Sunday School: Defining the '80s Through Film Part II

Welcome to the second of our multi-week course on the 1980s, as viewed through the lens of the decade's cinema. The '80s nostalgia train may have been derailed by the thermonuclear failure of Take Me Home Tonight, but dammit, I know in my heart of hearts that you still want to learn a thing or two about a thing or two.

In this week's course, we'll be digging into masculinity, mannequins and melodramatic manhunting. I'll be teaching you about lone wolves once took on entire armies all by their lonesome, how magical Egyptian ladies once danced to Starship, and how tortured dudes with beards can only track serial killers when keyboards are blaring behind them at all times. Get ready to blow up foreigners while staring moodily at freaky gay stereotypes, it's time to learn stuff...with a vengeance!

The Pun-Chewing Lone Wolf Who Blew Up Everything

Commando (1985)

One of the things we, as men (if you're a woman reading this, move downward in the feature, because testosterone is about to be celebrated, big time) can thank the 1980s for is the proliferation of the big, stupid action movie. Specifically, the big, stupid action movie starring an invincible, one-liner spouting badass who knows how to use every gun, wield every instrument of violent stabbing, and blow the living shit out of any scenery that happens to be unlucky enough to catch his field of vision. No movie encompasses this style of action filmmaking better than Commando. Arnold Schwarzenegger is one of the towering giants of ridiculous '80s cinema, and this film is the perfect showcase for the two things he's proven himself good at--deadpanning "hilarious" puns, and letting his pecs glisten in the sun as he fires off a machine gun the size of an '85 Skylark. 

As the tremendously named John Matrix, Schwarzenegger does the thing that we often demanded our '80s action heroes do: protect their damn women. In this case, it's a pint-sized Alyssa Milano as his daughter, who is kidnapped by a South American dictator (played by the decidedly not South American Dan Hedaya) and his insane, chain-mail draped sidekick, Bennett. Tropical settings were a favorite among '80s shoot-'em-ups, as were the requisite pan flutes in the soundtrack. Schwarzenegger effectively lone-wolfs his way through the entire movie--save for a bit of help from a hapless flight attendant played by the constantly-worried looking Rae Dawn Chong--more or less outwitting the entire US military and Hedaya's personal army of stunt men in fake mustaches and brown skin paint. The film's denouement is one of the most elaborately, stupidly awesome things ever put to film ( here's a taste). It's the cherry atop the bowl of explosions, bullets, and biceps that so many kids of my generation devoured with greedy glee during our formative years.

Additional Viewing:

Cobra (1986) - Arguably a good deal more '80s than Commando, but it hits many of the same marks as Rocky IV. Namely: Stallone, Brigitte Nielsen, dramatic montages, random robots, and a single sequence involving all of the above. It does have the added benefit of fetishizing industrial scenery, a bit of the ever-so-popular '50s nostalgia found in many '80s films, and a cop who can operate independent of the entire LA police force for ill-defined reasons. Also, another good, silly action hero name: Marion Cobretti
Top Gun (1986) - Maverick is effectively your lone wolf, plus this satisfies your Tom Cruise quota, the '80s' obsession with dudes in jet fighters (and MiGs, don't forget MiGs), and the all-important Kenny Loggins factor. DANGER ZONE! I mean, uh, " Danger Zone". Plus, how do you top that silhouetted love scene set to "Take My Breath Away"?
Delta Force (1986) - Ostensibly a reaction to the 1985 Trans Am hijacking, this "Lebanese terrorists hijack a plane and the US military kicks their ass" movie features Chuck Norris riding around on a motorcycle outfitted with rocket launchers, Lee Marvin's last role, Robert Forster in yet another "white guy plays foreigner role" as the lead terrorist, and Alan Silvestri's electro soundtrack played, without break, for like half an hour straight. It's not as '80s shitty as Megaforce, but it's still amazing.
Highlander (1986) - I know, I said I'd stick to three picks, but I can't ignore this remarkable bit of fantasy manliness. Christopher Lambert plays his defining role as an immortal on a quest to defeat other immortals on account of, "There can be only one." He is taught to fight by a man named Ramirez who claims to be Egyptian, that is played by Sean Connery. Yeah, it's that kind of movie. The whole thing plays out like a power metal album come to life--blades, big hair, and beheadings abound--a quality amplified significantly by the Queen-produced soundtrack. It's cheesy as hell, but a fun swords and sorcery kind of adventure with an '80s New York setting.

The Ancient Egyptian Princess Who Met an '80s Queen

 

Mannequin (1987)

Writers of '80s film had a heavy fascination with putting magical and/or foreign people and creatures where they seemingly did not belong--the " fish out of water" tale, if you're a slave to antiquated metaphors. Where those people came from or what they were varied wildly; where they did not belong was, almost always, the '80s. If you want the prime example of how ridiculous, overwrought, and downright stupid this concept could get, look no further than Mannequin. 

In the film, Andrew McCarthy is a struggling artist who takes a job at a department store, only to discover that a store window mannequin is actually a real woman from ancient Egypt (played by the totally Egyptian Kim Cattrall), who only comes to life when he's around. They, of course, spark up a romance, which leads to success for McCarthy, and discovery of the wonders of the '80s for Cattrall. The movie features one of many classic James Spader villain roles, and one of the most insane gay stereotypes of all time in Hollywood Montrose (played by Meshach Taylor). Even divorced from McCarthy's skinny neckties, Cattrall's silk pantsuits, the embarrassment of ridiculous '80s pop riches that is the film's soundtrack (all of which can be found in this absurdity of a montage), Hollywood would make this list all by his damn self. He's the embodiment of the '80s gay sidekick; a flaming, lisping queen who screeches with girlish terror, dresses in 17 fashion styles at once, and makes constant, insufferable bon mots regarding pop culture and how it pertains to his particular gayness. Proof? Sadly, decent clips from the first film are hard to find, but here's a "great" one from the 1991 follow-up, Mannequin: On the Move. Yes, someone thought enough of the character to give him an increased role in the sequels. Thanks, movies.

Additional Viewing:

Splash (1984) - Literally a fish out of water movie. Literally. Tom Hanks is rescued by a mermaid, who comes looking for him in New York. They fall in love, without him knowing what she really is, and then they eat lobster. Features such comedic luminaries of the era as John Candy and Eugene Levy, and, of course, Daryl Hannah in her prime.
'Crocodile' Dundee (1986) - People of the '80s were fascinated by the strange, fantastical realm known as "Down Under"--its scientific name, "Australia" would only be discovered sometime around the mid-'90s.  Paul Hogan was one of the many beneficiaries of this fascination, as he took the lead in this adventure comedy about a crocodile hunter in New York. This is actually a double shot of fish out of water, as the early portion of the film features an NYC journalist ( Linda Kozlowski) out of her element in the outback, and eventually Dundee in New York, showing us Americans what a knife really looks like.
Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) - Mostly a movie about the crew of the Enterprise traveling back in time to rescue future-extinct whales, it's also the first '80s nostalgia movie, with a ton of great, goofy "future people experience the '80s" bits. They encounter punks, they get mistaken for Russian spies, they lack correct bus fare, it's madness! It helps that this is one of the more watchable Star Trek movies to begin with, but the added bonus of examining the culture of the '80s through the lens of Gene Roddenberry's future is pretty awesome as well.

The Synth-Tortured Cop Who Couldn't Stop Staring Off-Camera

Manhunter (1986)

This is admittedly a bit of an obscure pick, but this also happens to be the movie that inspired this list to begin with. There may, in fact, be no more all-encompassingly '80s movie than this one. No surprise, then, that it's the work of Michael Mann, the creator of the most '80s TV show of all time, Miami Vice, and one of the all time champions of '80s-synth soundtracks for everything.

Actually the first of the Hannibal Lecter novels to be adapted (it would later be de-'80s-ified by Brett Ratner in his remake, Red Dragon), Manhunter featured one of the great almost-stars of the 1980s in William Petersen. Petersen had a few major roles around this time, but none so memorably '80s as FBI profiler Will Graham. Mann has Graham alternately staring at everyone and everything around him broodingly and spouting complete nonsense ( or both, at once, with the addition of endless slow-zooming) as he attempts to catch the fearsome Tooth Fairy, a serial killer (played by great creepy actor Tom Noonan) who kills random families and has a really good '80s serial killer house. The whole movie is nothing but non-stop mood lighting, angular cameras, then-modern architecture and blaring synth-pop culled from whatever happened to be on Mann's walkman that week. One key gimmick of '80s movies that consider themselves "serious" is to assault many (and if possible, every) scene with absurdly dramatic music, and few directors weighed down scenes via synths quite like Michael Mann.

The last scene of the movie is something you could play for anyone as a pure, unfiltered example of an entire decade summed up in a single scene. His shorts, her pants, the melodramatic, piercing stares, the unnatural body positioning that signals "troubled man weighing the balance of his life," that SONG. Wow.

Alternate Viewing:

To Live and Die in L.A. (1985) - More William Petersen, plus an astonishingly crazed Willem Dafoe as an unhinged counterfeiter. They go at it after Dafoe kills Petersen's partner, sending Petersen on a totally '80s revenge bender. This might as well be McBain by way of Manhunter.
The Keep (1983) - Totally obscure, not a crime movie, and not even out on DVD, but easily the ultimate example of how Michael Mann can '80s the living shit out of anything--even a World War II-set horror movie. I've written about this film previously, if you're interested in learning more.
Scarface (1983) - Brian De Palma's much-celebrated crime epic about a Cuban immigrant ( Al Pacino) who works his way up through the ranks of early '80s Miami's underworld is impossible to ignore. The whole film is like a coke-addled, post-disco fever dream of gun violence and new wave clubbing, and it set the stage for Miami's role as one of the decade's great settings for crime fiction. Its influence on gangster culture in the years to follow is undeniable--I mean, there's a reason every asshole frat boy ever has had this movie poster up on his wall, right next to John Belushi, Bob Marley, and the periodic table of mixology.
 
And with that, our second course week comes to a close. You've got quite the load of homework ahead of you, but don't forget to prep for next Sunday, in which we shall examine in crackpot scientific detail the 1980s fascinations with the 1950s, mismatched buddies and parental neglect leading to exciting adventure! See you next time!