The Boost (1988)

The Boost (1988) is a movie that was recommended to me by my great movie guru buddy Rob, creator of Booze and Reviews, a site-in-progress that pairs drinks with movies, for ideal watching. 

The basic idea is that James Woods is an exec who gets hooked on coke and starts rapidly falling apart. His girlfriend is Sean Young (of Blade Runner fame) and she gets dragged down as well. Woods is Lenny, a tax professional whose career is turned upside by one of the IRS's periodic updates to the tax code. He becomes deep in debt and turns to drugs to give him "The Boost" he needs to find a solution and solve his problems.

Predictably, especially with James Woods (please see the thunderous masterpiece that is Videodrome) he goes completely insane in that way that only Woods can. Things definitely fall apart, and quickly. He spends like a madman, buying cars and dogs and all kinds of things. But someone's got to pay for all that swag...

When Woods is on drugs, he becomes extremely manic and can't be controlled. Which is really fun to watch! He has this wide, plastic grin that takes over his face, while simultaneously his eyes glaze over. And he always finds ways to embarass poor Sean Young, who is a dancer and seems to do all her own scenes (impressive!). 

My favorite parts are the crazy '80s party scenes where Woods just takes it to overdrive - especially when they go to "Mexico," which is the only place the movie shows its budget - it's definitely a backlot set somewhere. 

Amazing trivia! This movie is based on a book by ... Ben Stein. Yes, that Ben Stein! Of Ferris Bueller ("Bueller.... Bueller... Bueller... Bueller...") fame and who got his own game show Win Ben Stein's Money, back in the '90s when anything went and it was wide open. The book is titled Ludes: Ballad of the Drug and the Dream, and sounds amazing. 

Of course, this means that the original drug under discussion was quaaludes, which are downers, rather than cocaine. Frankly I think Woods would be just as crazy on ludes as he was on coke. This movie was made on a shoestring budget, although you can't really tell - they do a good job of avoiding that B-movie look. 

It was directed by Harold Backer who is best known for the minor Al Pacino classic Sea of Love (which is excellent) and also The Onion Field, Vision Question ('80s classic!), Taps, and Malice. He seems to have stopped making movies around 2001, according to IMDB. 

The Boost was a major failure, unfortunately. IMDB reports it cost $8 million to make and brought back less than one million. This means that very few people ever saw it, which is a real shame. It's not fantastic, but it's worth seeing and has a number of entertaining scenes. 

Still of the Night (1982)

This is a movie I'd never heard about before searching cable for '80s fare - Still of the Night (1982) with Roy Scheider and Meryl Streep. Confession: I dislike Meryl Streep. I can never accept her in any role, I always sense that she is Acting with a capital A. But I like Roy Scheider a lot, so I gave it a shot. Also, I am contractually bound to watch it according to the terms of the blog. 

Sadly, it's not very good. After psychologist Sam Rice (Scheider) loses a patient to a brutal murder, he encounters the patient's mistress (Streep) who he is incredibly intrigued by and starts to fall for. Meanwhile, he reviews his case notes and starts investigating on his own. 

His investigation quickly goes off the rails and gets murdery. He gets mugged, mugger takes his coat (!?) and then mugger is immediately misidentified as Scheider and is murdered. Uh oh! 

There is one tense scene that caught my attention where Scheider visits Streep as she's getting a massage. His leering gaze and her subtle manipulation thereof are very well done, and you're left with a complex atmosphere of reversed sexual tension, where he is powerless but to observe and she uses it to her advantage. 

But otherwise, the movie is pretty dull. I have to say that the print MGM ran on their channel was amazingly good. Crystal clear, all the colors intact, not grainy, no artifacts ... just in great shape. When the best thing you can say about a movie is that the print is good, that's a bad sign.

I tried to watch this twice, and just couldn't get into it. And it seems I'm vindicated, since when Meryl Streep was asked "what's one bad movie you acted in?" she immediately answered with this one.

It was directed by Robert Benton, who is best known for Kramer vs. Kramer and Places in the Heart. Maybe also Billy Bathgate and Nobody's Fool with Paul Newman. It cost $10,000,000 to make and only grossed a total of about $3,000,000 - so a major failure. However, it clearly didn't slow Streep down, since her next movie was Sophie's Choice which won her her first Oscar. Roy Scheider's career, however, rapidly wound down. 

Avoid, which will be easy since you've also probably never heard of this and it only came on TV because MGM is dumping their film library onto their cable channel. 

Dressed to Kill (1980)

Brian De Palma was heavily, heavily influenced by Alfred Hitchcock and it shows. His movies always feature characters on their own against horrible evil that lurks underneath a pleasant facade. So today we cover his first movie of the '80s - Dressed to Kill (1980). 

Dressed to Kill starts with a wild, "WOW!" opening - we see a woman touching herself in the shower as she watches a man shaving with a straight razor as lilting, romantic soap opera music for violins plays. Then, suddenly, shockingly, she is attacked in the shower by a man. She cries out a horrible scream that echoes as the screen fades to black ... and cuts to her in bed, making love with dead eyes to the man who was shaving earlier. 

This is a twisted world, my friends. This is Angie Dickinson's masterpiece, as well. She is just top notch, working with Michael Caine (always good). She plays Kate Miller, a bored housewife who has your everyday housewife rape fantasies ... and who begins a real affair with a stranger she meets at a museum... and then is brutally murdered (!!!!!!!). 

Taking cues from Hitchcock's Psycho, De Palma kills off the purported heroine a third of the way in, shocking audiences and destabilizing the viewer. But there was a witness to her murder ... Liz, an escort, who must team up with the slaughtered Kate's electronics-wizard son to catch the killer when the cops (as in Hitchcock) prove stupid, ineffective, unwilling to help. Caine plays Kate's psychologist who tries to help solve the murder with no help from the authorities. 

This movie is chock full of incredible style and iconography taken right from Hitchcock - the fantastic museum scene (extremely reminiscent of the scene in Vertigo where Jimmy Stewart follows a woman to an art museum in San Francisco). It starts in total silence, and ends with a series of tracking shots of Kate alternated with shots from her point of view as she curiously follows the man she has shared glances with. In Hitchcock, as in this movie, such tracking shots mean the character is being drawn irresistibly into a terribly dangerous position (see: Notorious, North by Northwest, Vertigo, many others). It's used to great effect here. 

The film also has a great soundtrack (by Pino Donaggio) full of lilting violins that remind me very much of Angelo Badalamenti's immortal score for David Lynch's Blue Velvet (1986). It enriches every scene and fabricates an atmosphere of real danger ... but classy danger. I would go so far as to say this is one of the best orchestral soundtracks of the 1980's. 

The camera is always moving, as well. We see Kate on the museum stairs (stairs - another Hitchcock icon, where the character encounters some danger) and the camera lowers, pans left, zooms back out to show a taxi, then zooms in to show the stranger waving her glove at her in a "come hither" way. The camera works as almost a surrogate for the viewer, and as such it enhance the tension tremendously.

I could write about this movie all night - a good sign - but will instead say instead that the look of the film is also heavily inspired by Vertigo - shadows alternate with bright clothing choices (white especially) and interesting, baroque sets. It looks great. 

Be sure to catch Dennis Franz as the terrible cop - but with a full head of dark hair!

The movie did very well in the box office. IMDB reports it cost $6.5 mil to make and brought back almost $32 mil - pretty damn good for a mid-July release in 1980, coming up against The Empire Strikes Back, Caddyshack, and Airplane. 

Easy Money (1983)

I love Rodney Dangerfield. I just do. I dig his schtick. I find him funny in pretty much every way. He drinks too much, he smokes too much, he has that sad sack face, and he gets no respect. Just none at all. 

Happily for the purposes of this blog, Dangerfield was at the peak of his popularity in the '80s and starred in three very good movies, all of them very funny. Today we'll deal with the middle film of the three: 1983's Easy Money. 

Great comedic cast! Dangerfield, Joe Pesci (with thick black hair!), Jeffrey Jones, Val Avery, Tom Noonan, Tom Ewell are the biggest ones. Also,a bonus: Jennifer Jason Leigh in one of her first post-Ridgemont roles as Dangerfield's daughter (!).

The plot here is that inveterate smoker, drinker, overeater, and above all gambler Monty Capuletti (Montague + Capulet ... someone was a Shakespeare fan) is getting married. His late mother-in-law, tired of his degenerate ways, writes a will that states (like so many movie wills) that if he cleans up his ways for one year, he will inherit 10 million dollars. 

But for Dangerfield, that is a big deal. A really, really big deal. One of the first scenes shows him placing bets on harness racing - where crazy Joe Pesci goes bananas like he will later in so many movies, and attacks a losing jockey. Does Pesci EVER play a calm, normal citizen? It would be a revelation. He's either attacking someone, being attacked, or being mocked or satirized for being so vibrantly Italian.

Anyway, this movie is similar to many "do X to inherit millions" movies like Brewster's Millions or King Ralph or a few others. As always, there is some evil character who stands to inherit the money if our hero fails - in this case it's a department store manager, since the mother-in-law owned the store. 

But this movie also surprises you in that it is fairly tender and gentle. For example, an early high point is a crazy, inspired rendition of "Funiculi Funicula" by Dangerfield at his daughter's wedding which could have come right out of a movie like Broadway Danny Rose. 

And the advice he gives his family - from the little girl in the opening scene (very funny) to his daughter - is surprisingly wise. Dangerfield shows hints of three-dimensionality, which is kind of unusual for an actor generally played for the broadest of laughs.

There is also a significant plot twist near the end involving the inheritance that I really want to spoil - what are the chances you, reading this, will someday come across this movie and then say, sighing, if ONLY it hadn't been spoiled for me - but I will withhold and say only that the twist (and counter-twist) is fairly clever and betrays a more clever writer than you'd expect. 

Which brings us to "Who wrote this, anyway?" Unsurprisingly, Rodney Dangerfield had a heavy hand. But VERY surprisingly, P. J. O'Rourke is listed as a co-writer. A big favorite of an ex-girlfriend of mine, I had no idea he was involved with anything like this. Big props to Mr. O'Rourke. And as far as I can discover, this is the ONLY movie he had a hand in. What are the odds?!?!

This is also fairly unusual fare from longtime SNL director James Signorelli. As far as I can tell, his ONLY other feature film was the Elvira: Mistress of the Dark movie (!!!). What a weird pedigree... Easy Money and Elvira. This movie is filled with strange Hollywood coincidences. 

As far as money goes, Wikipedia reports it brought in $30,000,000 - and I guarantee it didn't cost that to make, so it definitely made a lot of money. Good! Soon I'll review Back to School, probably THE classic Rodney Dangerfield '80s movie (yes, more than Caddyshack). 

And now, a treat for you: 

House of Games (1987)

House of Games (1987) is sort of the definition of an art house movie. Written and directed by noted screenwriter David Mamet, it's about a woman psychologist's descent into the world of confidence artists. As her sense of what is real and what is part of the game blurs, the viewer, too, is conned. 

On top of that is a really strange acting style I can barely describe except as "robotic." Mamet's wife Lindsay Crouse plays the main role, and everything she says is clipped and measured carefully. "Yes, I had a good night. I am going to leave now. Yes, in this taxi. This is my taxi, and I am about to drive away. Have a good night, please. Goodnight." 

Everything is like that. It heightens the surreality of the whole venture to a fever pitch. The viewer always THINKS they are one step ahead of her, but you never really are. In an early scene at a poker game, they deliberately let Crouse believe she has discovered a con - the scene is fantastic and features a wonderful Ricky Jay - but even as you sit and think "ha, she thinks she is in the know, but something is up," little do you suspect that something is WAY up and there are about eight levels of con going on. 

It's a hypnotic movie as well. It's metered out very specifically and carefully, with a deliberate pacing that refuses to give in to your desire to get a solution right away. It really helps the movie deceive you (and her). The way the movie identifies you with the woman, her journey becomes your journey. Or so you think. 

The movie also has an interesting soundtrack full of xylophones that vibrate around eerily, and it looks interesting - a shadowy look full of blacks and reds and blues. The world is off-kilter and predatory, and it lets you know from the beginning to the end. 

The cast is a murderer's row - Joe Mantegna, Ricky Jay, David Caruso, J.T. Walsh, Mike Nussbaum, more. They all perfectly inhabit their universe of mixed sleeze and respectability. 

It also features a wow ending that I refuse to spoil, but will highly recommend if you think you're interested in the kind of movie I've laid out so far. 

Raw Deal (1986), Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)

 
One of the perils of trying to blog about every movie from the '80s is that I end up seeing more movies than I have time to write about. This week I'm going to try to catch up a little bit and cover a wide variety of things. 

Today's offering is going to be a study in complete contrasts: Arnold Schwarzenegger's most braindead film, Raw Deal (1986) against what might be Woody Allen's most cerebral, Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989). 

I should preface this by saying that like most young boys in the '80s I completely idolized Arnold Schwarzenegger (and Stallone and Ford and Willis, et al). It's easy to see why: Schwarzenegger is huge, invincible, usually the good guy, never loses, and is just a massive force to be reckoned with. He is the ultimate action hero. 

But my sister made a good point the other day: why did/does Hollywood persistently ignore his blatant Austrian-ness and instead insist on labeling him some super-American stereotype? His characters always have the most generically American names imaginable: 

• Adam Gibson (the 6th Day)
• Ben Richards (The Running Man)
• John Kimble (Kindergarten Cop)
• Douglas Quaid (Total Recall)
• Alex Hesse (Junior)
• Gordy Brewer (!!!, Collateral Damage)
• Harry Tasker (True Lies)
• Howard Langston (Jingle All the Way)
• Jack Slater (Last Action Hero)
• Jericho Cane (!!!, End of Days)
• John Matrix (!!!!!!!!!, Commando)
• John Kruger (Eraser)

I mean, come on! Adam, Ben, Gordy, three times John?? And John Matrix??? Man. 

I'm not sure why they insisted on doing this. At least Predator acknowledged his Germanity by calling him "Dutch." It's a strange phenomena, and yet I never heard anyone comment on it until now. It's like everyone just said to themselves "anyone that big GOTTA be American" and pretended the accent was just a delightful quirk. 

Raw Deal is about a former FBI agent (here named alternately Mark Kaminsky or Joe, depending on which identity he's in) who goes undercover to infiltrate the mob after the mob targets  the family of the head of the FBI. The longer story is that he was kicked out of the FBI for roughing up a suspect, and has become the sheriff of a small town in North Carolina (!!!) before he's lured back to the case with the promise of reinstatement if he can infiltrate the mob and take them down. I always wonder if deals like this really happen. 

I have to say, as a die-hard (haha) Schwarzenegger fan, this is my probably my least favorite of all his movies. It has all the requisite '80s-isms (pumping rock soundtrack with lead guitar everywhere and surprise sax solos ... macho gunfights ... bad one-liners ... endless bad guys who can't shoot straight but sure do die quick) but somehow just never clicks. It's kind of joyless. 

Schwarzenegger apparently liked making this because he finally got to wear a "normal" wardrobe (no more Conan loincloth, Terminator leather jacket, etc) and he DOES look more normal here than in most movies - suits, hair slicked back, etc. But the movie as a whole is too slow, a little dull, and doesn't have enough "pop" in it. It satisfies, but it doesn't enchant. 

The big gunfight finale in the casino is a real treat, even though it pales against Commando, Terminator, Predator, and a couple others. But apparently I'm not the only one to think so; this guy voted it #2, second only to Commando: 

http://whatculture.com/film/arnold-schwarzeneggers-top-20-greatest-action-scenes.php/20

Raw Deal was directed by John Irving - no, not THAT John Irving - who also directed The Dogs of War (1980), Ghost Story (1981), Hamburger Hill (1987), the "good" Robin Hood from the '90s (1991), and a bunch of ones that sound intriguing but that I've never seen. 

Like most of Arnold's '80s fare, it made money - although not as much or as wildly as other ones. According to IMDB it cost $8.5 million and grossed about twice that. 

Now, the pendulum swings... Crimes and Misdemeanors comes near the last part of Woody Allen's truly great period, dating roughly from Annie Hall through Manhattan and Zelig and Broadway Danny Rose and Purple Rose of Cairo and Hannah and Her Sisters and Radio Days to this movie and then roughly until Bullets Over Broadway in '94. 

Anyone who has seen Match Point (2005) has seen half of this movie - the serious half. There are several plot threads at work here, but the main one for our consideration deals with opthamologist Judah (Martin Landau) who is in crisis - his spurned mistress wants to tell his wife about their long-running affair, and Judah's financial improprieties with his business (never explicitly mentioned, but you get the idea he was using business money for personal use). Coming forward like this would destroy Judah's life - his wife has no idea, his kids have no idea, and he seems to be a respected, beloved figure both in his religious community and in New York at large. 

If it sounds familiar, it's because it's almost identical to the dilemma that Jonathan Rhys-Meyers faces in Match Point, when his affair with Scarlett Johansson threatens his up-and-coming life with his wealthy wife and her family. 

So the main plot centers around the question: What should Judah do? His choices are framed as two forks, one of which centers around his brother Jack (the masterful Jerry Orbach) who has ties to the mob and advocates rubbing the mistress out of the picture... and Ben (the subtle, excellent Sam Waterston), a rabbi going blind but faces it gracefully, and advocates coming clean, and trusting that a high power will make things right. 

But unlike Match Point, this movie is funny, as seen in the side plot featuring Cliff (Woody Allen's character), a documentary filmmaker trapped in a loveless marriage who is given the chance to make a TV biography of his brother-in-law Lester (a very funny Alan Alda), who he hates. Lester is a blowhard with all kinds of theories including the classic "If it bends, it's funny, if it breaks, it's not funny!" which he punctuates with a comment about joking about Abraham Lincoln's assassination. "Back then, you couldn't joke about it... but now, it's fair game!!" or something to that effect. Great stuff.

But Cliff's like is complicated by an affair of his own - he is falling for Halley, the producer of the TV bio, played by Mia Farrow, who is a sensitive, delicate, funny, clever character. And then Lester turns his eye toward Halley as well...

Small trivia note: Lester is apparently based on comedy writer Larry Gelbart, who is largely responsible for the character of Hawkeye Pierce in M*A*S*H. So Alan Alda is playing the man who wrote the character that made him famous; this is like Peter Dinklage someday portraying George R. R. Martin, or Mark Hamill portraying George Lucas. Kind of surreal.

The movie is bracing, funny, beautiful, has an incredible soundtrack, and a completely devastating, shocking ending. I have always suspected this movie ends the way Allen wished Hannah and Her Sisters ended - he always has claimed to regret the happy, upbeat ending of Hannah. This movie has a much more grounded, realistic ending. No spoilers, you have to see it. 

Sadly, this movie actually seems to have lost a little money - IMDB says it cost $19 million to make and brought back just shy of that. I hope it's entered the black after all these years on video, etc. It deserves it. 

As a teaching assistant for the only dedicated film professor at the University of Maryland in the 2000s, I must have seen Crimes and Misdemeanors about 25 times, maybe more. But I never tire of it. It comes together perfectly, and has a fantastic mix of elements that keeps it fresh after all these years. Among the very best of Woody Allen from his best period, and highly recommended. 

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989)

Merry Christmas, world!

Today my sister introduced me to National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989). I'd seen the previous two (Vacation and European Vacation), but never this one somehow. 

Like all the Vacation movies, your appreciation really depends on how much you like Chevy Chase. I happen to not like him EXCEPT for these movies, so I'm in luck. But your mileage may differ - I know plenty of people who can't stand his well-meaning-but-oh-so-dumb persona. 

Here he yet again plays the head of the Griswald clan, and yet again the kids are played by two new kids - Juliette Lewis (!) and Johnny Galecki (!!). And the wife is the lovely Beverly D'Angelo who is pretty fun here. 

In this iteration of the formula, the Griswold family and in-laws (including a very funny Randy Quaid) assemble while various crazy antics play out: Griswald puts up a too-big tree in his living room. Griswald gets stuck in the attic. Griswald puts up an insane Christmas light display. Griswald (sort of) kidnaps his boss. Griswald Griswald Griswald. 

I especially like how he inadvertently tortures his yuppie neighbors (Julie Louis-Dreyfus and Nicholas Guest). 

This movie has a few very funny moments - his speech when he receives his "bonus" ... a few great facial expressions and reaction shots ... and a few total dud moments too (the entire opening I find almost unbearable). 

It's difficult to really describe or review a gag movie like this, so I won't try too hard. It made good money back in 1989, costing $27 mil to make and bringing back $71. The script is another gem by John Hughes, and the director is veteran TV director Jeremiah Chechik, who is probably best known for Benny & Joon. 

Nice piece of '80s trivia: the truck he races in the opening scene is Kurt Russell's work truck from Overboard (1987 and a particular favorite of your blogger, being the first movie my family saw on our VHS player). 

And sad to say, the tremendous Lindsay Buckingham song "Holiday Road" is not featured anywhere in this movie. A real loss.