25 From 85: My Favorite Films Of 1985
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Enemy Mine is a film that starts out as a "bad alien" movie and then evolves into a "good alien" movie by intergalactically pondering the question of "Why can't we all just get along?"
The truth is, no matter what planet one is from, when it comes to reaching racial harmony, even on an interplanetary scale, we all need to follow Jerry Seinfeld's advice and try to take a bite out of both sides of the black and white cookie.
Look to the cookie, my fellow Listophiles.
We must all look to the cookie.
Oh, and to all you science fiction geeks out there,
that's cookie, not wookie.
So don't start looking towards Chewbacca for any kind of sage words on the subject. No matter how much your geek infested brain is going to try to convince you otherwise, unlike Klingon from Trek, there isn't a single one of you out there who is going to be able learn how to speak Wookie.
And to rest of the non-sci-fi nerds out there reading this, the sad thing here is that we all know that there is some sci-fi nerd who responded to that last sentence with "Challenge accepted!".
After R:FBP2 however, Sly's crazy ex-soldier easily crossed over that line and just sorta became more of a cartoon-like character of violence that he's become famous for since then.
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Still, for all the bloated brawny ridiculousness that has infested this franchise, I've been able to accept this particular movie for the fiery explosion-laden popcorn escapist fare that it is.
Though, that doesn't mean I have to like any of the sequels that followed up after this one. For me, those all still suck.
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Prince's ex-nasty girl, Vanity teams up with a dragon that can catch bullets with his teeth.
Sho-Nuff.
With the criminal proving to be elusive, the agents start participating in activities that will put their badges and their police codes into jeopardy.
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Directed by William Friedkin, To Live And Die In L.A. is a police story that winds and weaves through the path of compromised processes and whatever-it-takes tactics that can lead to the kind of in-department corruption and above-the-law vigilantism that any officer can easily fall prey to in the obsessive pursuit of the perp.
Starring the Highlander guy and with a look that has
been described as "visually vibrant", Subway is an artistically French underground movie about the French who like to live artistically underground.
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In this installment, Mad Max wanders into the lost community of Bartertown only to find himself thrown into the caged arena of the Thunderdome to square off against the symbiotic might of the Master-Blaster. A bungee inspired battle which results in the learning of a very important lesson about the post-apocalyptic world of the future; when it comes to survival in the Thunderdome, we don't need another hero.
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In other words, he experiences what it's like to be on in Soho after hours.
A black comedy that I didn't find to be as funny as most critics, yet it was still a movie that, over-all, proved to be an interesting trip through lower Manhattan in the street level manner that only Martin Scorsese can provide.
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The saving grace of this typical cowboy Clint chronicle is that, at the end of the day, it's still a solid Eastwood shoot-em-up.
More than any other decade, the 80's seemed to lack the numbers when it came to western thrillers. Therefore, despite the rerunning of certain formulas, Pale Rider helps to fill in a quota of cinema iconography that we've gotten used to seeing in the 60's and in the 70's; the shadowy, roughly cut visage of Eastwood's face under a dusty cowboy hat with silently gritted teeth, ready to dish out some six-shooting justice to any "black-hatted" hombre lookin' to stir up some trouble.
Don’t get me wrong, I know that there really wasn’t all that much substance within the plot of FN, but the truth is, what it does manage to do very effectively is present itself as a sort of spoofy love letter to the movies that used to fill up the creature features content of horror TV shows that were so popular with young horror fans and which were run and rerun during late weekend nights pf the 70's and 80's.
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The story here centers on Charlie Brewster, a high schooling teen whose favorite show, appropriately enough named Fright Night, is the inspiration into his belief that his two new male neighbors are in actuality, a vampire and his human familiar. Obviously, no one around him shares this fantastical belief, but that doesn’t stop Charlie from seeking out the host of the Fright Night television series, a washed-up actor, Peter Vincent, with nothing better else to do outside of shooting his TV show and who therefore decides to investigate, in return for an easy paycheck.
Despite the dated look of the special effects and make up used to make the concept of a blood sucking dead walker come alive on the screen, it is still pretty apparent to modern eyes that these were the highest quality level of visual techniques of the time that were being utilized. The plot, still buried deep within the nature of camp of which this material is built for, is still written with the level of integrity that balances between suspending one’s sense of disbelief towards dead humans rising from the grave with appetite for the blood, and the subsisting continuity of the corpse lore that doesn’t insult the intelligence, at least to the point where your brain has to be left at the door.
Fright Night captures spirit of the best lightweight horror films that featured the classic creatures with longtime legends has to offer and updates them to fit within the aesthetics of enjoyable cinema that was the 1980s. It may not have scared you out of your pants, but it did make it enjoyable to sit down in a dark theater with a big bucket of popcorn, a small half barrel sized cup of blue, frozen slushy, and the mindset of fiendish fun that tends to rise out of this particular brand of fanged fandom.
a partially naked Amish woman.
And let's be honest....
the image of something like that is just downright hawt.
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Back in the 80's, Harrison Ford always seemed to get the best roles.
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A "what-if-John-Hughes-was-suicidal" type of off-beat romantic-comedy
that will either touch your heart or make you reach into your pocket with the hope that you'll have at least two dollars in there (for those of you who may not get that, it's a "running" joke {pun intented} of the movie).
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Back in the day, quality sword & sorcery movies were incredibly rare. Ladyhawke (why the "e" at the end?) and Legend were the only ones I ever really liked (wasn't much of a fan of Willow), up until when LOTR finally got made many years later.
And while Legend focused more on it's stunning sets and character designs, this one was geared more thru it's storytelling and character development (although, this one's also was very appealing to the eyes).
A love story appropriated through the genre, it stars Ferris Bueller, Scarface's girlfriend and a very moody replicant.
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And no, this movie's title is not referring the "big adventure" that landed him in jail and thus made this playhouse dwelling man-child infamously kinda creepy.
But maybe it's that slight touch of creepiness that seems to add a bit of edge to this quirky cross country comedy about a "boy" and his bike.
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Legend was probably the first movie to come into my life where I felt that it truly captured the fantasy element of a sword and sorcery saga that I always wanted to see on film when it came to this genre. The visuals in this movie are amazing, bright and filled with an abundance of energy (especially for it's time). The designs of the landscape and the characters encapsulate the kind of style that I would have envisioned whenever I read a book featuring elves, trolls, unicorns and whatnot. Even the devilish full body make-up of the primary antagonist, Lord Of Darkness, was spared no expense at the baddassery of his gigantically horned self.
I think that Legend was an aptly titled big step into what these types of movies had the potential to be.
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A tense-filled court-room thriller filled with enough twists and turns in it's story that, if there were another courtroom movie playing after this one, it's plot would probably benefit from the spill-over.
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Directed, co-written and starring Albert Brooks, LiA is wistfully witty look at how easy it is to lose the pursuit for the American Dream when driving through life with no real sense of direction and without Lady Luck on your side.
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A case of bad luck that can only be described as "out of the frying pan and into the fire... and then more fire".
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With his acting skillz running on all cylinders, Jon Voight stars alongside Eric Roberts in another example that demonstrates that Eric really can act, if only he could find a way to say no to all those B-movie scripts that keep coming his way.
Based on true events, this is a tale of two men who, fueled by disillusionment and greed, end up in a unlikely position where they can sell governmental secrets of the U.S. to the then-rival government of the then-communist Soviet Union.
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Driven by the combined thespian skillz of two actors at the peak of their careers (Sean Penn and Timothy Hutton), The Falcon And The Snowman is an excellent story of two low-profile citizens caught up way over their heads in high-profile stakes.
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Let's be honest here,
despite the connection that the majority of John Hughes' films have to the 80's,
when it comes to The Breakfast Club,
this is the movie that has the decade saying "Don't you forget about me".
In a simple mind kind of a way, that is.
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In this Soviet produced war drama, we follow a peasant boy on his military journey as he goes from being "drafted" into a severely under-supplied resistance group to the atrocities that ensue as a troop of drunken Nazi soldiers blaze through a hapless village and it's towns people.
It's very difficult to capture in words just how visceral the experience of watching this can be other to say that you will most unlikely ever see another movie that effectively and genuinely depicts the dehumanizing aftermath of military battle as this one.
Truly one of the best war films ever made.
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And maybe, even take a few of our senior citizens with 'em.
Which is fine by us.
Cuz in space, no one can hear an old man fart.
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In more ways than one.
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Disguised as a film about traveling through a bus,
this is actually a great introspection into the life of someone who's been on the journey of life and kinda wishes that she could do it all again, but this time, behind the wheel of her own vehicle.
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Definitely my favorite of his works.
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Michael J. Fox, Leah Thompson, Christopher Loyd, along with Crispin Glover, form a cadre of actors whom, at the time of that BTTF occupied theaters, were not considered top marquee celebrities, a situation that would change, particularly for Fox, after this surprise hit's release.
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Marty McFly may seem like just a typical, whitebred kid from the 80's, but the truth is, well.... he really is just a typical whitebred kid from the 80's. Okay, maybe his dad never shrugged off his 1950's brand of nerdiness, but let's be honest here, back in the 80's, we all sorta knew that that was more the norm than what was usually portrayed on TV and in the movies as to what typical was. And maybe every once in a while, Marty tended to hang around with an offbeat, weirdo professor, but the fact that Marty could play guitar pretty good, was in a band and had a good looking 80's style girlfriend sorta balanced all that out, didn't it? And he wasn't doing drugs.
But whatever, this so-called "atypical" kid gets caught up in one of his professor friend's experiments, and next thing you know, he's driving a super-souped up DeLorean (the "car of the future") through time, and finds himself stuck in the past. And with an empty flux capacitor, a younger version of the professor and his teen-aged so-to-be dad, McFly must find a way back.... to the fut....well.... you know.
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Directed by Robert Zemekis, Back To The Future is a time-traveling tale which inarguably solidified the fact that it's never a good idea to take your mother to the school dance. Even if it's before she becomes your mother.
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Other Fave Movies Lists By Year:
1970
www.listal.com/list/10-70-my-fave-films
1971
www.listal.com/list/15-71-my-favorite-movies
1972
www.listal.com/list/15-72-my-favorite-films
1973
www.listal.com/list/20-73-my-favorite-films
1974
www.listal.com/list/films-of-1974
1975
www.listal.com/list/20-75-my-favorite-films
1976
www.listal.com/list/20-76-my-favorite-films
1977
www.listal.com/list/20-77-my-favorite-films
1978
www.listal.com/list/20-1978-my-favorite-films
1979
www.listal.com/list/20-79-my-favorite-films
1981
www.listal.com/list/25-81-my-favorite-films
1982
www.listal.com/list/25-82-my-favorite-films
1983
www.listal.com/list/25-83-my-favorite-films
1984
www.listal.com/list/25-84-my-favorite-films
1986
www.listal.com/list/25-86-my-favorite-films
1987
www.listal.com/list/25-87-my-favorite-films
1988
www.listal.com/list/25-88-my-favorite-films
1989
www.listal.com/list/25-89-my-favorite-films
1990
www.listal.com/list/30-90-my-favorite-films
1991
www.listal.com/list/30-91-my-favorite-films
1992
www.listal.com/list/30-92-my-favorite-films
1993
www.listal.com/list/30-93-my-favorite-films
1994
www.listal.com/list/30-94-my-favorite-films
1995
www.listal.com/list/30-95-my-favorite-films
1996
www.listal.com/list/30-96-my-favorite-films
1997
www.listal.com/list/30-97-my-favorite-films
1998
www.listal.com/list/30-98-my-favorite-films
1999
www.listal.com/list/30-99-my-favorite-films
2000
www.listal.com/list/35-00-my-favorite-films
2001
www.listal.com/list/35-1-my-favorite-films
2002
www.listal.com/list/35-2-my-favorite-films
2003
www.listal.com/list/35-3-my-favorite-films
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