Kategoria: 1987

#1916 Firehouse (1987)

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The Police Academy series was upon its release heavily bashed by critics for being crude, low brow humour. But stinkers like Firehouse show how skilfully crafted that humour and a roster of characters really is in comparison with this kind of garbage, put together with absolutely no ambition nor skills.

Basically a Police Academy but with fire brigade, Firehouse shows a badly conducting firemen getting a new roster of female fire fighters, with whom they then compete with. But this is no female power movie, more like a sorry excuse to display an infinite amount of mammaries on the screen.

Pretty much nothing in Firehouse makes one laugh, feel nor think, making it one of the most futile attempts in humour for a long time..

80s-o-meter: 81%

Total: 6%

#1898 Wild Thing (1987)

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Wild Thing is basically a modern day Tarzan in a concrete jungle. After seeing his hippie parents get killed and being risen in a slums with a philosophy of never being seen and helping the oppressed, Wild Thing has become something of a urban myth on the streets.

The concept has potential for a different kind of a superhero (cartoon) franchise, by really making the main character a cool and mystical creature. But, Wild Thing ultimately fails to pull this off.

It is all in all quite tame ride that – while mildly entertaining – does not really live up to its full potential.

80s-o-meter: 78%

Total: 61%

#1892 Nuts (1987)

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A mistreated woman (Barbra Streisand) ultimately accused of murder wants a fair trial, while her family and doctors insist her to be declared mentally incompetent in Nuts, a courtroom drama that faces the viewer with a few interesting questions about basic human rights versus justice system and the powerful psychiatric and mental health care machinery.

A lawyer played by Richard Dreyfuss sets out to defend her, and the dynamics between these two is a joy to watch on the silver screen.

80s-o-meter: 70%

Total: 71%

#1884 Dirty Dancing (1987)

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Dirty Dancing I presume is a movie that everyone who lived on or are interested of the 80s know of. I definitely had been exposed to the concept, that it starred Patrick Swayze, and kind of put the dots together to know the movie was about dancing.

Expecting this to be a modern tale of ambitious young dancers trying to make it in a big city, what I did not know was that Dirty Dancing is a nostalgic period picture taking place in the summer of 1963 when a young girl nicknamed Baby travels to mountain resort with her parents to spend the summer holiday there. The upper middle class girl then gets involved with the dancers hired as staff to entertain the guests, and is shown a mambo like ”Dirty Dancing” the staff gets involved in their free time, after which Baby hits it up with the dance instructor Johnny.

In the end this was much lesser of a movie than I had anticipated. The dancing does not look that impressive, the two main leads seem to have zero chemistry between them and I also totally missed the point of the plot, especially how it all concludes at the end as they put on a show for a few campers. Is it Baby’s coming of age story, about her finding her own way and breaking social barriers? Or is it just about some nice nostalgic vibe of the movie, and watching the dreamy Patrick Swayze dance around?

Your guess is as good as mine.

80s-o-meter: 75%

Total: 55%

#1878 Matewan (1987)

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Another quality historic drama here!

Matewan depicts events that took place in a small coal town in West-Virginia back in 1920 when the workers who unified by young union organizer go on a strike against exploitative mining company and their gun-wielding corporate henchmen.

The movie looks and feels fantastic, and with the modern transfer it could still pass in any theatre. The story is told with seemingly realistic historical detailing, and it manages to bring the viewer very close to the subjects and grasp the feeling of them sitting on a powder keg.

80s-o-meter: 2%

Total: 83%

#1873 Moonstruck (1987)

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I usually don’t force the family into watching the 80s movies – this is purely my personal project – but as they wished something lighthearted for the Saturday night and Moonstruck was available on Prime I decided to go with it as I hadn’t yet seen the movie myself.

And how wrong could it go? After all the movie stars Cher, Danny Aiello, Olympia Dukakis and Nicolas Cage, and was nominated to six academy awards, winning in three, bagging her first Oscar. But, we all found the movie to be a bit of a bore. Everyone seems to be quite tired in what they do and the pace of life is tediously slow. Not only does the love affair between Cher and Cage feel contrived, but so it the former relationship with Danny Aiello’s character, as is how Aiello handles the climatic twist at the end. Artificiality aside, there’s only one small romance – that of the mother – that evokes any emotions.

Also the humour did not really find its target (although the setup could have lent itself to many delicious comedy situations), and the best laughs you can get out of this movie is Aiello forgetting his suitcases for three times in a row.

80s-o-meter: 85%

Total: 41%

#1857 Hotel Colonial (1987)

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Hotel Colonial is not a widely remembered movie – and those who know it often remember it for wasting the talent of John Savage and Robert Duvall.

I think I saw a slightly different movie here. The movie took me to an adventure to a different world that I found enchanting – a bit like playing some point and click adventure on a computer. The plot is also pretty unique, and for the most parts I did not know where it was going to take me, but I did not really care as the journey was worth it, and for me the story of the protagonist being drawn to the depths of madness by the mysterious character more than warranted the 90 minutes I spent with Hotel Colonial.

But I do agree that character writing and directing is where the movie suffers the most. Savage is a bit lost throughout the movie (although it suits the mental state of the his character) and Duvall’s performance is just plain painful to watch, knowing the level of performer he usually is.

80s-o-meter: 80%

Total: 72%

#1849 Halloween 2023: Blood Frenzy (1987)

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Blood Frenzy is a low quality slasher that apparently has some following who deem it a good movie.

For me, I didn’t see much difference to a gazillion of shasher movies other than the desert setting and grown ups instead of grown ups acting as if they were teenagers.

The movie is low quality, low budget all over and nothing here stands out for me to remember after some two weeks of seeing the movie.

80s-o-meter: 70%

Total: 17%

#1848 Halloween 2023: Evil Spawn (1987)

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A pretty useless story of an actress past in the twilight of her career taking injections by some mad professor, turning her into this combination of a blood thirsty killer / insect.

Done in the day – and also introduced by in the DVD – Fred Olen Ray, the movie is full of bad acting and dialogues ripped straight out of 1950s B-horror movies. It would’ve been a much more interesting story to see her struggle in the actress career and either overcoming it or taking some other unfortunate actions, rather than going by this nonsensical storyline.

Either that, or going full ahead with the apprent humour aspect. Neither of which is seen here.

80s-o-meter: 75%

Total: 20%

#1843 Halloween 2023: Lunch Meat (1987)

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When I see some amateur gore like Lunch Meat, I can’t but to compare its offerings to the brilliant Bad Taste. Especially so when in Lunch Meat’s case the movie is about hillbilly family hunting people to harvest and sell their meat for restaurants.

Where Bad Taste goes for imaginative, weird and entertaining extremities, Lunch Meat – likely sharing a similar shoelace budget – repeats the often seen, unimaginative and predictable pattern we already know.

I can’t think of much to like here. At its very peak moments Lunch Meat is ok-ish. But, those moments are few and far between.

80s-o-meter: 52%

Total: 12%

#1825 Halloween 2023: The Kindred (1987)

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On her deathbed, a scientist urges her son to destroy her lab notes from her experiments. As the son visits the her mother’s ancestral home, he uncovers the existence of a lost brother, and the horrifying secrets of genetic research gone wrong.

The Kindred is a horror creature movie whose strongest suit is by far the uncovering of the mystery and typical to the monster movies, the creature itself feels almost underwhelming compared to the mighty fine atmosphere the movie manages to create completely without its monster fx. In other words: here as well it’s more scary what you don’t see than rather than what you do see.

Also typical to the similar movies, it turns from a mystery horror thriller to a pretty standard action movie without managing to capitalise the original eery atmosphere. Still, there’s a lot to be liked here and The Kindred is a fine example of a horror movie done mostly right.

80s-o-meter: 85%

Total: 75%

#1822 Savage Harbor aka Death Feud (1987)

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Frank Stallone stars in Savage Harbour, a pretty lame action movie where a girlfriend of a gangster escapes from him, only to be kidnapped back and sex trafficked by the said gangster. This is not to the liking of our hero, who had gone and fallen in love with her.

Sure, I could repeat the common remark that Frank is no his brother – but if I’m being honest this movie couldn’t have been saved even if Sylvester and Arnold both starred in it.

There’s this strange vibe to the movie that makes it feel as if Eastern European film team had travelled to USA to shoot one of those real American style action movies, and every aspect of the movie from villains to heroes feels like second or third grade quality. Not outright bad, but if you miss it you really haven’t been robbed of anything.

80s-o-meter: 71%

Total: 27%

#1802 Miami Connection (1987)

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Dubbed as the lost action movie of the 80s, and released fully restored in Bluray in 2012 with a showy marketing efforts, Miami Connection manages to live up to expectations with its zany plot of motorcycle ninjas battling with drug lords and picking a fight with a rock group specialising in Taekwondo themed music. Truly something that could have only written and released in the 80s without any self irony.

The musical aspect of the band Dragon Sound with mullets and ’stashes ad libbing unbelievably catchy songs like ”Against the Ninja” and ”Friends through eternity, loyalty, honesty” (sic) adds another awesome level to the movie, and right from the first song we hear them playing it’s quite clear that the viewer will be entertained here, no matter what the plot is: this is all about the atmosphere.

Miami Connection is the kind of a movie that would have not gotten good reviews or following when it was originally released, but the sheer amount of 80s style truly makes it a priceless treasure for any fan of the era.

80s-o-meter: 98%

Total: 90%

#1801 Making Mr. Right (1987)

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Making Mr.Right’s story revolves around a driven public relations executive (Ann Magnuson), tasked to transform a socially awkward android (John Malkovich) into a marketable household name and trying to connect with androids even more complex creator.

Drawing its humour from complexities of relationships, identity, and human connection, the movie manages to make mostly best out of its utterly silly premise, although most of the head dropping clueless android gags fail to really amuse.

80s-o-meter: 81%

Total: 64%

#1798 The Stranger (1987)

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One of those movies that takes place in the imaginary land of Hollywood movies, The Stranger presents the viewer with a plot line so convoluted that I had to rewind back and watch the whole movie again to see if I had missed something along the way.

Don’t get me wrong – I very much enjoy movies that aren’t necessarily realistic, but still the movie has to be able to sell those utterly silly ideas to the viewer, and this is where the most memorable movies succeed. The Stranger unfortunately isn’t one of those, and everything from the movie doctor to the movie baddies feels utterly forced and fake.

I do have to give the movie a few points of a plot twist that I have never seen before nor did I expect to see it here. But to me that plot twist was as hard to swallow as the rest of The Stranger.

80s-o-meter: 70%

Total: 31%

#1797 Tough Guys Don’t Dance (1987)

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Not to be mixed up with Tough Guys, released just one year earlier, the cryptically named Tough Guys Don’t Dance makes an attempt to create a neo-noir thriller movie in the vein of old noir classics, but ends up mostly known for its ”Oh God! Oh Man! Oh God! Oh Man!” scene that has since become a modern meme classic.

I see good aspects here as well; I like old film noir thrillers with femme fatales, caricature-like baddies, chilly and rainy coastal settings like in Key Largo. I even like to an extend a film having style over substance, if the atmosphere is good enough to suck me in. In this sense Tough Guys Don’t Dance gets quite close. If the directing was any better and the plot didn’t feel as convoluted with tons of people coming and going without proper introductions, this could have been an ok take on the subject.

But, unfortunately Norman Mailer – who also wrote the original novel – decided to direct this thing on his own, and similarly to the Stephen King’s own film work, the skill of weaving a movie to a comprehensive package was really not one of Mailer’s strong suits.

80s-o-meter: 85%

Total: 43%

#1793 Barfly (1987)

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Charles Bukowski led a heavy drinking life himself that he romanticised in his novels as his alter ego Henry Chinaski who’s a lovable bum heavy on drinking. Enter Barfly, the first US-made movie featuring the character, played by Mickey Rourke.

A movie that does not really have much of a plot going for it, the show is ultimately kept afloat by the sheer charisma put into the role by Rourke – although Bukowski wasn’t reportedly entirely sold with his version of Chinaski. I don’t know, Rourke really puts a lot of himself – or rather, his lovable bum persona – to the role. I do like it, but I can also see the movie being quite different and more poetic in some other hands.

As far as the hybrid Rourke/Bukowski character goes, he is an interesting mix of far ends of the same spectrum: self destruction vs skill to survive, intelligence vs acting like an ass, poetic vs foul mouthed and depressed vs smile that never seems to wear out.

80s-o-meter: 60%

Total: 62%

#1782 Cross My Heart (1987)

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Cross My Heart is a captivating comedy of a two people going to their third date having put on a perfect dating facade for so far. Maybe a bit too perfect, as they both are about find out a lot of new things about the other – and of themselves.

The movie is a two person show between Martin Short and Annette O’Toole, and both provide big grins for the viewer. It’s especially Short whose movies of the era always surprise me how great physical actor and a comedian he was at the very top of his game.

80s-o-meter: 92%

Total: 76%

#1776 Bulletproof (1987)

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If I see the name of Fred Olen Ray on a movie I know what I’m going to see will be entertaining. Many times hilariously bad, but always entertaining. And Bulletproof might be the most hilarious of them all. Plus every other imaginable superlative.

I honestly can’t tell if Bulletproof is an action comedy spoof akin to Hot Shots!. The movie manages to include every single Hollywood action cliché: there’s the rogue cop lead, tons of bad dialogue and kill lines and all latin American Marxists, Russian communists, arabs, ie all of the American’s favourite enemies of the era. And it is all such over the top and ridiculous that the movie will leave one entertained laughing – or scratching their head in disbelief.

This is amplified furthermore by the fact that the lead role is played by Gary Busey who just comes across plain goofy jumping around the scene and grinning like a madman. I do love Busey and having him in the movie like this is honestly just first topping on a cake. The second? His character in the movie is called McBain.

Yes, actually.. McBain.

80s-o-meter: 101%

Total: 90%