Spy Spoofs, Bright Yellow VHS, and Wellie-Wearing Cows Shhh! Top Secret! snuck onto home video this week back in 1984, after a lukewarm June 22nd theatrical release. Top Secret may have lost the box office battle against other ’84 summer heavy weights like Gremlins and Ghostbusters, but Val Kilmer’s cool, calm and quotable ZAZ spy … Read more
Teen Witch materialised on Home Video today in 1989, after an April 28th theatrical release. My favourite negative review of the film is by Chris Willman of the Los Angeles Times: “…complete with teen wish-fulfillment fantasies, condescending moralizing, asinine musical montages, horrifying pop songs, french kissing, blatant product plugs and Dick Sargent.” Those are also … Read more
The McDonald’s Ad That Feels Like a Warm Hug Apropos of nothing, this is still the single greatest moment in advertising history. The original cut of the commercial was filmed in ’82 with new closeups of Ronald added in ’86 and ’91 for each new actor. The commercial didn’t air in ’87 and ’88, but … Read more
Miguel as portrayed by Anthony Dileo in 1985’s Day of the Dead. My favorite George Romero heel. He might have once been a swell guy, and certainly Sarah thought so for a while, but by the time we’re aquatinted with the private, he’s been beaten into this loathsome, abusive and pathetic character. A shattered, self-loathing … Read more
The Most 80s Teen Movie to Ever 80s Teen The Zoo Gang (1985) starring Marc Price, Jackie Earle Haley, Tiffany Helm, Bobby Jacoby, Eric Gurry and Ben Vereen is absolutely a real film that happened. Not only that, but it’s also one of the first films to don the PG-13 rating. This flick’s a proper … Read more
The Quirky Android Rom-Com You Almost Forgot Heartbeeps (1981) is a weirdly whimsical Allan Arkush-directed rom com about a couple of androids starring Andy Kaufman and Bernadette Peters. I thought I’d hallucinated this one for 20 years, maybe it was the result of playing with Star Wars action figures while Taxi was on… or seeing … Read more
NBC’s Teen Comedy Gold Standard Dance Till Dawn (First broadcast in October 23rd, 1988) is one of the all-time great made-for-TV Teen movies and featured (my 80s alter-ego) Chris Young, Christina Applegate, Tempestt Bledsoe, Brian Bloom, Cliff De Young, Tracey Gold, Edie McClurg, Alyssa Milano, Matthew Perry and Alan Thicke. See, Back in the 80’s, … Read more
The Bond That Set My 00 Standard You never forget your first Bond. This was the first NEW James Bond after I discovered the franchise through a late night Bondathon around the time of Octopussy’s release. With a scorching air-drum-inducing theme song by then-hottest band in my record collection, Duran Duran, the movie felt like … Read more
Verhoeven’s Mind-Bending Arnie Action Total Recall got its ass to Home Video today in 1990, after a June 1st theatrical release. Another Verhoeven tour-de-force – it was priced-to-own at $24.99 and became one of year’s top-selling videocassettes. If I Rekall correctly, I tried sneaking into a showing after watching Back To The Future Part III … Read more