Movie Review: License To Drive (1988)

A teen adventure comedy, License To Drive is much better than it needs to be thanks to a sympathetic Corey Haim performance and a sharp script.

16 year old high school student Les (Haim) can't wait to get his driver's license in order to impress his alluring classmate Mercedes (Heather Graham). Les' Dad (Richard Masur) and pregnant Mom (Carol Kane) fully expect him to pass his driving test at the first attempt, as do his friends Dean (Corey Feldman) and Charles (Michael Manasseri). Despite acing the driving portion of the exam, Les flunks the computer test.

Unable to deal with the humiliation of failure, Les conveniently forgets to tell his friends that he still does not have a license. Instead he smuggles his grandfather's blue Cadillac out of the garage when his parents are sleeping, and embarks on a date with Mercedes, which extends to a joyride session with Dean and Charles. Mercedes is soon consuming too much alcohol, while Dean eggs Les on towards more adventures with unexpected consequences.

A star-making vehicle for Haim, who really was 16 years old, License To Drive captures the young actor at his peak and helped to propel "the two Coreys" to the height of teenage stardom. It would all end in drug-drenched tragedy for Haim, but here his instinctive talent and easy screen charisma are fully on display, and undeniable. He lifts what would otherwise be a routine teen flick to an enjoyable romp through a combination of mischievous innocence and adorable winks at the audience.

Director Greg Beeman wisely recognizes the talent at his disposal and makes the film all about Les. The would-be romance with Mercedes, the spiky friendships with Dean and Charles, the awkward relationship with slightly goofy parents and the relentless pursuit of a driver's license all start and end with Les in the middle of his own world.

In what is essentially a slightly less dangerous version of Risky Business, all of Les' adventures are also patchy, underdeveloped and sometimes icky, including resolutions where Mercedes ends us passed out drunk, stuffed in the trunk of a car and then exploited by Dean as he takes revealing pictures. In 1988 these events were still considered somehow funny for a teen-oriented comedy film.

Helping the film rise above forgettable is a stronger than usual supporting cast bringing the secondary cast to life. This was Graham's first credited screen role and she shines as the unattainable high school crush who is suddenly available. Richard Masur and Carol Kane ensure that Les' parents are more quirky than usual, while Feldman and Manasseri are believable as the friends who make sure trouble is around every antic.

License To Drive exploits the unspoken joke that licensed or not, Les is a naturally talented ace driver behind the wheel of that Cadillac. The film finds the fun it seeks riding along with its young star, but in retrospect is tinged with the sadness of a talent lost too soon.

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Movie Review: Gremlins (1984)

A comic-horror adventure with mischievous killer creatures taking over a small town, Gremlins enjoys a decent opening but runs out of ideas half-way through, and degenerates into silly puppeteering overload.

In a mysterious Chinatown shop, eccentric inventor Rand Peltzer (Hoyt Axton) buys a small furry creature called a Mogwai as a Christmas present for his teenaged son Billy (Zach Galligan). The Mogwai comes with three strict rules: the creature should not be exposed to bright light and particularly not direct sunlight, should not come in contact with water, and should never be fed after midnight. In the family's quaint hometown of Kingston Falls, Billy calls his new pet Gizmo and does his best to adhere by the rules, but when an accident caused by neighbourhood kid Pete (Corey Feldman) spills water on Gizmo, the creature emits fur balls and each becomes a new Mogwai. One of the new offspring has a mohawk and a mean streak, and is labelled Stripe.

Zach seeks the help of his high school science teacher (Glynn Turman), who starts to run blood tests on one of the Mogwai. The playfully malicious creatures (with the exception of Gizmo) then get their hands on some food after midnight, and after a cocoonish incubation period they transforms into ugly looking evil monsters, intent on death and destruction. Zach's mother Lynn (Frances Lee McCain) has to fight off the gremlins in her kitchen, but Stripe escapes, jumps into a pool, and creates a large army of cohorts. As the number of victims grows, Zach and his potential girlfriend Kate (Phoebe Cates) have to find a way to stop the gremlins before the whole town is destroyed.

With Steven Spielberg as Executive Producer and an effective premise, the opening 40 minutes of Gremlins feature an entertaining build-up. Director Joe Dante, working from a Chris Columbus script, takes his time in introducing the little critters, the Chinatown scene appropriately mysterious, and the initial tour through Kingston Falls setting a rich stage for the mayhem to come and the colourful locals who will soon become victims.

The kitchen battle scene between Mom and the first group of gremlins is a highlight, small appliances being put to good use, both the blender and microwave getting to grips with the ugly critters and causing quite the gremlin gore and juice mess.

But then the film's energy ebbs away, as the novelty wears off and Dante settles for the obvious: numerous shots of numerous gremlins behaving badly, the yuks disappearing as familiarity takes over. And it's a common problem, a running gag about Dad's useless inventions equally floundering on the rocks of repetition. Like all jokes that stretch too far, Gremlins goes from funny to boring in a hurry.

The lack of charisma in the central role does not help. Once the mayhem erupts, Zach Galligan is given very little to do, and Billy mostly comes across as an unconvincing dork playing second fiddle to an evil version of the muppet show. Better but still underutilized is Phoebe Cates, and at least she gets to deliver the film's best spooky story, sharing the reason why she really does not like Christmas. Judge Reinhold has a small role that seems to have suffered severely in the editing room.

Gremlins is funny when it's furry, but soggy when it's slimy.

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Movie Review: The 'Burbs (1989)

A promising first half fizzles badly in the second half. The 'Burb is half of a good film, succeeding in painting a typically eccentric picture of life in the suburbs before disintegrating into a muddled mass murder mess.

In a seemingly quiet suburb, Ray Peterson (Tom Hanks) is on vacation. Much to the disgust of his wife Carol (Carrie Fisher), he decides to spend his time off lounging around the house, watching television and snooping on the goings on in the neighbourhood. His neighbours include Mark (Bruce Dern), who is still fighting the Vietnam war; Art (Rick Ducommun), who has too many conspiracies and not enough good sense; and the young Ricky (Corey Feldman), who seems to be in the movie just to attract the younger demographic and whose absentee parents are never quite explained.

Ray is most intrigued by the reclusive new owners of the decrepit house immediately next to his. Loud noises and strange lights are emitted from their basement in the middle of the night. When they are spotted, the owners look like escapees from a 1920s lunatic asylum. And it doesn't help that they appear to be digging up their yard past midnight to either bury or retrieve dead bodies. Ray, Mark and Art start poking their nose deeper into the affairs of the house horrors.

Director Jo Dante can do little with the Dana Olsen script that starts brightly but fades without warning. The opening 45 minutes of The 'Burbs is an entertaining introduction to the lives that live behind every hedge, exaggerated for effect but nevertheless recognizable enough from any real-world subdivision. Tom Hanks is effective as everyman, not quite aware of a creeping mid-life crisis, bored with life but content to burn his vacation by chilling out in his suburban haven. Bruce Dern is over-animated but quite funny as Mark, highly strung but coping with it thanks to the distracting charms of his wife Bonnie (Wendy Schaal). Rick Ducommun's Art is the annoying neighbour, with an answer for everything and knowledge of nothing.

The back-end of The 'Burbs unfortunately throws away most of the good work and becomes a faux horror journey into the bowels of a creepy house, complete with hints of macabre medical experimentations, basement cremations, and human bones in the back yard. None of it is explained, as Olsen and Dante throw all logic out with the trash and surrender to juvenile instincts. As every suburbanite knows, manicuring the front lawn while abandoning the back yard to a pile of junk fools no one.

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Movie Review: Stand By Me (1986)

A nostalgic ode to the innocence of childhood friendships based on a Stephen King novella, Stand By Me is a trip down memory lane enlivened by a willing young cast.

It's 1959 in rural Oregon, and the small community of Castle Rock is buzzing with rumours about a missing teenager. Four 12-year-old friends stumble onto crucial information: the teenager is dead, his body lying by the rail tracks, a two-day walk away. Street-smart Chris (River Phoenix); intellectual Gordie (Wil Wheaton); eccentric Teddy (Corey Feldman) and overweight Vern (Jerry O'Connell) decide to embark on an unlikely trek to find the body and gain the resultant perception of fame.

The dead body is a classic McGuffin and this is of course a journey of self-discovery, with the boys finding themselves and awakening to each other as human beings. The trip along the rail tracks represents the boys' struggle to overcome the travails of childhood and learn the responsibilities of adulthood, while engraving into their psyche a memory of a life-time.

Gordie is haunted and traumatized by the death of his football star older brother Denny (John Cusack). Gordie is sure that his parents would have preferred him to to be dead instead. Gordie is also carrying the hopes of his friends: he is the only one among them expected to go to college and achieve anything in life. Chris is cocky and self-confident, but has already decided on his destiny: he comes from a tough family, and a challenging future is all he sees ahead, although his self-awareness provides him with a remarkably sharp perspective on the world.

Teddy is physically and emotionally scarred: his abusive dad held his ear to a stove, and Teddy hides behind a facade of eccentric bravado. Vern is surprisingly timid and pushed deeper into his shell the more he is bullied about his weight.

Rob Reiner extracts mature and honest performances from his young cast, and keeps most of Stand By Me focused on the kids. The film is very much a perspective on life at age 12, and older teenagers are the dark forces: Kiefer Sutherland is at his snarliest leading a gang of thugs racing to beat Gordie and his friends to the site of the dead body. There are hardly any adults in the movie, with Gordie's parents portrayed as detached and cold hearted, while Richard Dreyfuss mails in a cameo as the grown-up Gordie narrating the story. The soundtrack of classic 1950s tracks increases the wistful sentimentality of the simple story.

Being a pre-teen may be all about simplifying life's complexities down to a tussle among friends; Stand By Me recognizes that at age 12, friendships are the essence of life.

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Movie Review: The Lost Boys (1987)

Before movie vampires were cuddly, hunky, and tragically romantic, they were pretty rotten creatures, none more so than the small colony of murderous blood suckers in The Lost Boys. These vampires have no redeeming features whatsoever, and they look fairly hideous whether in human or monster mode.

With Joel Schumacher directing, Richard Donner co-producing, and a cast of characters that brought together some of the better young talent of the era, The Lost Boys is a classy tongue-in-cheek horror flick with a few good moments of humour thrown in to spice up the fun.

Teenager Michael (Jason Patric) and his younger brother Sam (Corey Haim) are new arrivals to the small coastal California town of Santa Carla, where their mom Lucy (Dianne Wiest) has relocated their lives following a divorce. Beyond perpetually cheesy fairgrounds, Santa Carla has little going for it, and it loses it's minimal appeal when Michael and Sam realize that they are now in the murder capital of the country. Someone or something is committing a lot of violence in what should be a sleepy little resort community.

Things brighten up momentarily when Michael meets the flirty Star (Jami Gertz); but she turns out to be just a lure to attract Michael to a group of rowdy vampires led by David (Kiefer Sutherland). The impressionable Michael shares a drink of blood and is half-way to becoming a vampire; he just needs to kill something to complete the transformation, and Sam looks like a reasonable target. Sam enlists the help of local vampire hunters Edgar (Corey Feldman) and Alan (geddit?) to fight off Michael, destroy David and his gang, and find out whether Lucy's new friend Max (Edward Herrmann), a meek but creepy video store manager, has anything to do with the local carnage.

The Lost Boys brings together a talented young cast that sparkles, sometimes under heavy make-up, despite the Santa Clara darkness. Kiefer Sutherland has rarely had a better opportunity to growl and drip evil on the big screen, while the role of Sam is perfect for Corey Haim's screen persona of scrappy resourcefulness. His regular screen partner Corey Feldman is also a natural as Edgar, all fake bravado, surviving thanks to equal measures of dumb luck and misguided initiative.

The Lost Boys also benefits from a sultry Jami Gertz at the peak of a career that promised much but fizzled too early. Jason Patric gets the most central role, but delivers a less interesting performance, all 1980s hair and little engagement. Dianne Wiest and Edward Herrmann add a dose of classiness to the movie.

Schumacher creates an atmosphere of silly dread, never aiming to be really scary but still managing to engineer a few effectively bloody moments. The Lost Boys has no message of value, but enjoys itself all the same delivering  high quality nonsensical fun.

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