Source: Some information on this page may have been sourced as part of the 2023 Wikimedia Australia Partnership Projects grant, with the purpose of improving and expanding the use of Wikidata on our website. Wikidata is a free and open knowledge base that can be read and edited by both humans and machines. Read more about this project here.
At a peak in his career LA Rams quarterback Joe Pendleton (Warren Beatty) is erroneously summoned to heaven by an over-zealous escort (co-director Buck Henry). Mr Jordan, a senior official in heaven, (James Mason) seeks to set things in order by offering Joe a place back on earth in the body of another mortal. After seeing environmental lobbyist Betty Logan (Julie Christie) Joe decides to inhabit the body of Leo Farnsworth, a rich amoral industrialist who is in danger from his murderous wife (Dyan Cannon) and her lover (Charles Grodin). When Joe decides to get Pendleton’s body into shape he engages the services of his old coach in order to do so. This comedy was Warren Beatty’s directorial debut and he has great fun as Pendleton/Farnsworth. A fairly light romantic comedy/fantasy, “Heaven can wait” is a remake of “Here comes Mr Jordan” (1941) and was a big hit in 1978. Winner of one Academy Award in 1979 for Best art direction, the film was nominated for seven others.
Content notification
Our collection comprises over 40,000 moving image works, acquired and catalogued between the 1940s and early 2000s. As a result, some items may reflect outdated, offensive and possibly harmful views and opinions. ACMI is working to identify and redress such usages.
Learn more about our collection and our collection policy here. If you come across harmful content on our website that you would like to report, let us know.
How to watch
Stream, rent or buy via
Collection
In ACMI's collection
Credits
Collection metadata
ACMI Identifier
316886
Languages
Croatian
English
English
English
French
French
Greek
Hebrew
Italian
Italian
Portuguese
Slovenian
Spanish
Spanish
Audience classification
PG
Subject categories
Advertising, Film, Journalism, Mass Media & TV → Motion picture remakes
Economics, Philosophy, Politics, Religion & Sociology → Death
Fantasy & Science Fiction → Fantasy
Feature films → Feature films - United States
Food, Health, Lifestyle, Medicine, Psychology & Safety → Death
Hobbies, Recreation & Sport → Football - United States
Literature → American literature - Film and video adaptations
Sound/audio
Sound
Colour
Colour
Holdings
DVD; Access Print (Section 1)