80s

Splash

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Splash. Touchstone Pictures 1984.

Before watching the movie:

It’s easy to forget that Tom Hanks is in this movie because he’s overshadowed by two big stories: “Disney creates the Touchstone label to distance its core brand from edgier stuff like Splash“, and “Daryl Hannah is gorgeous”.

I think that before The Little Mermaid, it was a common assumption that mermaids were blonde, but I understand that there was a point when this movie owned the image of what a mermaid looked like to the extent that mermaids were blondes because Madison was a blonde, instead of the other way around.

I expect that 28 years later, this movie will look like a soft PG that you might see on Nickelodeon in the afternoon.

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Coming to America

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Coming to America. Paramount Pictures 1988.

Before watching the movie:

On the one hand, Eddie Murphy is a fish out of water in the part of his career before he decided playing multiple roles was a good substitute for being funny. On the other, I’m a little worried that this might not have much more to say than Trading Places did, only more one-sided and with uncomfortable stereotypes about native Africans the whole way through.

Also, the last time I saw Eddie Murphy, he wasn’t being very funny. But that was more of a personal project for him, and he was unfunny in a meaningful way.
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Transylvania 6-5000

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Transylvania 6-5000. Jadran Film 1985.

Before watching the movie:

I’ve heard mixed reviews about this movie. Everything from “it was awful” to “it’s not so good”. When Leonard Maltin famously reviews a film with “it stunk. I’m Leonard Maltin”, it gives me pause, but I’m hoping some of the other reviews that lean toward “it’s okay if you’re expecting a dumb comedy” are more accurate. Mismanaged expectations are one of the biggest killers of film reputations.

Also, I tend to rate more favorably than many, or at least I think I do. I’ve recently had opportunity to compare how I rate films on a five-point scale to others, and found that on such a scale, the really good movies tend to get fours unless I was especially wowed by them, which is a higher bar for me than for others. Maybe doing this blog for three years has made me harder to please.

More on-topic, I can’t imagine Jeff Goldblum turning in a bad performance. I guess I don’t really know much about Begley other than this seems to be out of the general type I put him in.

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A Fish Called Wanda

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A Fish Called Wanda. MGM/Prominent Pictures 1988.

Before watching the movie:

Often, one never realizes how little one knows about something until one has to describe it. I know this is a riotously funny movie with John Cleese. Possibly his first big thing after Fawlty Towers. I think I’ve heard something about some character’s fish friends. I did not know until I decided to watch it that it was about three crooks trying to find out where the captured fourth stashed the loot.

I almost called Jamie Lee Curtis and Kevin Kline up and comers, but while they’re younger and more current than Cleese and Michael Palin, I think they were actually pretty well established by the late 80s.

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Without a Clue

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Without a Clue. ITC Entertainment Group, 1988.

Before watching the movie:

I used to make a point of saying why I chose a movie, but I stopped because it was often just “it was on the shelf/streaming service”. However, this one has a particularly unusual path. Several years ago, I got a CD of Halloween-themed film music. One of the tracks was “Super Sleuth, from Without A Clue”. The name didn’t fit, the music didn’t fit, the source didn’t fit, it seemed an all around poor choice. However, it directed my attention to a movie that had the potential to fit my tastes very well. I don’t think I got around to looking it up on my rental service for another few years, but whenever I added it, it’s taken until now to get to the top of the list.

Frequent readers of this blog should know that I have a particular attraction to variants of Sherlock Holmes stories. I’m intrigued by the halfway application of the literary agent hypothesis, but mostly I just want to see Michael Caine play a bad actor trying to be Holmes. Ben Kingsley seems a terrific choice to play a straight man in a double act, and Michael Caine is terrific in everything.

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Dragnet

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Dragnet. Applied Action 1987.

Before watching the movie:

I was kind of expecting this to be funnier than the show (which I’ve never seen, but am familiar with through homage), but I didn’t know when I first selected Dragnet that it’s intended to be a parody. Maybe if I was a fan of the original show I’d be worried, but Dragnet plays to parody so well I see a lot of potential to be the definitive parody (displacing the Stan Freberg audio sketches).

This movie seems to afford an increasingly rare opportunity to see Tom Hanks do comedy.

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Friday the Thirteenth

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Friday the Thirteenth. Paramount Pictures 1980.

Before watching the movie:

Well, I reviewed Nightmare on Elm Street, so it was only a matter of time before getting to this one. It also happens to be a time where three important factors come together: the post goes up on a Friday the 13th, I remember I have this movie in the lineup, and I don’t currently feel it’s too cheesy to do Friday the Thirteenth on Friday the 13th.

I think this codified the modern slasher film, so I’m probably going to have to overlook a lot of apparent unoriginality and formula-reliance. Also, this is one of those stories that our culture doesn’t allow one to be ignorant of the end. But I’ll still be courteous to any rock-dwelling, internet-connected cinephiles. Continue reading →

Breaking In

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Breaking In. Samuel Goldwyn Company 1989.

Before watching the movie:

This is a comedy about safe cracker mentoring. When I think of safe crackers, I think of No Deposit No Return, and there’s room for similar cracking hijinks, but beyond that, I have little to go on.

I don’t know what to expect in terms of performances because it’s Burt Reynolds playing an older man but not his reputation “self” and an actor I think I only know because he was part of a gang in one of the Back to the Future movies.

This movie was made in 1989, but doesn’t this poster look more late 70s/early 80s? Maybe I don’t have as good of a feel on poster styles as I thought.

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Sixteen Candles

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Sixteen Candles. Universal Pictures 1984.

Before watching the movie:

From what I’ve read about the plot… haven’t I seen this movie? Wait, no. It’s just that half of the teen angst movies in existence use similar plots. Molly Ringwald won’t be happy with anybody but the most popular boy in school, while there’s a dorky kid hovering over her who’s got a crush on her.

There’s also something about her family forgetting her birthday, so she’s extra keen to get noticed by said popular boy. I’d rather not be so sarcastic, but it’s such a stock story. It’s going to have a lot to make up for in the execution.

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The Best of Times

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The Best of Times. Kings Road Entertainment 1986.

Before watching the movie:

This is an interesting approach to a nostalgic high school sports movie. Normally, such a movie would either actually have high school characters through whom the writers and audience can wax nostalgic, and the main stories I’ve seen where adult characters want to recapture their youth, either they just reconnect with old friends or time travel is involved. Here, a bunch of adults stage a rematch of The Big Game as adults, around fifteen years later.

They’d be in their late 20s/early 30s by my reckoning, so they should still be young enough to do it decently, but not as well as they used to. Before I did the numbers, I was expecting late 40s, old enough to be firmly in middle age and midlife crises. Not that I was a star athlete in high school, but I’m now realizing the ages I can expect to see are basically what’s coming up next for me. That’s a chilling thought to go into a comedy with.

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