BAYWATCH (2017)

The trend of existing television properties being re-explored for transition to the big screen (and vice versa) continues with no signs of slowing down. Some have been successful (21 Jump Street) and some have not (CHiPs), and, to no one’s surprise, the “some” that haven’t been successful are leading the pack. With so many of these rebooted properties hailing from bygone eras, mostly the ‘80s and ‘90s, what’s getting lost in translation, and what set off those properties so much, is the nostalgia factor. 21 Jump Street was not a good show, even if you loved it as a teen and had the biggest crush on Richard Grieco. To replicate what you loved about it would've been impossible, so producer Jonah Hill and its writers/directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller did the next best thing: reinvigorated the concept of adults infiltrating a local high school to root out crime, but all the while recognizing it was a ludicrous concept, even having their own characters call out this concept and recognizing the meta-ness throughout. It was satire, spoof, and a straight up reboot all at once, and it was massively successful. But the creative trio didn’t stop there: after already doing the impossible, they did the more impossible: made a sequel that’s just as good, smart, and hilarious.

Baywatch is desperate to exist on this same plane. It thinks that by replicating the slow-motion beach run with its cast gorgeously and handsomely displayed in their red bathing suits that reveal or contour to their perfect bodies, but this time having someone fall down, it will be just as clever and meta – the beach run, which is old, but then someone falls, which is new. Baywatch: The Movie is like the old thing, but it’s also this new thing, which is stupid on purpose. I mean, falling down is funny, right?

Baywatch hails from the Farrelly Brothers school of comedy philosophy: crude is funny – the cruder, the better. No one looks back on the Baywatch series and considers it any kind of high-art entertainment. Even using the word “art” in the same sentence as “Baywatch” feels really slimy. But at least it had an identity – good or bad as that is. (The less said about Baywatch Nights, a quasi-Baywatch meets The X-Files, the better.) Baywatch: The Movie doesn’t have an identity. With a script by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift, who’d previously explored pre-existing properties to – no bullshit – better results with Freddy vs. Jason, Baywatch is bits and pieces and cameos from the original series (including an appearance from Pamela Anderson, who is given not a single line of dialogue) attempting to exist in a broad Animal House-like atmosphere. Among the incessant f-bombs and high school locker room dialogue are too-long scenes of painful back-and-forth diatribes or gutter-dwelling moments like the one where a character’s erection gets caught in a beach chair, to which the film dedicates a maddening amount of time and which couldn’t be unfunnier if tried. This approach doesn’t just not work but it feels desperate and forced, almost knowing that it doesn’t have enough substance from which to mine real, smart comedy. (The only other way to have re-explored Baywatch, and which perhaps would have been the better approach, would have been as a straight-faced comedy.)

Personally, I love The Rock. He’s an extremely likable, charismatic, and decent seeming guy. But he’s yet to wrangle himself a film that’s worthy of his talents as a performer. Sure, he’s found success with the Cars Go Fast series, and that’s great considering they prove to be billion dollar endeavors, but the guy who was pre-sold to us all as the next Arnold Schwarzenegger (their passing-by scene in The Rundown where Arnold winks and tells him “good luck” wasn’t just a random joke but a spiritual passing of the torch) has yet to forge the same kind of path. (Dude even starred in the Rampage movie…I mean, come on.) In Baywatch, he’s wasted, forced to curb his appeal as a comedic actor and play the straight man against his wild and crazy lifeguard staff, which includes Zac Efron whom we can at least praise for being in something way, way better than the despicable anti-comedy Dirty Grandpa.

Ultimately, Baywatch doesn’t even have enough faith in the show’s original concept to set the action at the beach and have a conflict revolve around the beach, instead relying on a tired drug-distribution business that lifeguards, ordinarily, would have nothing to do with. It’s very by-the-numbers, derivative of previous comedies better able to rely on raunchy dialogue while still having heart, but worst of all, simply not funny. Literally the only thing it has going for it is several scenes of Alexandra Daddario in a bathing suit. I know it's 2021 and I'm not supposed to say things like that anymore but a truth is a truth.

Did the Baywatch legacy deserve better? Probably not. But audiences at least deserved a better time out at the multiplex. Though he’s gone back to this well several times already, picture a Will Ferrell-led Baywatch film which sees him and his doughy body stepping into the Mitch Buchannon role – him and his loyal band of miscreants – while borrowing absurd plots from the show’s original run (killer crocodile, anyone?) and playing it all entirely straight. That right there, though perhaps overdone, sounds more appealing than dick jokes and fall-downs.

BØRNING (2014)

The car chase has been part of the action genre since nearly its inception. Names like Bill Hickman, who oversaw the car stunts in legendary films like The French Connection and Bullitt, and more appropriately Hal Needham, who remains probably the most famous in the Hollywood Hills for having directed and constructed the stunts of the Cannonball Run and Smoky and the Bandit films, were pioneers in what would soon become a new art.

Like car chases, films are a rush. When expertly constructed and smartly maneuvered, a film can sneak up behind you, take you by surprise, and before you know what hit you, it's already gone, fading into the distance, nothing but a blurry set of taillights disappearing around a curve. Marry them together in a fairly balanced way and you've got the makings of a film that never lets up, whether or not the cars are still in park.

Roy Gundersen (Anders Baasmo Christiansen) likes to go fast, and in doing so, has built himself a family of both honest-to-gosh blood relatives and lifelong like-minded enthusiasts with whom to share his need for speed. While out on a leisurely drive with his very pregnant wife (and at her urging), Roy engages in a street race with local gear head TT (Trond Halbo), and not only loses the race, but loses control of the car, driving it off the road and flipping it on its roof. As a result of the crash, Roy's wife's water breaks so he rushes her to the hospital, where their daughter, Nina, is born sickly and with jaundice. Roy is promptly arrested soon after by Officer Philip Mork (Henrik Mestad), who will make it his mission to see that Roy either curb his street-racing tendencies, or go to prison for it.

Cut to fourteen years later, and Roy is working in an auto-body shop trying to stay out of trouble, when once again he crosses paths with his old rival TT. After a war of words, Roy challenges TT to a race - and not just to a street race, but a cross-country haul-assin' to the North Cape, a distance away of 2,208 kilometers (1,376 miles). Soon, two dozen cars are lining up to take part in an attempt to win the ceremonial $100 pot per racer, and Roy's all ready to go...until his now ex-wife drops fourteen-year-old Nina (Ida Husøy) at the shop, leaving her in his care for the week. With no other choice, Nina accompanies her estranged father on his run across Norway, where, in the midst of car-on-car mayhem, law enforcement outsmartment, and a decades-long rivalry, father and daughter will slowly begin to reconnect after years of silence, all while driving really, really fast.

Present a film about caravans of muscle cars taking to the streets and modern audiences will inevitably think of The Fast and the Furious. Though that's to be expected, Børning owes everything to Hal Needham's legacy, beginning with story construct - a country-wide, every-man-for-himself car race - and continuing with its tone - which begins with car-chase thrills before introducing bouts of loony humor and, when you least expect it, some heart. Watch as Roy's Mustang haphazardly careens down hillsides set to banjo-jangling rockabilly and try not to picture Burt Reynolds or The Dukes of Hazard in their ten gallon hats and their "aw shucks" smiles. With shades of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World thrown in for good measure, Børning presents a collection of characters all taking part in a mad-dash across the Norwegian countryside for their very own reasons. Some are doing it out of pride, some for the rush, and some because they're dying, and it's the last chance for them to experience the beauty of their country.

Børning is, not surprisingly, fast-paced, and is beautifully shot to fully convey the impressiveness of the car stunts on hand, and very little of it relies on CGI to maintain that '70s era feel. But it's also refreshingly character-based, allowing for moments of effective humor and genuine heart. Christiansen's Roy comes dangerously close to veering off the road of redemption but thankfully circles around just in time, and young Ida Husøy as Nina not only charms the pants off her audience, but partakes in a scene involving a gas station sandwich that will break your heart. One cinematic device perhaps more overused than the car chase is the the estranged parent and child overcoming their years of absence and finding a way to reconnect. Though Børning offers a new environment for its own parent/child reconnect to take place, the audience isn't necessarily seeing something it hasn't already seen countless times before. Despite that, Christiansen and Husøy work very well as the father/daughter dynamic, and even though it may be a well-worn clutch, the audience can't help but get caught up in their new-found bond. There's also a suggested romance between Roy and fellow body-shop worker Sylvia (Jenny Sklavan) that remains a bit too ambiguous, and for most of the film it's barely acknowledged, leaving the audience wondering if their relationship carries any weight beyond the sexual, or if they're supposed to care about their union. Though the ending would suggest a future between them, its potential for further emotional retribution is too little, too late.

Supporting characters offer the same amount of solid work, but the ailing Nybakken (Otto Jesperen) steals every scene in which he appears, milking his illness (the fictional Schreiner's syndrome) for all it's worth, not to mention proffering the biggest laugh of the film. You'll know it when you see it, and it's impossible not to love.

The car chase thing has been done to death, and it's built multi-billion dollar franchises, but in the middle of all the spectacle, something is being left behind. Børning director Hallvard Bræin seems to have figured out just what that is. (He's also turned it into a so-far three-film franchise.) While the engine's roar and the glistening chrome may present an intense and thrilling time at the cinema, it's always going to be more interesting for the audience to learn about - and come to care for - the people behind the wheel.

THREE O'CLOCK HIGH (1987)

Three O’Clock High is one of those broad, high-concept, and innocent teen films that don’t get made very often. Regarding its making, director Phil Joanou was quick to say that he was very aware of John Hughs’ mark on the high school teen comedy and that he very purposely steered the execution of Three O’Clock High in a different and less grounded direction. Despite that (and he does — I’m not about to call him a liar), Three O’Clock High shares the broadness, innocence, and easily communicated conflicts of Hughs’ films.

A bully wants to beat up another student.

That’s it. That’s the conflict. There is no deeper hidden meaning (unless you’re really reaching). Punchee-to-be Jerry Mitchell doesn’t go on a day of self-discovery as he awaits his fate. He’s the same character at the end of the day (okay, perhaps braver) than he was when he first woke up late that morning. One might think this is a shortcoming of Three O’Clock High, but on the contrary: the simplicity is the film’s greatest strength.

It’s also a wonderful product of its time. I don’t think it’s a spoiler alert to say that in this lovable, lighthearted teen comedy that Jerry punches the bully back at the end and wins the day, and that’s what makes it so unique: the message IS “seriously, use violence to solve your problems.”

Even the PRINCIPAL (John P. Ryan, in a rare role where he’s not killing someone in a Cannon film) urges Jerry to punch the bully.

A SCHOOL OFFICIAL IS URGING VIOLENCE.

Think that teen-oriented message would ever make the final cut today?

Much of the comedy on display is of the timeless sort, with some gags harking back to the earliest days of Chaplin (the library sequence is one of my new favorite things), and Casey Siemaszko (Back to the Future) plays a very likeable, every-day type of kid who’s just as confused as the audience is as to why Buddy the bully (Richard Tyson, the evil dad from Kindergarten Cop) has singled him out.

Three O’Clock High is just a fun film, and not one that’s well known, likely getting lost in all the adoration of John Hughes’ output. It’s light, easy, and breezy fare, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. Not every high school teen flick needs to have kids at detention spilling their guts, tears, and greatest fears. Sometimes they just have to punch the bully and get the car home before Mom and Dad get back from vacation. Take the opportunity to get to know the trials and tribulations of student school store manager Jerry Mitchell and the punch that was heard around the world.

BILL & TED FACE THE MUSIC (2020)

The concept of a “Bill and Ted 3” has been, at the very least, a discussion around Hollywood meeting tables for almost the last twenty years. Considered one of those long-mooted sequels that didn’t seem likely to ever exist, like 2017’s Blade Runner 2049 and next year’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Bill & Ted Face the Music somehow feels designed to both reflect and combat the horrifying, confusing, soul-crushing clusterfuck known as 2020. Throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s entries of Bill and Ted’s excellent adventures, the characters always exuded an idealism and sense of good that was rare for a time when movies geared toward the youth were usually tackling the pains of adolescence (Fast Times At Ridgemont High, everything John Hughes) or turning them into a generation out of touch with their emotions (Heathers, River’s Edge). That our beloved, never-stoned stoners seemed to lack the cerebral acuity of their fellow students, in spite of their at-times elaborate verbiage, is part of what made the characters so fun and even enviable. They weren’t hampered by the events of the real world. They weren’t concerned about their futures, even if they should’ve been. Their entire worldview was limited to San Dimas, and it was a world free of conflict. All they knew was they were friends, they had fun together, and their burgeoning two-man band, Wyld Stallyns, was going to blossom into a world-changing event.

After years of false starts, vague and optimistic updates from its leads, and a looong period of script development, Bill & Ted Face the Music arrived during a time, it would seem, when it was most needed (but which was, much to my chagrin, not called Bill & Ted’s Righteous Recon).

I have long said, and still believe, that while it’s possible to make a long-delayed sequel to a movie or series that manages to be a worthy new entry, it’s a much taller order to design that sequel to feel like the other movie(s) it’s following. Though the aforementioned Blade Runner 2049 achieved this, many, many others did not. Hell, not even King Beard himself was able to pull this off with his own late-comer sequel to a cherished ‘80s property – the much-maligned Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull – which was not only terrible, but didn’t feel like it belonged to its own series whatsoever (except for that great punching sound). Somehow, in spite of everything, in defiance of our pessimism and working knowledge of Hollywood’s propensity for carelessly exploiting any brand with the least amount of street value, Bill & Ted Face the Music not only works as a movie, but successfully recaptures the magic of the series itself. 

Alex Winter easily steps back into the role of William S. Preston, esquire, and though his performance offers the most bubbly enthusiasm in the movie, it’s no secret that Winter went on to a quieter, more obscure career, and never had the same opportunities to further remove himself from his now most famous character – at least certainly not when compared to his juggernaut on-screen companion, one Keanu Reeves, burdened with an audience’s morbid curiosity to see if the actor, who went onto a decidedly less-comedic career that focused on action, dark thrillers, and dramas, could somehow re-embody the character who birthed a thousand memes. For the most part, Reeves is just as successful in re-finding the “whoaaa!” of Ted Logan, bringing to life a middle-aged mimbo with small dreams and little want in life, but his performance is occasionally hampered by an unintended melancholy that comes from his character’s very rare descent into glee. Simply put, Ted’s forgotten how to smile, and in a concept for a sequel that’s already surreal in the sense that it exists at all, it makes some of the sequel’s events feel just the least bit off.

Typical in these many-years-later sequels, Bill and Ted have multiplied, each having a daughter with their princess wives. Thea (Samara Weaving) and Billie (Brigette Lundy-Paine) are the spitting images of their fathers, each adorably named after her honorary uncle and each as equally obsessed with the perfect rock and roll sound. They’ve nailed the brain-dead surfer delivery, with Lundy-Paine’s take on Reeves’ Ted especially spot-on, but thankfully, though their daughters are pivotal in the central conflict, this is by no means a passing-of-the-torch kinda sequel. Bill and Ted are still very much our heroes, even if they’re sharing the stage this time.

Regardless of this new generation, however, let it not be said that Bill & Ted Face the Music lacks the touch of the original band. Series writers Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon return to write their third Bill and Ted saga together, which resurrects as many surviving characters as possible from the previous movies, from Death’s William Sadler (who is a blast) to Ted’s father Captain Logan (Hal Landon Jr.) and Bill’s (former) stepmother, Missy (Amy Stoch). George Carlin’s Rufus is missed, but proper tribute is paid, and his daughter, Kelly (Kristen Schaal), takes on his watchful guardian duties with a goofy sincerity that fits her personality as well as her character. It would also be an understatement to say that Barry’s Anthony Carrigan as “Dennis,” the time-traveling assassin robot, absolutely steals the show every minute he’s on screen, shaving off the biggest laughs with a silly subplot that shouldn’t really work but always does.

The greatest thing to be said about Bill & Ted Face the Music is its total and complete lack of anything involving cynicism, whether with itself or about the world in which it takes place. Because of this, it feels like an antidote for the ugliness and despair to which our world has fallen victim for the better part of the last decade. Except for a more grandiose representation of “the future,” which relies on visual effects that weren’t available during the previous Bill & Ted days of yore, Bill & Ted Face the Music resurrects everything about the series you remember it being. Bill and Ted are still friends, still jamming, still unconcerned about the state of their futures…that is until their next round of time-traveling adventures begin. Only then are they faced with a bevy of alternate futures where their musical careers crash and burn, where they are estranged from their families, and where they have failed to write the ultimate song that will unite the world. And if you’ll allow a brief detour into “no shit” territory, Bill and Ted aren’t just trying to save the entire world as we know it, but they’re trying to save themselves, too – from a present where their wives are close to leaving them, where they’re not eager to bear the burden of responsibility, and where they’re afraid to chase the dream they’ve been fated to obtain. For us, the audience, this is our in. This is what allows us to connect with our characters. And this is what gives Bill & Ted Face the Music its heartbeat. When we catch up with Bill and Ted a mind-boggling 29 years after the events of Bogus Journey, they’re not living the life you’d written for them in your heads. Based on what we know about these two lovable boobs who do nothing but Chauncey Gardiner their way through life, we expect them to be sharing a crappy two-bedroom apartment with pizza boxes and beer cans all over the floor and possibly getting fired at the same time over the phone because they work the same shift at the same job for which they failed to show up on the morning we’re finally catching up with them. But no, they’re actually living next door to each other in a nice-looking, middle-class development in a nice-looking, middle-class cul-de-sac. They drive plain cars, contend with plain problems, and lead plain lives. They, by god…look like us, and maybe because they are – well-meaning boobs with the responsibility for uniting the world, finding the common good in us all, celebrating the purest moments of life, and embracing all that which binds us in time. This is what we should all be doing, time-traveling phonebooths notwithstanding, and it took a couple of middle-aged doofuses to show us the way.

Much is made about the plot/conflict of Bill & Ted Face the Music – of Bill and Ted’s task to write the ultimate rock song that will unite the world – but for those viewers like me who respond much more emotionally to the ravages of time, both in real life and when reflected in properties that were major parts of childhood, it’s the pensiveness, the acknowledgement of lives lived, and the choices we can still make while we have the time that hits me in the feels the hardest. Maybe I should be ashamed or embarrassed that my eyes welled with tears not once but twice during this long-awaited Bill & Ted 3, but I’m not. Frankly, it’s the perfect movie for 2020, because it’s stuffed to the brim with everything our hearts needed: proof that we can, indeed, go back to the things from our youth and discover they are just as special as they ever were; an injection of goodness, hope, light, and a sense of community that’s been harmed and abused by a growing ugliness based on political differences; and finally, an escape into a world where two not-so-bright dudes can, against all odds, save the world. And in a time where it feels like we have more reasons to fear life than to celebrate it, well, that’s most triumphant.

[Reprinted from Daily Grindhouse.]

VHYES (2019)

I tend to avoid falling victim to trends – not because I’m the rebellious hipster type, but because I genuinely don’t understand most of them and feel like even more of an outlier because of it. (I still don’t know what fidget spinners are and I never want to.) But this rebirth of fondness for the VHS movement and everything that comes from that beautiful ‘80s time period? Yes. It’s mine, and I want it. I want the big hair and the scrolling VHS lines and the keyboard synth and all the dumb real-world-blindness that came from kids piling into jeeps for trips to the beach or bowling alley instead of staring at the constant barrage of bad news on their phones and growing more and more despondent because of it.

This fondness for everything ‘80s began rolling in during the early 2000s with filmmakers designing throwback horror films to honor that long-lost decade of Giorgio Moroder, cocaine, and the Paramount era of Friday the 13^th. Whether it was a fondness for a bygone era, or a necessary escape to a less traumatic time, who knows, but we’ve been going back in time more and more as the years bleed into each other, and that suits me just fine, being that, in case you haven’t noticed, 2020 and the several years before that have really, really sucked.

Most of this time traveling seems to have revolved around the horror genre in one way or another, be it low-budget indie films (House of the Devil, It Follows), mainstream Netflix content (Stranger Things), or the music scene, which has seen the post-Daft Punk explosion of dark-dwelling synthwave artists like Carpenter Brut, Perturbator, and Dance of the Dead. VHYes, written and directed by Jack Henry Robbins (the offspring of Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon, who both cameo in extremely odd but hilarious ways), seems to know this. Even though VHYes is a comedy for most of its running time, there are constant bases being touched in the horror world, be it the science-fiction (and chastely presented) porn parody about three Swedish lesbian aliens, or the true-crime tale of the Witches Coven, which ended with a sorority house burning down following a mysterious event. Also, given VHYes’s presentation as a VHS tape of random television bits and camcorder hijinks being accidentally recorded over a young boy’s parents’ wedding tape, there is a “found footage” element that comes into play – subtly at first, and then much more prominently towards the conclusion of the film, at which point VHYes becomes less of an amusing, quirky, and lighthearted comedy and more of an abstract, nightmarish, and even horrific descent into pure terror and purer heartache.

VHYes, in case you weren’t able to pick up on this, isn’t presented as a straightforward narrative, but that’s not to say there isn’t a forward-moving narrative that connects all the different skits in a meaningful way. (Said skits feature the likes of Thomas Lennon, Mark Proksch, an absolutely scene-stealing Kerri Kenney, and many more.) You’re not hit over the head with this narrative either, and that’s VHYes’s biggest accomplishment, at least from the point of view of someone who absolutely detests being spoon-fed lazy exposition by films that assume its own audience is too stupid to follow along. If your audience is perceptive enough and wants to do the work to piece it together, VHYes offers you just enough to give you a glimpse of what life and domesticity look like when people think no one is looking. 

If you want to get really analytical, VHYes plays out almost like a commentary on social media – a skewering of the feelings of inadequacy you feel when so many of your e-friends are purporting to lead these lives where they’re sky-diving in Hawaii and riding camels in Morocco and all the other bullshit things they’re lying about. Like social media, the characters in VHYes act a certain way when the camera is on them, but when they think it’s not, they’re lost in moments of self-reflection and existential helplessness. In the modern age, we post funny videos and memes and jokes on our social media accounts in an effort to present the illusion that everything is fine, but meanwhile, on our end of the screen that no one sees but us, we’re sobbing. In VHYes, a quick scene of a woman sitting at a breakfast nook by herself and sipping coffee while lost in some dreadful thought conveys more meaning and honesty than when that same woman is capering and grinning after she sees the little red light glowing near the camera lens. We live two lives, VHYes is saying – the one we want people to see, and the truth.

With VHSYES, your mileage with vary, as they say on Internet. For this reviewer, I laughed from beginning to end – and when I wasn’t laughing, it’s because I was lost down the unexpected rabbit hole of adolescent pain, confusion, and sometimes pure terror. Just as the film intended.

VHYes is now available on Blu-ray and DVD from Oscilloscope. I cannot recommend it enough.

ANOMALISA (2015)

Every single film so far in writer/director Charlie Kaufman's oeuvre has been about the longing between human beings, and the inevitable heartache and/or failure to which it leads. Anomalisa may have ditched those same humans in favor of an array of handmade puppets, but the humanity of the piece is still hugely present. Puppets aside, and to parrot some of the more on-the-nose critical notices that Anomalisa has received, this really is the most human of Kaufman's films so far.

Written and co-directed alongside Duke Johnson, Anomalisa is impressive on every single imaginable level--from the immediately obvious technical to the poignancy that slowly accumulates as we witness our lead character, Michael Stone, encounter a sea of sameness: the same faces, the same voices, the same disconnect. That these characters are brought to life with swappable faces isn't just some gimmick--it's essential to the story both thematically as well as logistically. Originally a "sound" play performed live for audiences during an extremely rare two-night event, that Anomalisa has been reimagined utilizing stop-motion animation and handmade puppets sounds like something doomed for failure. But as Kaufman has proven with his intimidating imagination time and time again, he's taken the most absurd of concepts and turned it into something oddly compelling and surprisingly emotional.

Perhaps Kaufman could have fashioned a live-action screenplay and used actual human actors on screen. Perhaps Tom Noonan's face could have been super-imposed on every single secondary character, and his voice dubbed over every single secondary line of dialogue. And as strange as it sounds, Kaufman could have pulled this off--with the same amount of sincerity balanced with absurdity. (If he did it with puppets, than anything is possible.) But it also would have been a page out of his Being John Malkovich (also about puppets, in a sense), and Kaufman doesn't like to do the same thing twice in the same way he doesn't like to make the same film twice, common themes notwithstanding.

As impressive as the puppetry is, what brings them to life is the phenomenal (and extremely limited) voice cast. David Thewlis presents Michael as sad and alone right off the bat, even when he speaks on the phone with his oppressed wife and indifferent son. Jennifer Jason Leigh (a refreshing reminder of her talents following her agonizing turn in Tarantino's insufferable western The Hateful Eight) plays coy and shy remarkably well, imbuing Lisa with believable mental scars as well as physical ones. But the performance of the hour belongs to Tom Noonan, whose calm, monotone voice is somehow simultaneously anonymous and instantly recognizable. It was an utter stroke of genius to cast him as "Everyone Else," being that his voice, with little manipulation on his part, easily suits the array of characters--male and female, young and old--that Michael encounters during his stay at the Fregoli Hotel. (Wikipedia describes "Fregoli syndrome" as "the delusional belief that different people are in fact a single person who is in disguise.") Noonan reads most of his lines with utter calm, easily garnering laughs during the more ridiculous dialogue, but also achieves laughs just as worthy during, say, the scene where Michael overhears a bickering newly wed couple swapping profanities that he passes in the hotel halls. Captured in the ideal way, all three voice actors recorded their lines during a reading of the script, each existing in the other's space to feed off the energy from their performances. This wasn't a case of their lines being recorded separately and pasted together later, and this helps to convey the relationships being established--or destroyed--during Anomalisa's running time.

It's easy to see that many potential viewers will write off Anomalisa before seeing a single frame of it simply because of the way it was made. But those potential viewers with small minds don't deserve to experience something so beautiful. Let it remain a secret for those who want and desire something far more emotional and significant than what can be found right now at the local multiplex. Anomalisa is a gorgeous film with a heartbreaking message at its core and just might be Charlie Kaufman's most personal and revealing film yet. 

If you're even a casual fan of Charlie Kaufman (if such a thing exists--you either love him or hate him), Anomalisa is the next step forward and upward for the acclaimed writer/director. It's a revealing look at the humankind disconnect, our at-times frustrating inability to communicate who we really are, brought to life by things that have the look of man, but not the soulfulness. For its ingenuity, innovation, and humanity, Anomalisa gets the highest recommendation.

BOSS (1975)

Boss, also known as The Black Bounty Hunter and its original/credits title Boss Nigger (the one and only time I’ll use that particular title, and for search/posterity only), was released less than one year after Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles. Both films saw a pretty similar plot, though the latter was played for much broader comedic effect: a black sheriff presides over a white town in the Old West and shakes up their culture — along with their women. And while Boss is a comedy, it’s not nearly as on the nose as its most immediate colleague. Being a Blaxploitation title, it also strives to upset the status quo by deviating away from the comedy to revel in darker aspects of humanity’s ugliness. Much of this comes from the hugely offensive exchanges that Boss (Fred Williamson) and his deputy, Amos (D’Urville Martin) engage in as they first arrive in town. (The n-word is thrown around more liberally than Tarantino’s Django Unchained, and that’s saying something.) But it also comes from the violence, the tragedies faced, and in the generally despicable way that the white town treats black and Mexican characters. The Blaxploitation sub-genre could do this like no other, and though it’s a cinematic movement not taken all that seriously due to some of the dubious titles that were released and the unintentionally amusing tropes that became legacy, always hidden within some heinous concepts was an important, and sometimes smartly rendered, morality tale. (Williamson’s Black Caesar is the best example of this.)

Williamson, who wrote and produced Boss, sometimes falls victim to too broadly showing whites as offensive — even those who aren’t trying to be. “Our family in Boston had black people working for us,” begins the white Miss Pruit (Barbara Leigh), and already you begin to cringe — openers like this equate to “I’m no racist, but..” in real life. “They were good people. They used to sing and dance a lot. I used to love to watch them.”

Cut to this face:

In fact, there’s exactly one white character — Pete the Blacksmith — who is a decent man right off the bat; he doesn’t start off as horrid and bigoted before learning the error of his ways. Williamson’s script suggests that, in a town of, maybe, a hundred citizens, one of them isn’t racist.

Yikes.

Though not taken very seriously (Blaxploitation might rank even below horror, which I never thought was possible), the sub-genre was instrumental in doing one main thing: exposing white audiences to black culture, in an effort to humanize them, by sneaking it into otherwise mainstream concepts for films. It’s no mistake that Blaxploitation was launched and enjoyed a nice long successful run following the turbulent fight for civil rights during the 1960s. It was a direct response and reaction to uncertain times and deeply rattled communities. Super Fly is one of the best examples of this covert exposure to black culture, during which the film stops the action several times as its main cast of characters visits a club to watch entire song performances by the film’s soundtrack contributor, Curtis Mayfield. Boss doesn’t follow this same approach, forgoing a look at black culture and instead focuses on the black experience; even when its black characters are in positions of power, specifically law enforcement, they still suffer the indignities of being treated like human garbage by the townsfolk. It’s just that they’re now in a place where they can do something about it. You’ll note, amusingly, that when Boss and Amos begin posting new ordinances all around town about what’s now considered illegal, and what kinds of fines those infractions incur, none of them rank more than a $5 fine — unless, of course, someone uses a racial epithet against someone else. That ranks a solid $20 fine or a day in jail.

Much of Boss is very funny, but it’s that kind of humor where you feel conflicted for laughing, even though that’s what was intended. Williamson knows there’s humor to be found in casual offense; I can’t even imagine what the pearl-clutchers of today’s easily-outraged populace would think as they watched. The strongest point of Boss’ use of humor is that the viewer becomes more easily disarmed during the moments that are genuinely dramatic. You spend so much time laughing about how Amos likes to pursue “fat women,” or at how obliviously terrible the town can be to Boss and Amos, that once a young boy is trampled in the street by the film’s villain, it’s not something you’d expect and it packs a surprising punch.

Blaxploitation very rarely infiltrated the western genre, even though the idea to do so harks back to 1938 with Two-Gun Man from Harlem, but with Williamson as the lead/co-writer/producer and veteran Jack Arnold (Creature from the Black Lagoon — irony!) at the helm, it’s doubtful any other duo could have pulled off a more entertaining and even poignant film.

MEMOIRS OF AN INVISIBLE MAN (1992)

Memoirs of an Invisible Man is probably the least discussed film of John Carpenter’s career outside of his first feature credit, Dark Star. There are a handful of reasons for this, which may be due to its so-so reputation, but it’s likely because it just doesn’t feel like a Carpenter film. Stepping in after original director Ivan Reitman (Ghostbusters) left the production over disagreements with Chevy Chase about its tone, Memoirs of an Invisible Man remains the only film Carpenter made for Warner Bros. That may sound like random boring trivia, but considering his terrible experience with the production, which he’s talked about freely over the years, it serves as a reminder as to why he avoided working with major studios whenever feasible — and they don’t get more major than Warner Bros.

A byproduct of Carpenter becoming a senior citizen has been his adorable irascibility and his total loss of a social filter. He publicly called Rob Zombie a “piece of shit” for the shock-rocker’s fudging of reality regarding how Carpenter allegedly responded to Zombie’s intent to remake Halloween. (The two later mended fences.) In addition, his candid misery on the set of The Fog remake (on which he served as producer) became legendary around the horror community for how salty one human being could be for being paid handsomely to sit in a corner. In keeping with all this, he’s made it pretty clear over the years that there’s one actor, above all others, he absolutely hated working with, and though you’ll never find any written confirmation of this, it was most assuredly Chevy Chase. 

If you’ve read up on the comedian and actor, followed his behavior on the set of Community, or tangled with the gigantic tome Live From New York: The Complete, Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live as Told by Its Stars, Writers, and Guests, then you know he’s an extremely difficult personality to wrangle. Carpenter, not naming names, once said during an interview on the set of Escape from L.A. that an actor he’d just finished working with could “burn in hell for all eternity.” (I once pointedly asked Carpenter which actor this was, and if that same actor happened to share the name of a city in Maryland, and I received “no comment” as a response. However, he later disclosed during an interview that Chase “still sends [him] a Christmas card every year.”)

All that tabloid fodder aside, Memoirs of an Invisible Man, as a film, is very very…okay. Perhaps the most jarring thing about it is its somewhat confused tone. Though marketed as a comedy/romance, and in spite of its moments of levity (all, naturally, deriving from Chase’s invisible antics), the tone is fairly straight and even a bit dark. Memoirs of an Invisible Man just might be the only comedy/drama/thriller/romance/film noir in existence. (Chase’s character recording a pseudo-memoir of the events of his life over the last few days is a clear callback to Double Indemnity.) Chase and love interest Daryl Hannah show close to zero chemistry, but Michael McKean is typically great, if underused, and Sam Neill (yay!) as a shadowy government official in steady pursuit of Chase’s invisi-dude offers the best character – he’s certainly one of the main reasons to watch.

Memoirs of an Invisible Man has unfairly garnered a shitty reputation over the years – as a title that’s easy to dismiss and a very minor footnote in an otherwise celebrated artist’s career. I can somewhat understand why: as someone who considers Carpenter his all-time favorite filmmaker, Memoirs of an Invisible Man doesn’t feel like a Carpenter flick at all, and as any cinephile will tell you, one of the joys of watching films is to zero in on a filmmaker or writer’s style that speaks to you and to revel in that style for every one of his or her creations. (That the director’s name doesn’t precede the title, as it has otherwise ever since 1976’s Assault on Precinct 13, seems to suggest that Carpenter feels the same.) It very much embodies the kind of too-many-cooks, compromised, and flavorless productions that studios pump out dozens of times per year. Carpenter doesn’t script, ghost-script, or score, and his usual cadre of cast and crew aren’t on board. There’s a new director of photography, a new composer, a new editor…and no Peter Jason.

Memoirs of an Invisible is the definition of disposable entertainment. It’s not offensive enough to be terrible, but if you’re someone like me who’d sooner watch a lesser Carpenter film that at least feels like a Carpenter film, then you may wonder when you’d ever get the urge to watch it at all. Funnily enough, while the title Memoirs of an Invisible is obviously about Chase’s character, it’s more appropriate for Carpenter’s ultimate influence on the film: as you’re watching, you know he’s there in the room with you, but you can’t see him at all.

IN ‘WEIRD SCIENCE,’ THE DICKS GET TO WIN

Say the name “John Huges” to a film fan and they’ll easily think of several things: the ‘80s, teens, and love. If ever a filmmaker had been the face of a movement, it’s Hughes, whose films easily embodied the growing pains of the middle-America teenager. And that’s what makes Weird Science a semi-outlier in his long and prolific career. Hughes’ most well-known films, The Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles, were comedies at their hearts, but also contained enough emotion, substance, and relatability to register as more than just another 90-minute romp filled with teen hijinks and gentle kissing. Same goes for Pretty in Pink, which stops its general lightheartedness and allows for a genuinely melancholic monologue from Harry Dean Stanton about being an older and ineffective father.

Weird Science is base-level John Hughes. It covers all those same components, but in the most superficial way possible. It is, essentially, Hughes’ take on the teen sex comedy, which had become prominent by then, ushered in by National Lampoon’s Animal House before things like Porky’s and The Last American Virgin took over. Because of that, it’s probably not fair to judge Weird Science in the same way you would judge St. Elmo’s Fire, being that both flicks, despite similar genetic make-up, have different goals.

Which is what makes Weird Science kind of a blast, and very, very strange.

High school horndog outcasts Gary (Anthony Michael Hall) and Wyatt (Ilan Mitchell-Smith) want to get laid. Of course they do; they’re boys in high school. So, since this slice of Shermer, Illinois, exists in a land before Tinder, the obvious next step is to create a girl (using Wyatt’s computer) that will satisfy their carnal urges and teach them all the different ways of being a sexual maestro. Hughes was right to have Frankenstein playing on a background television all during this creation sequence because this is obviously a riff on that Modern Prometheus. Soon, their creation shows up: a gorgeous British bird they name Lisa (Kelly LeBrock) who will go on to wreak all kinds of ‘80s havoc.

A popular term these days is “problematic.” I’m sure you’ve heard it. It gets thrown around more and more when it comes to judging art from a different era with 2019 “woke” eyes, a term that, like "hipster" or "socialist," gets conjured a lot by people who don't actually know what it means. Still, bits and pieces from Hughes' catalog haven't aged well in this modern era. Bender looks up Claire’s skirt in The Breakfast Club…without asking. Problematic. In Sixteen Candles, one friend dismissively calls another a “total faggot,” and this unfolds within throwing distance of “Long Duk Dong,” perhaps the most freakishly offensive Asian character not seen since Peter Sellers played Inspector Sidney Wang in Murder by Death. Sixteen Candles: also problematic...along with Murder by Death, I guess. In an op-ed for the New Yorker, even frequent Hughes Muse^TM Molly Ringwald opined about watching The Breakfast Club with her modern eyes and seeing things considered problematic today. “It’s hard for me to understand how John Hughes was able to write with so much sensitivity, and also have such a glaring blind spot,” she writes. It’s a good thing she didn’t appear in Weird Science, as all the fainting couches in the world could not have offered her the support she'd need to reckon with such a triggering past, as it’s basically a poster board for all the ways a comedy could never be made today. 

Yes, Weird Science is a sex comedy, so naturally one should approach it knowing that some of its content is likely to touch hands with the risqué. However, Weird Science ups that content a bit with some of its odder underlying choices, perhaps the least realized but most disturbing aspect being that its lead "heroes," Gary and Wyatt, aged 16 and 15, respectively, inadvertently create their own personal pedophile by assigning Lisa the age of 23. Naturally, that line of thinking didn’t exist back in the ‘80s, nor did the implication sink in that because Lisa was created, she hence lacked the ability to consent to the boys' sexual whims, so once it’s made clear she is fully under the boys’ control, it's implied they are basically off-screen raping her throughout the movie. 

Yep, that's how I began this part of the discussion.

Creepy sexual stuff aside, there’s also the scene where the trio goes to an after-hours blues club with a mixed-race clientele, during which Gary gets so drunk that he begins mimicking the gravelly-voiced African-American man next to him by giving himself a “black” voice. (The movie comes to a dead halt during this sequence—not because of the “offensiveness,” but because it’s putting its full weight on one joke that never works, is generally obnoxious, and goes on for way too long.) I should note that I don’t personally find any of the above offensive because I’m an adult and I have the ability to recognize that art made during certain eras are going to reflect those eras: what was considered acceptable, what was part of the lexicon, and what, back then, was simply considered funny. I mean, Moe used to express his frustration with Curly and Larry by beating them mercilessly with pipe wrenches and literally pushing them to the ground. How seriously are we supposed to take comedy, whether slapstick or absurd? When it comes to Weird Science, is the humor ideal? These days, no. Certain things once normal are now avoided. Should Weird Science ever get the remake treatment, genders will be swapped, unconsented sex will be avoided, and everyone will make sure everyone else is on the same page all the time to avoid any traumatic misunderstandings during the climactic party scene (unless the bad guy does it). Sounds boring.

Weird Science is often very funny, fully coming alive during the third act where Gary and Wyatt throw a party that goes very out of control, allowing for cameos from members of the cast of The Road Warrior (Vernon Wells) and The Hills Have Eyes (Michael Berryman). It's during this sequence when Weird Science gets the most outrageous, especially when contents of the house are sucked out the chimney and redistributed across the back yard once Gary and Wyatt attempt to create another Lisa-ish compu-girl for two bullies (Robert Downey Jr. and Robert Rusler) who spent the whole movie breaking their balls. It’s as if Hughes had spent years writing down every joke, sight gag, and concept he’d maybe want to use one day and decided that, during the third act of Weird Science where anything could happen, he would use it all: frozen grandparents in the cupboard; an evil older brother, Chet (an amazing Bill Paxton), turning into some sort of monstrous cryptid; a bedroom where it snows all the time; a rocket ship fucking the interior of Wyatt's bedroom (symbolism!); motorcycle cannibals; and more. Hughes weaves them all together in a weird, excessive pastiche of chaos that helps usher Weird Science across the finish line, transcending it from an odd but average comedy to ‘80s cult classic. (That the film is bookended by Oingo Boingo’s song of the same name helps a lot. What’s more ‘80s than Oingo Boingo?) (Cocaine.)

Hughes was known for creating the trends along with bucking them—his filmography was the first to treat teenagers as characters with genuine emotions and personalities as opposed to troublemaking archetypes—which is perhaps why Weird Science, technically a teen-sex comedy, contains no sex whatsoever...at least, not on screen. Despite some brief nudity, courtesy of the skin rags in Wyatt’s bedroom and one amusing sight gag involving a naked pianist—I said pianist!—Weird Science is visually chaste. The dialogue is certainly racy at times, but there’s not a single sex scene between any members of the cast, despite that being the reason for Lisa’s creation—and on top of that, there’s only one implied sex scene throughout the whole flick. If we follow the movie rule of “if I didn’t see it, it didn’t happen,” then Gary and Lisa never have sex at all, and if they did, you'd think the boys would compare notes about their first sexual dalliance in that soft, eye-opening way Hughes often employed when writing about the teenage experience. This would make sense in an ironic way if the flick had followed that concept for both boys—they created their own sex goddess, but never actually had sex with her—but instead, it seems Wyatt’s the only one who gets laid. It’s weird. 

♫ Weird Science! ♫

The more one thinks about Weird Science, the less sense it all makes, so maybe we shouldn’t dive too deep into the implications of its main characters, but come on: Gary and Wyatt are dicks. They do awful things, learn zero lessons, and still get the girls (Suzanne Snyder, my ‘80s crush I’m still sweet on and who appeared on Seinfeld as two different characters—it's true!—and Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter's Judie Aronson), who they both profess to love within 24 hours of interacting with them for the first time. And how do they “get” the girls? By shooing away some mutant bikers before very recklessly firing off a gun by accident in Wyatt's house for comedic effect. Sure, saved lives can make a solid case for new infatuation, but if I wanted to poop this party, I could say the girls' infatuation comes about as byproducts of their mutant traumatic experiences, a twisted transference of Stockholm Syndrome. And let's also remember that our guys "get" those girls after having agreed to create another Lisa for those earlier mentioned bullies in the most casual agreement regarding human trafficking since the nearest Q follower's imagination. And when Wyatt drops off Hilly at her house the next morning, where she tells him she’ll probably be grounded for a month, Wyatt says that he’ll wait for her…before grabbing her ass with both hands with his fingers crossed. What the fuck, what does that mean? He’s not going to wait for her? Did he learn nothing? Does he feel nothing? God, fuck you, Wyatt. DON’T YOU DARE DISRESPECT JUDIE ARONSON—SHE WAS AMERICAN NINJA'S GIRLFRIEND.

And what about poor Lisa, the victim in all this? How does a person come to grips with the existential realization that she’s been created out of thin air solely to be used as a sex toy? That she never had a childhood during which she could forge the experiences that help us all grow into the adults we become? And does that make it weird for her once the sex stuff falls by the wayside and she instead starts mommying the boys with a whole bunch of life lessons? Is she the wisest 23-year-old in existence? How does she get that gym teacher job at the end if she doesn’t have a social security number? Does she have DNA? Can she procreate? How long does a computer-generated person live, anyway? Do she and the boys all stay friends for the rest of their lives? Would it be weird if they did, or weird if they didn’t? When Gary and Wyatt eventually marry their girlfriends and Lisa goes to their joint wedding, do the boys reintroduce her to their new wives by saying, “Remember Lisa, the fuck slave we created with Wyatt’s Macintosh?”

♫ Weird Science! ♫

You might be tempted to think that because I've taken the time to explore the non-ageless content of Weird Science that I'm denigrating it in some manner, but I'm not. I'm celebrating Weird Science's oddness, it's strange surreal take on the somewhat boring teen-sex-comedy sub-genre, and yeah, it's political incorrectness. It's that last part that's being sucked out of the comedy genre, leaving it a soulless husk. A future in which people from all walks of life can walk out of a movie all having laughed at all the same jokes without feeling challenged in any particular way by its a content is a future that sounds bland and joyless. Comedy is the last line of defense where offense can be explored and prodded in ways that produce laughter both conflicted and joyful. Without that line to straddle, there's no Blazing Saddles, there's no Trading Places, and there's sure as hell no Weird Science. 

TEEN WITCH (1989)

During my virginal viewing of Teen Witch, it was inevitable that my mind be blown. As someone who adores cinematic misfires – films being the equivalent of “ideas that seemed good at the time” – the triumphant Teen Witch offered much entertainment.

The plot – so ludicrous.

The hair – so big.

The fashions – so ‘80s.

The random dance and rap sequences – so inexplicably present.

All of Teen Witch plays like a dream. At no point does it feel like it takes place in a real reality, and even for a movie reality it seems to be making it up as it goes.

Is it a musical?

No, not really.

Then why do people randomly break into song and, apparently, use musical interludes to solve conflicts using the hip-hop masterpiece “Top That”? (Speaking of, what’s particularly amazing about the “Top That” rap sequence is that it’s not one of those musical moments where the entire cast break into song. Rather, a handful of teenage boys are just out in the street randomly rapping and dancing with each other, and our femmes encounter this with a detectible look of apprehension. It’s kind of amazing — especially when the girl in the bucket hat gets magic courage and starts frontin’ Greaser Ryan Reynolds, who seems offended that she’s not steppin’ off.)

Is it a comedy?

Why yes, sometimes it is.

But how do you separate the intentional from the unintentional? Sure, it’s funny when Louise uses witchcraft to make her least favorite teacher take off his clothes during class in a Rated-PG manner, but is it supposed to be funny when during a pivotal emotional moment where Louise decides she doesn’t need witchcraft to fall in love that right behind her there’s an extra who looks like a demonic Jerry Seinfeld wearing a hideous sweater and dancing in the most awkward way possible while staring right at her?

  

Is it a dramatic, Hughes-ish, coming-of-age that real teens can relate to?

“Be happy with your non-witch form” is the lesson learned, so…maybe?

I…honestly don’t know.

Teen Witch is very ‘80s, and it’s interesting to see how much has changed in teen culture and the films that depict it, along with how much has been retained. Once Louise transitions from ugly duckling to beautiful swan, wearing Lauper-type ensembles comprised of bright colors and tutus, she becomes adorable. But the pre-witch version of Louise, in her frumpy clothes, her gigantic coats, her bulky sweaters, was still obviously adorable anyway. No amount of flat hair or awkward behavior was going to camouflage that. And that’s still a popular trope that’s been parodied in recent years – the beautiful girl that no one could see was beautiful because she wore glasses. However, amusingly, what the ‘80s depicted as the nerd – thick glasses, sweater vests, pompadours – is the version of today’s hipster and can be found in every catalog for Old Navy. See below:

Repeating my recent loss of innocence as it pertains to Teen Witch, I understand that I am treading on sacred ground. The catalyst for Teen Witch ending up on my reviewer radar was the announcement of the title on the Blu-ray format and the subsequent outrageous amount of enthusiasm for its release and the adoration of this title. Post-viewing, as I was walking around in a daze and inquiring if any colleagues had managed to get the license plate number off the bus that ran me down – aka, seen Teen Witch – I received a handful of disparate responses. One among them: “Um…TOP THAT is my favorite song!” 

How do you argue with that? I mean, listen to that soundtrack! Quick, pick your poison. What’s your favorite. “High School Blues”? “I Like Boys”? Perhaps “What Are You Doing About Love”? Spoiler: they’re all stupid! But I’ll be damned if they don’t add to Teen Witch‘s enjoyment.

Nostalgia is powerful. It can result in everything from fond memories to sheer denial. If I had grown up with Teen Witch in the same way many others did, perhaps my response to it would be different. And maybe these people recognize Teen Witch as cheesy, silly, irreverent, and somewhat poorly made at times (in one scene I swear Zelda Rubinstein is reading her lines off cue cards like Christopher Walken during an SNL skit), but it’s also admittedly perfectly harmless and certainly worthy of your embrace. And anyone who knows me knows that I’ve embraced much worse for far less. One thing is for certain: while watching Teen Witch, I was never bored, never not entertained, and I’ll probably never forget it.

Top that!

CAMPAIGN: SCHOOL OF 1980

The guys who made this...

Who Goes There? (The Thing homage)

...are trying to get this off the ground:

In a lawless 1980, in a defeated school, one teacher takes a stand against a vicious, and surprisingly old, gang.

A few years ago...

A time of chaos. America's schools have become battlegrounds.

George Washington High School is a powder keg waiting to explode. The teachers are demoralised by juvenile, crazed gangs protected by liberal lawyers and social workers. It seems no one is strong enough to fight back and give the kids a chance.

Except one teacher. Eve Lamb, battered and almost broken by her last school, is back to bring civilisation to the urban jungle. Eve is back to teach Home Ec. and give those kids a Tomorrow.

All goes fine until Eve crosses top gang THE PUNK ROCKERS and its leader, the apparently 17 year old genius Hans Koontman. Koontman is the dark mirror image of Eve, realising beneath her civilised facade is a born killer. The stage is set for a final confrontation between human dignity and animal savagery.

Only a violent showdown answers the question: who will survive?

School of 1980 is inspired by the harsh urban 80s movies Class of 1984, Mad Max, Assault on Precinct 13 and The Warriors!!   

Why make School of 1980?  

We want to make a film you cannot look away from. A film that grabs you by the throat and makes you watch. The funniest, craziest, fastest ten minutes you've ever seen.  That's all.

All I can say is...I'm in. So hard.

Makelight Productions is launching an Indiegogo Campaign to help fund this project, and they are offering some really fun/cool stuff to those who decide to donate.

You can check out those details here.

To those at Makelight, I wish you great luck with this. I look forward to the final product.