Reviews
Hudson Hawk (1991)
How far do you go for a laugh?
A big budget, action/adventure/comedy which although often childish and ridiculous is not perhaps as bad as it is made out to be. It does however have a gung ho, anything for a laugh attitude, but the charisma and charm of leading man Bruce Willis is able to keep you interested. It contains some wonderful song and dance routines (admittedly performed by the two leads in the middle of a robbery) and some wonderful dark humour thanks to co-scribe Dan Waters.
Other performances worth mentioning are James Coburn, Andie MacDowell and a wonderful over the top performance by Richard E Grant. Love this movie or loathe it, you have to admire the spirit of the movie and the childish fun therein.
They should have left the choking on vomit, whilst french kissing scene in though.
Meet the Applegates (1990)
A family movie with a difference
Director Michael Lehmann's second movie which takes a very witty look at the typical suburban American family, in all its cliched glory. The plot is fairly straightforward, though bizzare to say the least. A group of Brazilian rain forest bugs, threatened by industrial development take on human form in order to blow up a nuclear power station as a warning. In order to do this they have to become a typical American family to provide cover for their agenda. However, they soon realise that there is no such thing as the perfect family and very quickly things start to go wrong.
The dialogue is sharp, witty and always amusing, although the directors attempt at a screenplay is not a patch on that of Dan Waters who wrote his first movie Heathers. Overall, a very overlooked and forgotten movie which deserves praise for the amount of mileage the director got from a small budget and a mediocre script.
Heathers (1988)
A fitting close to the decade of the teen movie
This $2 million dollar movie is a triumph in writing and visual style and comes across as almost a backlash against the typical teen movies that preceded it. The most striking feature of this movie is the dialogue, sharp, humourous and memorable lines flow thick and fast throughout. All the usual elements to a teen movie are here, drugs, sexuality, alcohol, suicide, eating disorders and so on, but they are addressed in a darkly humourous fashion that seems to tread an original line between being condescending and being exploitive.
However through the haze of twisted humour comes an emotional involvement with the charactors, particurly Veronica played by superbly by Winona Ryder which counteracts the sheer charisma of the J.D. charactor played by Christian Slater.
Everyone I seem to speak to about this movie either worships it unfailingly or have never heard of it, and like myself, though being English can recognise ourselves in one of the many colourful charactors of the school.
Having been made by a first time director, producer and Writer Heathers is far from perfect and contains minor continuity errors and questionable logic. However this should not detract from the fact that it is a movie which emotionally effects everyone who watches it in some way or another. Ideal medicine for the treatment of the Peter Pan complex so many of us suffer from.