Category: Comedy

#820 Pennies from Heaven (1981)

Posted on by admin

Based on the BBC serie of the same name, Pennies from Heaven is a musical that is for some reason being served as drama, although its core concept of dancing and mouthing old hits from the golden era cannot be perceived as anything but comedic and silly.

The big gimmick of the movie, escaping the grim day-to-day life to a jolly song totally detached from reality – a concept used later successfully in Lars von Trier’s Dancer in the Dark – works well for a short time, until it gets repetitive and then finally gimmicky. Actually, it’s not the musical numbers but the actual movie bits that start to feel tiresome after awhile: Pennies from Heaven is the kind of period picture that relies far too heavily on just establishing the period for a cozy feeling, and if taken to the current time, the story just wouldn’t have much going for it.

The dance numbers themselves are fabulously constructed and clearly it’s taken a lot of practise for the actors to train for them. What’s distracting though is the way the original songs are being lip-synced instead of having the actors perform them. The real treat of the movie is Christopher Walken whose brief performance is nothing short of a breathtaking.

80s-o-meter: 45%

Total: 58%

#812 They All Laughed (1981)

Posted on by admin

Best known for being the notorious last movie for the young actress and Playboy model Dorothy Stratten, They All Laughed seems like an improvised movie made up on the spot as the filming went on.

The movie introduces a few gentlemen that work for some kind of a detective agency. This gives them a loose motive to follow some babes around in pointless scenes that seem drag on and on forever. As much as I enjoy watching NYC, observing someone tailgate someone other for twenty something minutes doesn’t really hold up my interest.

Their endeavors – that could in 2018 be described only as plain creepy – are here rewarded with them ending up making out with the models. Ben Gazzara plays the oldest wolf of the bunch who wanders around the city with beautiful women throwing themselves at his feet.

If there ever was a point to the movie, I completely missed it.

80s-o-meter: 57%

Total: 11%

#809 Cavegirl (1985)

Posted on by admin

Running a blog about eighties movies, I always try to find something commendable about a title I review. Cavegirl is one of those occasions I just couldn’t find anything good to say no matter how hard I tried.

Not only is it exceptionally badly executed and tediously boring, but also has the rare quality of being extremely painful to watch, thanks to its endless stream of misfired slapstick, often composed of flatulence or other bodily functions.

Cavegirl is a movie completely without merits, and the faster you forget about ever hearing about it, the better.

80s-o-meter: 54%

Total: 0%

#808 First Monday in October (1981)

Posted on by admin

Like many Walter Matthau movies, First Monday in October isn’t particularly eighties in style, but more like a nice, cozy breeze from the past. Often typecast as the grumpy, stubborn character, Matthau does have plenty of that old world charm which he always manages to bring into his productions.

Same goes here; Matthau plays an uncompromising, liberal Associate Justice that finds himself in a verbal tug-of-war with the first female Associate Justice just appointed to the Supreme Court. The old men contra women workplace setup is a bit dated, but not at all something that wouldn’t resonate still today. The real highlight of the movie is the snappy, smartly written dialogue that Matthau and Clayburgh deliver in a delightful fashion as they go against each other, tooth and nail.

It’s also an interesting period piece from the time when landmark decisions on the adult video censorship were being made in the Supreme Court.

80s-o-meter: 62%

Total: 75%

#806 Big Trouble in Little China (1986)

Posted on by admin

A campy cult classic by design, Big Trouble in Little China is an outrageous action adventure comedy from John Carpenter, a living legend of the 80s cinema.

I really love the core concept of being able to just step to a side street in the middle of the busy urban San Francisco and get sucked into an ancient chinese adventure where none of your western rules apply anymore. I love how the all the protagonists, magicians, sorcerers, karate masters and their showdowns are pages ripped right out of a comic book, and how the movie plays around with every cliché it can think of. I love Kurt Russell’s portrayal of Jack Burton, a big-mouthed self-quoting wannabe hero who always ends up a little short in his heroic efforts. I love the set design, the effects, the poster and pretty much every still frame of the movie you can throw my way.

And herein lies my fundamental problem with the movie: I love all the small things in Big Trouble in Little China more than I like it as an actual movie. This is not to say that Big Trouble in Little China would be a bad film – I just enjoy the idea of it more than I enjoy actually sitting down and watching through it. Part of it has to do with the movie starting out with such a great setup, but then never quite being able to outdo its outrageous premise, and ends up recycling a lot of what was already seen during the first 30 minutes of the movie.

Given all this, Big Trouble in Little China is still a piece of 80s cult cinema that begs to be revisited every few years.

80s-o-meter: 84%

Total: 80%

#803 Stroker Ace (1983)

Posted on by admin

Towards the 30 minute mark of Stroker Ace Loni Anderson stands outside in the balcony with Burt Reynolds and asks him why does he keep on racing, to which Reynolds sighs and answers hesitantly — “I don’t know – it’s uh, kind of hard to explain”.

The answer would’ve likely been the same had someone asked him why does he keep on doing all these car chase movies.

Reynolds had already totally drained the genre with Smokey and the Bandit and Cannonball Run and their uninspired sequels, and in Stroker Ace he goes on to flogging the dead horse with a movie that manages to be considerably poorer than the previous ones. Once again we see Reynolds playing the slick, wise-cracking yippie ki-yay playboy head over heels in love with himself. It’s an already tired routine that grows even older 5 minutes into the film.

Directed by Reynolds’ long time mate Hal Needham – a stunt man converted to a movie maker – the movie ends with his trademark blooper reel, even which fails to amuse.

80s-o-meter: 58%

Total: 13%

#799 Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

Posted on by admin

A movie with tremendously good production values, made by the very best talent of the Hollywood Who Framed Roger Rabbit is ultimately ruined by its now outdated gimmick of mixing in cartoons with live camera action.

A big part of why I love the 80s movies is that I’ve always preferred well executed puppeteering magic to using CGI characters. As much as we humans want to buy in to the stories, we’re really sensitive for any glitches in the matrix; it’s usually enough to break the illusion if one of the actors is watching to a slightly off direction when trying to interacting with the imagined character. The effects also tend the look cool at the time, but grow old just in few years.

Roger Rabbit’s very experimental nature mixing cartoon characters with live introduces many of the same problems: The novelty off the effects has worn off and the resulting movie lacks the needed immersion.

Then, there’s the obvious problem with the characters. Roger Rabbit, a character cut and pasted together for this movie is annoying. I’m talking about Jar Jar Binks annoying. Even worse yet, the character and its constant screaming around paired with the slapstick humor is totally devoid of any laughters. As a proof, Roger never became a classic character that’d go on to live outside the movie. The actual actors luckily do much better here: Bob Hoskins is choice for the classic film noir Hollywood sleuth and Christopher Lloyd makes his vulture-like Judge Doom character a perfect human-cartoon character blend.

The movie was received well by the critics and went on to win three Oscars. I can’t help but to think many were blinded by the novelty of the movie’s technical merits.

80s-o-meter: 55%

Total: 48%

#797 He’s My Girl (1987)

Posted on by admin

There are only a few cross-dressing movies that get away with the tired concept and those that usually do get away with it make some kind of an effort to rationalise the necessity for a dude to put on the dress. He’s My Girl skips all this and just goes for the lowest common denominator bloke in the high heels approach.

As sad as it sounds, the whole cross dressing act is also the strongest suit of the movie. T.K. Carter actually has the voice and the looks to pull off his sassy transvestite act, and it’s the rest of the movie and especially its cast that falls far behind. Very far.

It’s hard to justify why a movie like He’s My Girl should exist as it doesn’t really bring anything new or original to the table, nor does it manage to make one laugh. This is one of those movies that the time forgot, for a good reason.

80s-o-meter: 82%

Total: 23%

#791 Skin Deep (1989)

Posted on by admin

Blake Edwards’ 80s offerings seem to range from total failures to triumphs, with nothing much in between. Skin Deep, his last theatrical release of the decade is a success that really lives up to its tag line ‘The comedy that glows in the dark’. But I won’t be spoiling that for you – just urging you to watch the movie to find out by yourself.

Skin Deep is in many ways a rephrase of Edwards’ former works, and resemblance to the 1979’s ’10’ and the 1983 horrid stinker The Man Who Loved Women are obvious. The movie was written as a vessel for Dudley Moore, who luckily refused the role, for it resembled too much his earlier roles. Moore was of course right: The drunken, piano playing, womanising man child starring here is a cut right out of Moore’s Arthur movies, and would’ve turned to just another spinoff had Moore accepted the lead role. Instead, John Ritter was hired and he really embraces the role wholeheartedly, making Skin Deep his very best comedic role to date.

Ritter even surprises with some very solid physical comedy acting, something I had no idea he had the talent for.

Edwards’ writing and especially his dialogue is super sharp and he seems to gather up much of the best sides from his earlier screen writings here – plus of course them few just right loaned bits.

80s-o-meter: 78%

Total: 87%

#790 Her Alibi (1989)

Posted on by admin

When I began watching Her Alibi, I mistook it as a thriller – that’s the way it’s certainly set up in its first 15 minutes. But as the first elements of comedy start to appear, they’re certainly not of the subtle kind, and as the 30 minute mark closes in, it becomes clear that Her Alibi derives all of its humour from the same basic setup: The writer of cheap detective novels suspecting his new eastern european girlfriend to be an assassin, after his life, and the hilarious slapstick that ensues from this, including the novelist getting his bottock pierced by an arrow.

The script makes Tom Selleck come of as a total schmuck – if a lovable one – but doesn’t give her object of desire Paulina Porizkova even that: She feels throughout the movie as distant and rude to the viewer as she does to our hero. Porizkova’s inexperience as an actress is most obvious in the already so-and-so comedic situations where a seasoned comedienne could’ve possibly still done her bit to save the scene.

Ok, so the movie made me snicker a few times. The dinner scene was well prepared with the viewer set up to anticipate the coming up gag long before it takes place, and the final scene with the neighbour setting the record straight got a good belly laugh from me. It seems after this scene that the movie has a possibility to redeem itself, but woefully it just returns to the path of weak design choices, including the ending involving some actual clowns.

Because clowns are funny.

80s-o-meter: 83%

Total: 52%

#788 Honky Tonk Freeway (1981)

Posted on by admin

One of the most expensive box office flops of the 80s, John Schlesinger’s Honky Tonk Freeway aims draw a comedic picture of America’s constant life on wheels and its total dependency on cars.

The story begins as Ticlaw, a tiny town in Florida eager to get some tourist money pouring in is completely passed by the newly opened highway. While the townfolks execute one dirty trick after another to make that own exit happen, we are introduced to a selection of random people all over the roads of USA making their way to Florida – by car, how else. Looking at the array of wacky characters in their jalopies, an obvious comparison to It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World cannot be avoided.

There are some isolated good moments here but overall the experience is crippled by endless amount of characters and subplots that fail to lead anywhere, leaving the whole experience patchy. The humor is also hit and miss, mostly playing around with some tired stereotypes and easy targets.

Besides the misfired jokes and some occasional animal cruelty there’s certain good road movie feel to the movie, which – along with the interesting cast – is definitely the strongest asset here.

80s-o-meter: 56%

Total: 58%

#786 Morgan Stewart’s Coming Home (1987)

Posted on by admin

It’s always kind of an alarming sight when a movie poster aims to piggyback ride on the success of another movie; you kind of know the movie isn’t going to be anywhere near as good as the movie the poster refers to.

Such is the case here as well – kind of. After the huge success of Pretty in Pink, 1987 became a work filled year for Jon Crier who starred in total of four movies, all of which went pretty much under the public radar – and Morgan Stewart’s Coming Home being possibly the least known of the bunch. It’s one of those movies that got panned by critics, the audience and even the team behind it when it first came out, making the movie fall completely into oblivion.

Now, 30 years later the news isn’t that bad at all and Morgan Stewart’s Coming Home seems just like most other harmless 80s comedies out there. The lighthearted tone is set in the early few minutes of the movie and the movie keeps up with that premise until the end, as predictable as it may be. Although the whole living in a golden cage situation is alien to me, Crier’s acting work and his somewhat goofy, clumsy teenage-like composure makes it easy to relate to the character and the weird situation he is caught in.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and state that Morgan Stewart’s Coming Home into one of those comedies that actually got better over time.

80s-o-meter: 87%

Total: 75%

#785 Second Sight (1989)

Posted on by admin

Second Sight is the name of a detective company where a psychic and two of his co-workers try to solve some petty little crimes together. The movie follows the same pattern throughout: An eccentric psychic gets (somewhat violent) fits, tackles people to the ground and causes all sorts of embarrassing havoc. His assistant documents the events and carefully explains the behaviour to the viewer, while the head of the agency follows the duo, constantly rolling his eyes, irritated and embarrassed by the events.

Second Sight is not a strong comedy to begin with, but really ends up completely butchered by the irritating lead character. Bronson Pinchot (of Beverly Hills Cop fame) tries to do his very best Eddie Murphy imitation to make his eccentric character work, but fails in such a painful way the end result is cringeworthy to watch.

Truth be told, the character is so poorly written that even Murphy’s comedic chops couldn’t have saved this trainwreck.

John Larroquette and Stuart Pankin as the co-workers in the agency actually perform admirably with what little script has to offer, with Larroquette’s straight face comedic acting being the only delightful aspect here.

80s-o-meter: 82%

Total: 28%

#783 Terminal Exposure aka Double Exposure (1987)

Posted on by admin

Filed in action comedies / subcategory Hollywood / subsubcategory beach movies, Terminal Exposure is a buddy movie of two young California dudes accidentally witnessing a murder and getting way more than they bargained for after deciding to investigate the matter further themselves.

It’s totally paltry and insignificant movie, but maybe because the movie totally acknowledges this and just makes the lighthearted most out of it all, Terminal Exposure manages to entertain in its own paltry, insignificant way.

The movie remains the pinnacle in both the male lead’s short careers, but there’s really nothing to be ashamed about: They actually manage to make for a well above your average dynamic duo here with some genuinely good moments between them.

80s-o-meter: 91%

Total: 72%

#782 I’m Gonna Git You Sucka (1988)

Posted on by admin

I’m Gonna Git You Sucka is a blaxploitation spoof comedy that’s style wise somewhere half way between crazy comedies like Spaceballs and The Naked Gun series and spoof comedies like Life of Brian and Return of the Killer Tomatoes.

The fundamental problem with I’m Gonna Git You Sucka is that it tries much too hard to be funny and to equal its paragons, but just isn’t nowhere witty enough to provide the actual laughs. Instead, we’re presented with funnily dressed up pimps and overdosing on gold chains, but the movie never proceeds to do anything wittier or more inventive with any of these concepts.

The strong cast is the most interesting aspect of the movie; legends of blaxploitation like Bernie Casey, Antonio Fargas, Isaac Hayes and Jim Brown prove to have a strong screen presence even if put in a weak comedy. The great Steve James reprises his role from the American Ninja series, although the script doesn’t give him much to work with. Young Chris Rock can be seen in a small role in possibly the most hilarious skits of the movie, haggling in a diner for some spare ribs.

If it’s blaxploitation comedy you’re after I can’t do nothing but recommend the amazing 2009 filmatization Black Dynamite over this one.

80s-o-meter: 67%

Total: 50%

#780 Heaven Help Us aka Catholic Boys (1985)

Posted on by admin

There are plenty of movies done in the eighties that reminisce 50s and 60s, an era when many of the film makers were young. Sometimes the trip back in time does make sense story wise – like in the Vietnam war depictions – but more often the period picture approach contributes only to the nostalgic value and doesn’t bring much more else to the table.

Heaven Help Us is one of these titles where the justification of an older time period is debatable. Sure, the catholic schools were more strict back then, but the story of the mischievous students and an abusive teacher is timeless and could’ve as well taken place in the current time. The chosen time period and catholic school theme is alien to me and initially made it harder for me to relate to the events.

But, what lays beneath is a likeable coming to age movie about unlikely friendship between a seemingly random bunch of catholic school boys and their suffocated attempts to rebel against the power that be. Debuting in their first cinematic roles can be seen Patrick Dempsey, Stephen Geoffreys in a weird role of an almost mute chronic masturbator and Kevin Dillon in a leading role as a spiteful and dumb Rooney who might be one of the worst friends one can have, but also someone you’d rather have as an ally instead of your enemy. Mary Stuart Masterson who was a slight miscast in Some Kind of Wonderful does a wonderfully charming role as the object of always likeable Andrew McCarthy’s shy and clumsy romantic attempts.

80s-o-meter: 38%

Total: 64%

#779 Disorderlies (1987)

Posted on by admin

Here’s one of those movies I’m not really eligible to review; after seeing Disorderlies just about a thousand times on a VHS back in the day, it’s impossible for me to be totally objective here.

Starring The Fat Boys, a hip hop trio from Brooklyn made famous by the MTV, Disorderlies features some very obvious comical cues adapted from The Three Stooges – another comedic trio. The Fat Boys proof to have a some natural comedic talent to them and their mellow presence translates effortlessly to the celluloid.

Disorderlies is one of those comedies that doesn’t do anything exceptionally well but still ticks most of the right boxes and provides 90 minutes of sure entertainment. The musical pieces included blend in the overall experience well, and their amount is kept just right: A forced musical this luckily isn’t.

Sadly The Fat Boys’ comedic career didn’t continue after Disorderlies – personally I wouldn’t have minded seeing them once or twice again on the silver screen.

80s-o-meter: 89%

Total: 82%

#778 Goddess of Love (1988)

Posted on by admin

Vanna White, best known to the general public as the hostess of Wheel of Fortune stars in Goddess of Love, a made-for-TV romantic comedy. Although is safe to say the movie wasn’t destined to steal away any academy awards from the theatrical releases, it’s still somewhat passable as a real movie even if the obvious commercial break transitions are a straight giveaway.

The plot: Zeus turns Venus – the goddess of love – into a statue that turns alive in 1988 Los Angeles, causing all sorts of silly events and misunderstandings to unravel. For a plot this fluffy and trifle the movie is surprisingly entertaining, and even the suspension of how it all will turn out in the end is kept admirably.

While it’s impossible to recommend the movie to anyone and still save one’s face, for those who know what they’re getting into Goddess of Love offers solid 90 minutes of nonchalant – and totally trivial – entertainment.

80s-o-meter: 88%

Total: 67%

#777 It Came from Hollywood (1982)

Posted on by admin

A collection of clips from old B-movies edited together with an added commentary track and some short skits, It Came from Hollywood is a movie that the time forgot – unlike most of the titles it aims to mock.

I can only begin to guess how an idea this weak got greenlighted: The concept must’ve been completely useless already back when the movie was originally released, and has only suffered inflation since. The entertainment factor is low here, and one couldn’t pass this kind of show even as a cheap cable TV programme these days.

The commentary provided by Dan Aykroyd, John Candy, Gilda Radner and Cheech & Chong is of the worst kind: Sarcastic but entirely without wit.

It Came from Hollywood manages to fall far behind the so called weak movies it features. That, coupled with the fact that many titles featured here aren’t even made in Hollywood makes this movie a total waste of time for both the viewer and the actors involved.

80s-o-meter: 23%

Total: 2%

#776 Maid to Order (1987)

Posted on by admin

A modern, Beverly Hills twist of the classic It’s a Wonderful Life theme, Maid to Order is a story about rich and spoiled girl who has to start all over again as a maid after the fairy godmother grants his father his wish of her daughter never being born. Yes, really.

Ally Sheedy isn’t able to sell her being the spoiled brat, which kind cripples the beginning of the movie. The movie does get somewhat interesting after the friendship amongst the staff is deepened and once the musical talents of Merry Clayton are introduced. The performance she puts on here leaves many actuals musicals to shame.

Maid to Order is super lightweight fluff that takes place firmly in that alternative reality of Hollywood. It reminds me a lot of all the unsung trailers you’d see scattered around various VHS rental tapes, of movies nobody is quite sure if they really existed.

Here’s an actual proof that some of them do.

80s-o-meter: 89%

Total: 59%