Two hit men, Lee Woods (James Spader) and Dosmo Pizzo (Danny Aiello) enter the house of Becky Foxx (Teri Hatcher) and her cheating husband, Roy (Peter Horton), while they are sleeping. They inject Becky with a tranquilizer and kill Roy. Lee then drives to an empty lot, shoots Dosmo and blows up the car hopping to frame Dosmo. Meeting Lee is his girlfriend, Helga Svelgen (Charlize Theron), the woman Roy was cheating with, in another car. They drive away.
Allan Hopper (Greg Cruttwell) is out driving when he gets a flat tire. He calls his assistant, Susan Parish (Glenne Headly) for help. He gets out of the car and falls in excruciating pain. Nearby a man, Buck (Michael Jai White) is boosting a car. He picks Allan up and puts him in the stolen car. He takes him to the hospital where Allan learns that he has kidney stones. Allan goes home.
Dosmo, wearing a bulletproof vest, manages to escape the car before Allan blew it up. He ends up in the backyard of the house belonging to Allan and is cornered by Allan’s dog, Marc The Pit Bull. Dosmo is afraid of dogs. He takes Allan and Susan hostage and locks Marc The Pit Bull out of the house.
Teddy Peppers (Paul Mazursky) is a suicidal ex-TV director. He goes to the cemetery with his dog to commit suicide. Audrey Hopper (Marsha Mason) is also at the cemetery visiting a grave. Teddy tries to get Audrey to take his dog, Bogey, and find a good home for it. Audrey takes Teddy to her brother’s house to give him the dog. Her brother is Allan. Audrey and Teddy are also held hostage by Dosmo.
Wes Taylor (Eric Stoltz) is an undercover cop working vice. His partner is Alvin Strayer (Jeff Daniels). Wes is getting a massage trying to get the masseuse to offer him a happy ending so he can bust the establishment. It doesn’t work, so he leaves. Alvin, waiting outside in a car is mad that things didn’t go as planned. While driving down the road they come across a frantic and bloody Becky. Wes, a wanna-be detective, decides to do a little investigating on his own. After giving her statement and leaving the police department, Becky gets into a car driven by Helga. Becky, having hired a hit on her husband, is pissed that Helga and Lee killed him with her in the bed with him.
At this point, all the main characters are present. As they try to maneuver through their individual scams and ironic circumstances they manage to intersect with each other in strange and sometimes violent ways, most of which don’t always end well.
“2 Days in the Valley” AKA “Two Days in the Valley” was released in 1996 and was directed by John Herzfeld. It is an American crime thriller and a black comedy.
It’s a fun and fast moving film with lots of little vignettes that are loosely connected. The film is mostly comprised of four main stories. The movie is star studded with great performances all around. It is sometimes compared to “Pulp Fiction” 1994 and I can see why, however, in this instance the stories are a little more humorous, less confusing, and the characters more down-to-earth. I mean, if you can call a sociopathic hit man relatable. All the characters are quirky but very stereotypical.
Other well known actors such as Keith Carradine, Louise Fletcher, Michael Jai White and Austin Pendleton had cameos in the film. The two dogs in the film were Coby, who played Teddy’s dog Bogey and Mark Goldstein who played Allan’s dog, Marc the Pit bull.