Twins

For Arnold Schwarzenegger, "Twins" was a mold breaking film and the first of two highly successful comedies that the star made with "Ghostbusters" director Ivan Reitman -The other being "Kindergarten Cop".

Some commentators have chosen to view this deviation from the high octane action genre as being the result of two less than astounding results at the box office; "Raw Deal" and "Red Heat" which between them made less than any one previous Arnie movie of previous years.

In fact, the truth probably is that Arnie was acutely aware of the need to not be typecast as 'just' the hulking destroyer with the sharp one-liners that he had been up to that point.

He was almost certainly very keen to expand his persona with comedy and even some romance.

In a 1988 interview, Arnold said:

"In my last five or six movies, my love relationship was basically with guns, with explosives, with grenades and missiles.

It made everyone uncomfortable with the idea of me doing a film that deals with comedy and humor. One thing that I realised was that I really enjoyed doing comedy, but there would always be confrontations with the directors, with the studios "No No No, what we want is for you to be a tough guy." I was trying to figure out how I could do a comedy from beginning to end, and Twins represented the next stepping-stone in my career."

His ability for comedy had already shown itself many times, both on and off the screen and the truth is that Arnold had first approached Ivan Reitman with the idea of making a movie together when they first met in the spring of 1984 at the premiere of Reitman's Ghostbusters... Even before The Terminator!

Three years later, Reitman had a script which he wanted to discuss with Arnold. It involved two brothers, the product of a 50's genetic experiment, seperated at birth. The 'superior' one is given all that humanity has to offer in the way of development on a idillic desert island (Schwarzenegger) whilst the other (DeVito) is 'dumped' in an orphanage with no knowledge of his past. 35 years later the 'perfect specimen' seeks out the 'misfit' to give him the sense of belonging and family they both need.

Together, the two twins embark on an adventure to find their mother and themselves.

The result was a very funny, warm and touching suprise for everyone that was enthusiastically received even by Arnold's die-hard fans and an enourmous success at the box-office.

Arnold was to say after the production had wrapped:

"I think Twins is going to have a suprising impact. And it's gonna be good for my career, because I can then do more of the films that I would like to do. Which is to do more comedies like that and then do movies like "California Suite".

In one 'fell swoop', Arnold had catapaulted himself into the league of the very best leading men. The world would never quite look at him the same again...