A broad and sometimes quite crass blue-collar farce about a kidnapped wife who is so gross her husband is only too pleased not to pay the ransom, especially as he was planning to bump her off.

The film gets funnier as it goes on, due mostly to the increasing role played by Bette Midler as the wife.

She sheds 20 pounds thanks to aerobic classes on the TV provided by the kidnappers (Judge Reinhold, Helen Slater) with whom she becomes friendly.

It's from their home that she plans revenge on her husband (Danny DeVito) who refuses to pay an ever-decreasing ransom demand in the hope that the kidnappers will kill her.

Somewhere in all this is a crossplot we didn't quite understand, involving DeVito's mistress (Anita Morris) trying to blackmail him with a video she thinks shows something other than it does.

Directed by the men who made Airplane! , Ruthless People scores nowhere near as high on the laugh meter; for Midler, however, it's a triumph.

DeVito has one or two frenziedly funny moments as the homicidal husband, and Bill Pullman makes an amusing film debut as a dim-witted extortionist.