In the make-believe world that Hollywood builds, real estate agents are almost always broad brushed as people to regard with disdain, distrust or contempt -- or all of the above.
Motion pictures' bigger-than-life art form presents those who practice real estate as myopic, slaves of the sale -- an end justified by any means necessary.
Also, often poking pointed fun, the silver screen's rendition of a realty professional is typically in the form of a caricature -- an insufferable, money-grubbing wretch who would sell their soul to close the deal.
This summer's movie fare is no different.
For example, a tight, bright and funny little independent film "You Kill Me" stars Ben Kingsley as alcoholic hit man, "Frank Falenczyk," whose drinking habits are getting in the way of him getting the job done in Buffalo.
His forced penance is a stint in San Francisco where he's enrolled in Alcoholic Anonymous to dry out under the watchful eye of his handler known only as "Dave."
Dave also lands Frank a job assisting a mortician at a local funeral home, and because he's a real estate agent, Dave also puts a roof over Frank's head.
It's not long before Frank discovers his handler is also a mob spy with lots of keys who "looks in on" the hitman from time to time.
"You roll your socks. You floss. You don't hide liquor in the toilet. You live like a Mormon," Dave tells Frank, reminding him who is handling whom.
Bill Pullman plays Dave as a sleazy, disheveled and bespectacled home sales agent with an untamed cowlick. His appearance alone would get him kicked out of the local trade group.
It's not by chance Dave chose the funeral home job for Frank.
This morbid agent farms for listings in the mortuary, not the least bit remorseful about his deplorable strategy.
Bodies emptied of life often leave empty homes behind.
Even Frank, once a Grim Reaper who now makes dead bodies pretty instead of making pretty bodies dead, thinks Dave is a motherless opportunist. Frank recoils at the thought that not only is the unscrupulous Dave his handler now, but he'll also have to share the fiery afterworld with him.
Unmoved by Frank's disgust, but tempting a fate of fire and brimstone forever, Dave replies as only his character could, "In a town with a 2 percent vacancy rate, the real estate agent is God. That's what I am."
On a lighter note, Saturday Night Live's Molly Shannon is the aptly named real estate agent "Eve Adams" (Because even the original fig leaf wearing consumers had to live somewhere.) in "Evan Almighty", a Bible story-twisting movie about a modern day Ark (in the movie, an acronym for Acts of Random Kindness).
But the reason for the Ark is a hot button shot at urban sprawl, environmental rape, defective building and other development ills -- a crooked Congressman used shoddy engineering to dam up a previously pristine valley near Washington, D.C. to allow developers to fill the valley floor with McMansions.
Eve is the syrupy sweet, caffeine-fueled agent who skips to work and sells Evan Baxter (Steve Carell) and family their monster home, sight-unseen, located in the exclusive Prestige Crest, and in the path of destruction.
She later sells Evan additional undeveloped parcels to build the Ark -- which ironically looks like a house dropped on a boat built for animals, two-by-two. They'll need the accommodations when the shoddy dam bursts.
It's not clear what the humans are supposed to do when the dam goes. Buy a boat house?
Eve is there to greet the Baxters when they arrive, but quickly hops off to sell more homes, oblivious (by choice or not) to the watery conditions homeowners will face.
Compared to the single-minded cynical Dave in San Francisco, Eve, on the other coast, is blissfully boneheaded.
They do, however, both agree it's always a good time to buy, come hell or high water.
