Jack Lemmon) has tried everything to save his sinking L.A. apparel business. He's cooked the books against the advice of accountant Phil Greene (Jack Gilford). He's hired prostitutes for his clients. But on this day, he and Phil take in a matinee with an arsonist to discuss torching their San Diego warehouse to collect the insurance money.
The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)
Enigmatic Boston real estate tycoon Thomas Crown (Steve McQueen in the 1968 version) has a lucrative secret pastime: He's robbing a bank. Not himself, of course; instead, he choreographs a team of five total strangers through the theft he has intricately timed and researched. Crown hardly needs the money; it's the rush he's after. On the hook for the stolen $2.6 million, the bank's insurance company sends investigator Vicki Anderson (Faye Dunaway) to solve the case. She immediately suspects Crown and just as quickly falls for his charms. Or does she merely pretend to in hopes of landing her own fat payday? Ah, whom to trust?
Sleuth (1972)
Famous mystery writer Andrew Wyke (Laurence Olivier in the 1972 version) invites his wife Marguerite's lover, a lower-class hairdresser named Milo Tindle (Michael Caine), to his country estate to propose a novel solution to the affair. Marguerite won't leave Wyke's money, Milo lacks the resources to afford her and Wyke wants to get rid of her bills without a costly divorce. Wyke proposes a bit of theater: Tindle would pose as a burglar and steal Marguerite's jewelry, Wyke will use his mystery-writing skills to fool the police and insurance company, and Tindle will walk away with the $170,000 insurance settlement to support Marguerite. All goes as planned until Wyke pulls a gun.
Did we miss a movie? Leave a comment below and tell us what best describes you or the industry.
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