Sure, The Man with Two Brains sometimes feels more like a collection of loose jokes instead of an actual movie – but the jokes alone are funny enough to justify watching the movie.
80s-o-meter: 85%
Total: 83%
Month: March 2015
#152 The Toxic Avenger Part III: The Last Temptation of Toxie (1989)
Essentially a sequel to the Part II, The Last Temptation of Toxie is a broken movie experience, but dares to be by far the most stupid one so far.
You’ll laugh, but feel ashamed doing so.
80s-o-meter: 82%
Total: 61%
#151 The Toxic Avenger Part II (1989)
The second installation of the series appeared five years after the original – this time around in Japan.
The Toxic Avenger Part II is pretty much as inane as the first one, but the whole concept feels more forced this time around.
80s-o-meter: 55%
Total: 75%
#150 The Toxic Avenger (1984)
Troma Entertainment’s cult classic Toxic Avenger sets out to be as stupid, inane, tasteless and campy sub-B-movie as possible – and succeeds on all accounts.
80s-o-meter: 55%
Total: 88%
#149 Wild Orchid (1989)
Thanks to Wild Orchid’s tacky dialogue and cheap soft-porn production values, Mickey Rourke’s attempt for sensual cinema ends up being embarrassing and really, really bothersome to watch.
80s-o-meter: 19%
Total: 3%
#148 Nine 1/2 Weeks (1986)
Two New York yuppies pork around and play tedious mind games in this predecessor to Wild Orchid.
While Nine 1/2 Weeks is luckily much less bothersome watch, it is still pretty much just as pointless.
80s-o-meter: 83%
Total: 28%
#147 True Blood (1989)
A street gang kills a cop and pins it on a small-time crook in True Blood, a solid and an unashamedly eighties drama that features the amazing Billy Drago as the sinister baddie.
80s-o-meter: 94%
Total: 84%
#146 Salvador (1986)
Salvador paints a grim picture of journalists caught between politics, journalistic ethics, personal involvement and the cynicism.
It’s a strong movie that would’ve performed even better if done with a slightly less sensationalistic and underlining approach.
80s-o-meter: 83%
Total: 77%
#145 After Hours (1985)
After Hours, Martin Scorsese’s fish-out-of-water adventure of a white collar insurance guy trapped in the nocturnal Soho has tons of amazing, surreal and unparalleled feeling to it.
80s-o-meter: 93%
Total: 90%
#144 Where the Boys Are (1984)
Where the Boys Are is a straight forward comedy that doesn’t bother with boring stuff like plot or character development, but just features one irrelevant and weird scene after another.
80s-o-meter: 91%
Total: 55%
#143 Biloxi Blues (1988)
Biloxi Blues is an army movie that’s a little about the army and the boot camp and most about learning to get along living away from home and friends with a bunch of total strangers.
80s-o-meter: 11%
Total: 71%
#142 Hardbodies 2 (1986)
A totally unrelated sequel, the only common feature between Hardbodies 2 and its predecessor is the sun and gratuitous nudity – lots of it.
Shot in Greece, the movie very surprisingly makes its European location work for its advantage. While the movie won’t have you rolling around floor laughing, it’s still a surprisingly good humoured and unpretentious little comedy.
80s-o-meter: 90%
Total: 55%
#141 Hardbodies (1984)
Three middle-aged business men rent a seaside flat to hit on young chicks – the Hardbodies. It starts from nowhere and ends up absolutely nowhere .. but it’s still pretty ok waste of time.
80s-o-meter: 81%
Total: 62%
#140 Nightflyers (1987)
Based on a novel by now world famous George R. R. Martin, Nightflyers has a lot going for it: A nice poster, a really solid set design, well executed special effects and an atmospheric soundtrack.
Too bad something went very wrong along the way. In fact, things went south so badly that when the movie was released, the director Robert Collector (Red Heat, Memoirs of an Invisible Man) opted to use a pseudonym instead of his own name.
And bad it is: 30 minutes into the movie it becomes painfully obvious the only event worth looking forward here are the end credits.
There aren’t many reasons to bother with Nightflyers. If I was really pushed to come up with one, it does feature the notorious 80s baddie Michael Des Barres (Murdoc of the MacGyver fame) in one his rare eighties feature film roles.
80s-o-meter: 77%
Total: 28%
#139 Up the Creek (1984)
Although the movie loses some of its initial momentum along the way, Up The Creek, a relatively unknown comedy gem of the 80s should definitely have a bigger recognition.
80s-o-meter: 85%
Total: 83%
#138 When Nature Calls (1985)
A sorry and lame effort for a comedy, When Nature Calls is a collection of sketches very loosely tied under the same theme.
You can kind of see what they tried to achieve here, but Monty Python this isn’t!
80s-o-meter: 11%
Total: 11%
#137 The Blue Lagoon (1980)
Look beyond the very apparent exploitative nature of the movie and you’ll find The Blue Lagoon to be a sweet story of a unique friendship and innocent love, and an experience hindered only by the very clumsy ending of the movie.
80s-o-meter: 11%
Total: 65%
#136 Drugstore Cowboy (1989)
Based on a autobiographical novel by James Fogle, Drugstore Cowboy is a great depiction of drug addiction that does not resort either to moralising or glamorising the subject.
80s-o-meter: 17%
Total: 87%
#135 Armed and Dangerous (1986)
John Candy and Eugene Levy co-star in Armed and Dangerous, a security guard buddy-cop movie that doesn’t maybe wow you as their best – but won’t definitely let you down either.
80s-o-meter: 88%
Total: 84%
#134 The Emerald Forest (1985)
The Emerald Forest is an incredible story of a kid getting abducted and raised by native indians that starts off well but soon becomes a tad too imaginative and unbelievable for its own good.
80s-o-meter: 82%
Total: 61%