Category Archives: Adolescence/High School

Private Lessons (1981)

Posted on August 26, 2015 | 2 comments

private lessons

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: Housekeeper seduces a minor.

Mallow (Sylvia Kristel) is an English nanny working for a rich client named Fillmore (Ron Foster) who gets involved in a scheme with the family’s chauffer Lester (Howard Hesseman) to seduce Fillmore’s 15-year-old son Philly (Eric Brown). The idea is for her to fake having a heart attack during their lovemaking and convince Philly that he has killed her and then Lester will blackmail him to take $10,000 out of the family’s safe and give it to him has hush money for not reporting it to the police, but Philly is smarter than they think and not only catches onto their scheme, but has a double-cross in store for them as well.

The idea of having an adult making love to a minor most likely wouldn’t have gotten the green light today. To me it reeked of being a major double-standard. If the genders had been reversed and it had been a 15-year-old girl seduced by an older man this thing would’ve been considered obscene and banned, but because it involves a teen boy with ‘raging hormones’ instead that somehow makes it ‘okay’ and is approached as being nothing more than an innocuous sexual ‘coming-of-age’ flick, which I found to be both annoying and aggravating.

The scene involving the young Brown getting naked and hopping into the tub with the equally naked Kristel where they then fondle and kiss each other seemed like child erotica and will most likely make viewers today who are now much more sensitive on this topic feel uncomfortable to watch. The ending in which the two go to bed together in a very drawn-out sensual segment that is done under a romantic context is downright smarmy. Viewers wanting to watch this simply to catch Kristel naked will be disappointed to know that most of her nude scenes were done using a body double named Judy Helden.

The script was written by Dan Greenburg, who also appears briefly as a seedy hotel owner and based on his 1969 novel ‘Philly’. He is a noted humorist who eight years earlier wrote the script to the film with the quirky title of I Could Never Have Sex with any Man Who has Such Little Respect for My Husband. For the most part this film is rather bland, but manages to pick up a bit during the second half when the story twist kicks in that at the very least makes it better than most other teen sex comedies, which are usually devoid of any discernable plot at all.

The script though is full of holes. For one thing it is highly doubtful that a rich parent would give their child a combination to a safe that has tons of money in it and there is never any explanation of what was put into the body bag that is hoisted into the ground and buried when Lester was still tricking Philly into believing it was the dead Mallow. Obviously it wasn’t her, so what was used to make it seem like a dead body? The film never says, but should’ve. Also, I found it hard to believe that Mallow and Philly could go out to a fancy restaurant and make out with each other openly in a booth and not have it create a stir and distraction with the other patrons especially when it was clearly involving an adult and a minor.

Brown whose only other claim to fame was playing Ken Berry’s son in the first two seasons of ‘Mama’s Family’ gives an engaging performance, but I couldn’t help but wonder what his parents where feeling and thinking during the love scenes. It’s also interesting to see Hesseman who wears a wig and has his mustache dyed brown in a rare turn as a heavy. Begley Jr. gets a few kudos in his attempt to play a ‘tough guy’ cop and Dan Barrows makes the most of his small role as the family’s gardener.

The film has a surprisingly great soundtrack that feature a lot of hits from the day which include: ‘Hot Legs’, ‘Tonight’s the Night’ and ‘You’re in My Heart’ by Rod Stewart as well as ‘Just When I Needed You the Most’ by Randy Van Warmer, ‘I Need a Lover’ by John Cougar, ‘Fantasy’ by Earth, Wind and Fire, ‘Next Time You See Her’ by Eric Clapton and ‘Lost in Love’ by Air Supply. How such a low budget movie was able to pay for the rights to these songs is a mystery, but it definitely adds pizazz and helps give the film an extra point.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: August 28, 1981

Runtime: 1Hour 27Minutes

Rated R

Director: Alan Myerson

Studio: Jensen Farley Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video, Hulu

2 Comments

Posted in 80's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Campy Comedy, Erotica, Movies Based on Novels, Movies with Nudity, Sex

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My Tutor (1983)

Posted on August 24, 2015 | 1 comment

my tutor

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 1 out of 10

4-Word Review: Tutoring him in sex.

Bobby (Matt Latanzi) is a high school senior set to graduate and go onto Yale even though he would rather go to UCLA and study astrology. In either case he fails his French class, which impedes him from attending either school. His concerned and controlling father (Kevin McCarthy) decides to hire a tutor named Terry (Caren Kaye) to live with them in their mansion estate while helping Bobby with his French so he can pass the course. Bobby though starts to become attracted to Terry and the two eventually become lovers much to the consternation of his father who would rather have the attractive woman all to himself.

I was still in high school when this film came out and living in a small Minnesota town as a preacher’s kid. I remember my Dad getting a call from some man who had watched this film in the theater and become ‘outraged’ at its ‘pornographic’ nature. He wanted to form picketers at all the area theaters that where showing it and eventually create a nationwide protest movement that he hoped would eventually get the film banned for being what he considered ‘obscene’.

Although there certainly is nudity it is only of the topless variety and it’s no more ‘outrageous’ than any of the many other teen sex comedies of the ‘80s. If the film is offensive in any way it is because it is dumb and uninspired and filled with a lot of silly humor that would be better suited for a Disney flick. The romantic angle is formulaic and the scene of the two in bed together is more mechanical than erotic and hurt by a sappy love song that gets played over it.

Lattanzi, who at one time was married to singer Olivia Newton-John and the father of Chloe Lattanzi, has a deer-in-headlights look about him and a limited acting ability to match it. He looks too old to be playing a teen and appears to be more like 24, which is what he really was. The idea that this good-looking guy with chiseled features could not make it with any of the girls is hard to believe and in a lot of ways the character behaves more like he is a naïve 14 year-old than someone headed for college.

McCarthy is a far better actor who manages to have a screen presence, which the transparent Lattanzi clearly knows nothing about. The fact that the old man makes a play for the tutor should’ve been played up more and I was surprised that when she flatly rejects his advances he didn’t just up and fire her and replace her with some other tutor, which would’ve helped give the otherwise one-dimensional script more conflict.

Arlene Golonka adds some light levity as the ditzy mother and its great seeing Crispin Glover in his film debut playing one of Bobby’s friends and for a change a more ‘normal’ type of character, which is freaky in itself. Clark Brandon, who enjoyed a brief acting career in the ‘80s and an even briefer foray into directing during the ‘90s, is also fun as Bobby’s other friend Billy who also gets the film’s one-and-only funny exchange when he tries to ask a blonde for a dance:

Billy: Would you care to dance with me?

Blonde: No thank you.

Billy: Then I suppose a blow job is completely out of the question.

My Rating: 1 out of 10

Released: April 22, 1983

Runtime: 1Hour 37Minutes

Rated R

Director: George Bowers

Studio: Crown International Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 80's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Campy Comedy, Movies with Nudity, Sex

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Lisa, Bright and Dark (1973)

Posted on August 6, 2015 | 3 comments

lisa bright and dark 1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: Teen has mental illness.

Based on the acclaimed novel by John Neufeld the story centers on Lisa (Kay Lenz) a teenage girl who begins behaving in strange ways. She feels that she is suffering from some sort of mental illness and asks her parents (John Forsythe, Anne Baxter) if she can see a psychiatrist, but they refuse as they were raised in an era where mental illness was considered a ‘character flaw’ that didn’t occur to ‘respectable’ people and psychiatry was still thought of as a ‘new-age’ type of practice. Her friends (Debralee Scott, Jamie Smith-Jackson, and Anne Lockhart) think differently and try to get her the help that she needs, but when that fails they then read up on psychotherapy themselves and try to help Lisa with their own brand of therapy.

This film, which aired on NBC in November of 1973 as a Hallmark Hall of Fame presentation, was critically acclaimed at the time, but it has not aged well. I applaud the effort at trying to destigmatize the myth of psychiatry, but the drama often times comes off as strained and unintentionally funny. The sappy songs by Rod McKuen are abysmal and enough to drive the viewer as batty as the main character.

I found it strange how enlightened Lisa’s teen friends were about mental illness and wasn’t quite sure that I bought into it. I would think they would be just as confused and frightened of Lisa’s behavior as the adults and maybe try to stay away from her completely. Seeing how sympathetic Lisa’s classmates are to her condition is nice, but not realistic. At that age I would imagine some of the teens would ostracize and mock Lisa while considering her some sort of ‘freak’ and the film would’ve been better balanced had at least shown briefly some of that, which it doesn’t. The idea that these girls could read a few books by Sigmund Freud and then be able to perform psychotherapy is laughable and the whole thing would’ve been better served had it taken place in a college setting as the students all look college-aged anyways and the plot would’ve been more believable because it could’ve had her working with students or interns that were majoring in psychiatry.

The film never bothers to give any type of explanation for Lisa’s issues nor any inkling as to whether she was able to find some sort of adjustment through medication or therapy. It all seems like an excuse to promote the acceptance of psychiatry to the mainstream and not about the main character at all, which makes it come off as a thinly veiled ‘message movie’ and nothing more.

Lenz, who for a time was married to singer/actor David Cassidy, does well in the title role, but I didn’t care much of her toothy smile. It is fun seeing Anson Williams and Erin Moran in supporting roles as they both later became cast members to the long running TV-show ‘Happy Days’. Richard Stahl also appears as the father of one of the girls, but has his voice dubbed for some reason, which was quite strange.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: November 28, 1973

Runtime: 1Hour 15Minutes

Director: Jeannot Szwarc

Studio: Hallmark Hall of Fame Productions

Available: DVD (Out-of-print)

3 Comments

Posted in 70's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Drama, Made-for-TV, Movies Based on Novels, Obscure Movies

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Losin’ It (1983)

Posted on August 5, 2015 | 4 comments

losin it

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: Road trip to Tijuana

Four classmates (Tom Cruise, Jackie Earle Haley, John Stockwell, and John P. Navin Jr.) load up into a 1957 Red Chevrolet Bel Air to take a trip down to Tijuana where they to hope to lose their virginity to the local prostitutes. Unfortunately they end up getting more than they bargained for as they get harassed by one of the local cops (Henry Darrow) as well as taking on an added passenger by the name of Kathy (Shelley Long) who they meet at a convenience store in the midst of a fight that she is having with her husband and now wants to hitch a ride with them so she can get a quickie divorce.

Although the plot description may sound sleazy this is by far one of the better raunchy teen comedies to come out of the ‘80s. The film was directed by noted horror director Curtis Hanson and written by the prolific Bill L. Norton. The production values are high and although not actually filmed in the real Tijuana it still gives the viewer a realistic sense of the both the street and party scene that is down there. The characters are more multi-dimensional than in the typical teen comedy and the action remains realistic with humor that is amusing without getting overblown.

The film does shift uncomfortably in tone during the second half and features some unpleasant scenes including having one of the boys thrown into a dirty and dangerous Mexican prison while another gets hung up in midair by a crane while being threatened with a blow torch. Initially I didn’t like this shift, but the film still manages to keep things interesting and culminates in a funny car chase back to the border, which due to what the characters have gone through, is more thrilling than in most comedies simply because the viewer is genuinely wrapped up into their plight to get out of there.

Cruise gives an outstanding performance playing completely against type as he is nowhere near his usual cocky self here and instead comes off as shy and awkward and even has the embarrassment of being unable to ‘rise-to-the-occasion’ when alone with one of the women. Haley is quite energetic and funny and Navin as his baby faced kid brother, who’s more sensible than the rest of them despite being the youngest, is a real scene stealer. Darrow, best known for playing Zorro, gets one of his better latter career roles as the corrupt cop.

The film is supposed to take place in 1965 instead of the ‘80s and I wasn’t sure why as what the characters go through could have easily taken place in either decade. The title tune, which gets played both at the beginning and end of the flick, has a very strong ‘80’s sound, which seems jarring and out-of-place in a picture that supposedly has a ‘60’s setting.

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: April 22, 1983

Runtime: 1Hour 40Minutes

Rated R

Director: Curtis Hanson

Studio: Embassy Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD

4 Comments

Posted in 80's Movies, Action/Adventure, Adolescence/High School, Comedy/Drama, Movies with Nudity, Road Movies, Sex

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Can’t Buy Me Love (1987)

Posted on July 20, 2015 | Leave a comment

cant buy me love

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 8 out of 10

4-Word Review: Geek dates hot cheerleader.

As a small tribute to Amanda Peterson who unfortunately died recently at the young age of 43 after many years of battling with drug addiction and even spending some time behind bars, I decided to review this film. Even though she was in 5 movies during the 80’s and starred in two TV-series including the short-lived, but critically acclaimed ‘A Year in the Life’ her part her as Cindy Mancini has become her signature role.

amanda 1

The plot revolves around Ronald (Patrick Dempsey) a high school nerd who secretly has a crush on class beauty Cindy, but realizes that she is way out of his league. Then one day while attempting to buy a telescope that he has saved up for by spending the summer mowing lawns he comes into contact with her at a mall as she is attempting to replace a dress that she borrowed from her mother (Sharon Farrell) without her permission and then accidently ruined. She doesn’t have the money to buy a new one, so Ronald offers to use his telescope money to buy it, but under the condition that she pretends to be in a relationship with him and act as his girlfriend for one month. Cindy reluctantly agrees, but finds to her surprise that she starts to grow fond of him, but when the month is over and their pseudo-relationship ends Ronald uses his new found popularity to jettison to the top of the social scene while becoming quite obnoxious in the process. Cindy tries to rekindle the romance, but Ronald has found new conquests and has no time for her, which gets her angry enough that she eventually tells everyone about their secret deal.

This movie, which was filmed on-location at the Tucson High School in Tucson, Arizona, is a gem especially for an 80’s teen comedy and making it one of the better ones from that decade and quite easily one of the best teen romances of all time. Part of the charm is that it lives out the dream of every geek young and old who has ever fantasized about going out with the hottest girl in school, but then takes this wish fulfillment fantasy and puts it inside a realistic scenario. It also makes a good comment as to just how fickle and shallow the high school popularity game really is. The characters are much more multi-dimensional than in most teen comedies especially Cindy’s and I also liked the way the film keeps things real, but still manages to maintain the innocence of that age without ever seeming overly sanitized.

Dempsey is great and he manages to get you to empathize with his sad, geeky quandary without ever making it seem too pathetic.  The part where he stays up late one night and counts up all the days he had to go through before finally seeing a naked female breast is the funniest part in the movie. However, by-and-large this is Peterson’s vehicle and she is splendid. I loved how her character starts out as being just another superficial teen girl, but slowly evolves into becoming much deeper and introspective and exposing a lot of class along the way.

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Normally I hate bratty little brother characters, but a young Seth Green makes the one here quite enjoyable. I also liked how the parents are not portrayed as being overly authoritative relics of bygone era, but human beings as well and Cindy’s relationship with her mother where half time she seems more like the mature one is fun.

Of course the film does suffer from a few shortcomings. Ronald’s impassioned ‘why can’t we all just get along’ speech that he gives near the end may have merit, but comes off as too melodramatic and corny.  I also thought these kids who were all supposedly seniors behaved too much like they were still in middle school where the teen social caste system is much more rigidly followed, but becomes less important and more phased out as they enter the senior high. It is also inconceivable how anyone even an out-of-it geek like Ronald could ever mistake a PBS show dealing with Africa tribal dances with ‘American Bandstand’.

Despite being an 80’s movie it doesn’t seem all that dated and I think teens today could still relate to it. Sure the characters don’t have smartphones or the other technological gadgets of today, but the foundation of teen life is still there and the movie does a great job of speaking to them on their level without ever seeming like their talking down to them.

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My Rating: 8 out of 10

Released: August 14, 1987

Runtime: 1Hour 34Minutes

Rated PG-13

Director: Steve Rash

Studio: Buena Vista Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video, YouTube

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Posted in 80's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Comedy/Drama, Cult, Movies Based on Songs, Romance

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Me, Natalie (1969)

Posted on July 8, 2015 | 1 comment

me natalie 1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: Homely girl finds independence.

Natalie (Patty Duke) has been plagued all her life as being unattractive and overlooked time and again by other men. Her parents (Nancy Marchand, Phillip Sterling) promise her that way day she will grow up to be beautiful, but it never happens. When she finds out that they secretly promise one of her potential suitors (Bob Balaban) that they will pay for his education to become an eye doctor if he agrees to marry her she becomes deeply hurt and decides to move out. Things are not easy at first, but she manages to find a job and a decent apartment in Greenwich Village. It is there that she meets David (James Farentino) an older man who she falls deeply in love with only to find out that he is married.

Duke does well in the lead role although this was at the height of her bipolar disorder, which was untreated at the time and it caused many problems on the set between her and director Fred Coe that was later chronicled her autobiographic book ‘Call Me Anna’ and subsequent 1990 TV-Movie of the same name. On the looks department the character really isn’t that bad and her ‘ugliness’ consists mainly of some bad buck teeth that could probably have been immediately resolved with a good orthodontist and some braces.

It’s the character’s personality that is really unattractive. She is extremely whiny as well as being bag of insecurities that falls completely apart the second she is faced with anything unpleasant or unexpected. She is constantly judging other women on their looks even though she expects everyone else to look past her own physical flaws and resents them when they don’t. There is even a scene where she coldly rejects an overweight man who asks her to dance by calling him a ‘loser’. While I applaud the film for showing us a candid portrait of an individual that goes well beyond the manufactured politically correct persona of a protagonist that we are so used to seeing it still may be tough going for most viewers to have much empathy for her.

What I liked about the movie is that it starts out as an old fashioned kitchen sink drama of this lonely girl stuck in a drab existence and simply looking to get married and then blossoms into something completely different as she gets out into the world and experiences the big city and late ’60s attitudes. The film has a few memorable scenes including her job at a topless and bottomless bar in which the waitresses are required to wear all black that covers even their faces and then they are fitted with prosthetic breasts and butts that they wear around the outside of their outfits and glow-in-the-dark. They then walk around the darkened restaurant taking customer orders while looking like a collage of floating female body parts.

The one thing that really hurts the film as a whole is the musical score by Henry Mancini. Normally I’m a big fan of his, but here his melodic stuff sounds out-of-date and not in touch with the late ’60s or the young people living in it. Simply because one may be a great composer doesn’t mean he’s a perfect fit for every project and this was clearly one of them as the music has a 1940’s quality to it that made the picture seem highly dated even at the time.

The movie though does successfully make a great point, which is that one can only find true happiness from inner peace and not by being dependent on the reactions of others. It also marks the film debut of Al Pacino who is seen briefly as a young man who asks Natalie for a dance at a high school social and then immediately asks her if she ‘puts out’.

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: July 13, 1969

Runtime: 1Hour 51Minutes

Rated M

Director: Fred Coe

Studio: National General Pictures

Available: None at this time.

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Posted in 60's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Comedy/Drama, Movies that take place in the Big Apple, Obscure Movies, Romance

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The Lord’s of Flatbush (1974)

Posted on March 21, 2015 | Leave a comment

lords of flatbush 2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: Sly and the Fonz.

Butchey (Henry Winkler) forms a leather jacket gang with his friends at a Brooklyn city high school during the 1950’s. The group is made up of Stanley (Sylvester Stallone) who is forced to marry his girlfriend when he gets her pregnant and Chico (Perry King) who romances the pretty new girl in school named Jane (Susan Blakely). As they grow into adulthood they find themselves drifting apart as new interests and demands begin to appear.

This film can best be described as a B-version of American Graffiti that came out just a year earlier. The production values are shoddy with a grainy picture that looks like it was filmed on somebody’s home camera. The story works in fragmented style that comes off more like a series of vignettes than an actual plot. Chico’s romance with Jane happens too quickly and seems artificial from the start especially since they are from ‘opposite sides of the tracks’. The actors themselves are clearly well over 18 and in Stallone’s case almost pushing 30 making their presence and the overall 50’s feel seem unauthentic.

The one thing that saves it is that there are some funny scenes as well as moments of decent drama and character development. The part where Stallone barters with a jeweler over the price of the wedding ring is quite good. I also liked the scene where the boys get together to intimidate a guy who is dating Chico’s girl only to run in fright when the other guy brings in a team of football players to defend him. However, the opening bit dealing with the teens misbehaving in class is not funny at all and I ended up feeling sorry for the teacher who was only trying to do her job.

Although given top billing Winkler is underused and almost forgettable. King is the real star and does quite well while also creating a multi-dimensional character. Stallone steals every scene he is in and proves to be much more adept at comedy than you might think. You can also glimpse Ray Sharkey, Armand Assante and Brooke Adams as wedding guests.

The film also features model-turned-actress Susan Blakely in only her third feature who does well playing the ‘good girl’, but the scene where Chico pressures her into having sex and she resists while asking him what color her eyes are in an attempt to see if he really ‘knows’ her and not just using her makes no sense. For one thing her big, blue eyes are the most prominent part of her face. Anyone, even a stranger, who glances at her face for even a second would know the color of her eyes, and thus having her ask someone what color they are is ridiculous already and then having them unable to tell her makes it the dumbest part of the whole movie.

susan blakely

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: May 1, 1974

Runtime: 1Hour 26Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Martin Davidson and Stephan Verona

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 70's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Comedy/Drama, Low Budget, Movies that take place in the Big Apple

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Hot Pursuit (1987)

Posted on March 16, 2015 | Leave a comment

hot pursuit 2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 1 out of 10

4-Word Review: He misses the plane.

Danny (John Cusack) attends a private school and when he flunks his chemistry test he’s not allowed to leave with his girlfriend’s family on their trip to the Caribbean. Then his professor inexplicably gives him a reprieve, which allows him to go anyways, but he misses the plane and is forced to play catch-up. First he meets up with some locals, but when their jeep gets submerged in water he takes up with a captain (Robert Loggia) who strands him out at sea. Meanwhile his girlfriend and her family have problems of their own when they inadvertently come into contact with drug smugglers.

The film is poor from the get-go and wastes Cusack’s appeal with material that lacks any imagination. The basic premise is derivative and the characters are one-dimensional. The plot plods along too slowly and the various hijinks that Danny finds himself in aren’t funny at all. The natives that he first meets up with are a bit on the creepy side and Loggia’s captain character is an over-the-top caricature that adds little.

The film’s biggest problem is its severe shift in tone. It starts out as an escapist comedy, which would’ve been alright had it actually been funny, but then ends up turning into a thriller when the family gets kidnapped by drug kingpins and it’s up to Cusack to get them out. Had it tried to keep some humor going during the tension it might’ve worked, but instead it gets unnecessarily serious and implausible with characters that are so poorly fleshed-out that the viewer really doesn’t care what happens to them making the climatic sequence boring and prolonged.

Cusack is good as always and I kind of liked him with his long hair look, but the character tends to be a bit too clean-cut. A young Ben Stiller appears here in his film debut and seeing him play against type as a leering, cocky bad guy is the only interesting thing about this movie and makes it somewhat worth catching.

My Rating: 1 out of 10

Released: May 8, 1987

Runtime: 1Hour 33Minutes

Rated PG-13

Director: Steven Lisberger

Studio: Paramount

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video, YouTube

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Posted in 80's Movies, Action/Adventure, Adolescence/High School, Comedy, Drama on the High Seas, Kidnapping Movies

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Adventures in Babysitting (1987)

Posted on December 22, 2014 | 3 comments

adventures in babysitting 1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: She’s got babysittin’ blues.

After being stood up on a date high school senior Chris Parker (Elisabeth Shue) decides to take one last babysitting job. It is for the Anderson family and their two children: 7-year-old Sara (Maia Brewton) and her 15-year-old brother Brad (Keith Coogan), who secretly has a crush on Chris. Things start out okay, but then her best friend Brenda (Penelope Ann Miller) calls stating that she is stranded at a rundown bus station and needs Chris’s help to get home. Despite her better judgment Chris decides to pack up the kids into her mother’s station wagon as well as Brad’s friend Darryl (Anthony Rapp) and takes them into the city to save her friend only to end up dealing with one disaster after another.

Shue’s presence, in her first starring role, is what really makes this movie work. She is not only beautiful, but shows perfect comic timing and despite the fact that she was already 24 at the time of filming still looks like a teen albeit on the very mature side. The kids though aren’t as good and although they do grow on you a bit as the movie progresses it would’ve worked better had she been babysitting a family of mutes. The Brad character is too bland and clean-cut, his friend Darryl is too obnoxious and the young Sara, who wears a stupid looking, winged, metal helmet for almost the entire movie comes off like an annoying little brat.

Miller’s Brenda character is the most irritating as she is ditzy and airheaded to the extreme and her scenes come off as forced humor at its worst. Since all the calamity starts when they get a flat tire I thought they could’ve used a different motivation for driving into the city, like going for ice cream or to a movie and cut the Brenda character out completely since it ends up being the film’s weakest part.

Although the setting is in Chicago and most of the scenes were filmed there a few of them weren’t including the frat house party, the restaurant scene and Anderson’s residence which were all done in Toronto. Either way it tends to paint Chicago in an unflattering light by playing up its urban stigma and for a film that seems squarely aimed at the preteen crowd it has some surprisingly edgy elements including 17-year-old prostitutes, a story thread dealing with a Playboy centerfold and even a few F-bombs.

However, on the whole it’s quite funny and entertaining; much funnier than I was expecting. I even found myself sitting on the edge of my seat in a few places including the scene where they have to walk across some ceiling rafters to escape from the bad guys as well as a tense, well-filmed climatic segment done on the glass roof of a skyscraper. The segment where Chris narrates her babysitting adventures to the background music of a blues band is great and her line “Don’t fuck with the babysitter!” which she states to an intimidating gang leader is classic.

In many ways this is quite similar to Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, but better. The comic scenarios aren’t quite as over-the-top, the adults aren’t so painfully stupid and the main character is thankfully not as smug. Like in Ferris there is also an amusing moment shown after the end credits, which I found to be just as funny.

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Released: July 1, 1987

Runtime: 1Hour 42Minutes

Rated PG-13

Director: Chris Columbus

Studio: Buena Vista Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Instant Video

3 Comments

Posted in 80's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Cold Climate/Wintertime Movies, Farce, Movies that take place in Chicago

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Class of 1999 (1990)

Posted on December 18, 2014 | Leave a comment

class of 1999 1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: The teachers are robots.

The year is 1999 and American high schools are running rampant with drugs and gang warfare. In an attempt to try to regain some control administrators have hired on a company run by Dr. Bob Forrest (Stacy Keach) who has created teachers who look human, but are actually robots capable of exerting extreme punishment on those students who get out-of-line. A Seattle high school is chosen as a venue to test these robots out with Miles Langford (Malcolm McDowell) being the only human instructor made aware of these other teacher’s identities. At first things go well and civil behavior from the unruly teens is attained, but then the teachers get out-of-control where even their creators are unable to rein them in, so it is up to some rebel teen students lead by Cody (Cody Culp) to fight them off and stop them.

This is a sort-of sequel to writer/director Mark L. Lester’s earlier Class of 1984 and in many ways on a low budget scale it’s alright. I watched this film with my Cinema Terrible group here in Austin where we get together each month to watch two really bad movies. Usually everyone spends the time making fun at what they are watching, but this film surprisingly kept them quiet and captivated, which no one had initially expected. Lester has directed 33 of these types of films since 1971 and he knows how to deliver. His product certainly isn’t on an Academy Award winning level, but for those looking for some cheap non-think entertainment with a fast pace and decent effects then this ain’t too bad.

The best element of the film is John P. Ryan, Pam Grier and Patrick Kilpatrick as the three teacher robots. Ryan especially owns the screen during all of his scenes and the part where he takes some difficult students one-by-one over his knee and gives them a nice long, hard spanking is without question the best moment of the whole movie. Grier though is good too and during the climatic sequence she runs around essentially topless with her chest ripped open and her computer parts exposed, which I found to be well done. McDowell is the only one of the familiar names who is wasted and apparently only worked 2 days on the production.

The film’s biggest issue is that it has no sense of humor despite its over-the-top campy premise. The teen cast show minimal acting ability and their characters come off like walking, talking clichés. In a lot of ways this film would have been better had the evil teacher robots been portrayed as ‘the good guys’ and instead of being annihilated at the end by the students they were the ones who eradicated all of the mouthy, crude and disrespectful teens, which some would consider to be much more of a ‘happy ending’.

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: May 11, 1990

Runtime: 1Hour 33Minutes

Rated R

Director: Mark L. Lester

Studio: Vestron Pictures

Available: DVD, Amazon Instant Video, YouTube

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Posted in 90's Movies, Action/Adventure, Adolescence/High School, Low Budget, Movies with Nudity, Sci-Fi, Thrillers/Suspense

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