The Curse of the Jade Scorpion

Set in 1940s New York, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion follows CW Briggs, a seasoned insurance investigator at the North Coast company, and Betty Ann Fitzgerald, the efficiency expert brought in to modernize the office. The two clash immediately: she finds his methods outdated, and he resents her attempts to change how he works. At a birthday outing, the staff attend a stage show by a hypnotist named Voltan, who puts both of them under his influence. What follows turns the pair's mutual hostility into sudden, unwanted attraction, while thefts at insured homes draw attention back to Briggs himself.

Woody Allen directed and wrote the film, the twenty-ninth of the forty-eight features he has directed, arriving between Small Time Crooks and Hollywood Ending. Allen plays Briggs opposite Helen Hunt as Betty Ann, with Dan Aykroyd as their boss, Charlize Theron as Laura Kensington, David Ogden Stiers as Voltan and Brian Markinson as Al. The production, made with DreamWorks Pictures and European partners, cost about 33 million dollars and took roughly 19 million worldwide, a shortfall against its budget.

Reception was mixed. On IMDb it holds 6.7/10 from around 44,000 votes, and on TMDB 6.6/10 from about 850 votes, both modest figures that suggest mild audience approval. A critics' rating of 5.5/10 from 122 reviews sits below those audience scores, indicating reviewers were less positive about the film than general viewers were.