Is it an homage? Is it a parody? Last Action Hero is both. It is also a film whose idea was better than its execution. From 1993, Last Action Hero was released two years after Terminator 2. In the interregnum, Arnold directed a TV movie, Christmas in Connecticut (which I will NOT be watching), did a little voiceover work, became a restaurateur, appeared as himself in Dave (another film I’m choosing to skip), and slept on a mattress filled with Krugerrands. I’m not totally sure that last bit is true, as, sometimes, facts which we find on the internet turn out to be less than truthful. What I do know is that two years was an awful long time to wait for Arnold to build on the success of Terminator 2. I’m also not convinced that Arnold’s sabbatical from starring roles was unrelated to the decline of the American action star. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Last Action Hero”
Schwarzenegger Month
Schwarzenegger Month: Terminator 2: Judgment Day
There cannot be a Terminator movie without Arnold Schwarzenegger. It’s just silly talk to pretend otherwise. But, by the time Terminator 2: Judgment Day was released, in 1991, Arnold was no longer a semi-anonymous hulkster who could believably play a robot. Audiences were too familiar with him. Said another way, in the original Terminator, we viewers saw the character of the terminator. In the sequel, we see Arnold. This factor set up a delicate dance for director James Cameron, one he did not execute perfectly. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Terminator 2: Judgment Day”
Schwarzenegger Month: Kindergarten Cop
Sometimes, the toughest thing when writing about film is being impartial. Not every film a reviewer watches fits into their tastes or what moves them, but that does not mean a film is bad, or that it can be simply dismissed. The immediate, visceral reaction that one has to a film is only one factor that must be considered in deciding whether or not it is any good. For me, personally, there is no greater film kryptonite than a family flick. Even when I was a kid I could barely tolerate a family flick. Anything that tries so hard to be inoffensive, that so consciously tries to remove any edge or soul that is has, that appeals to the softest parts of all of us, is a whitewashing of the human experience, a greater fantasy than anything with dragons and orcs in it. Nobody, and I mean nobody, smiles as much as the suburban American zombies that inhabit family films. I don’t know why the idea of wholesomeness enrages me so much, but it always has, and it always will. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Kindergarten Cop”
Schwarzenegger Month: Total Recall
Arnold Schwarzenegger wasn’t in any movie released in the year following Twins. I would like to think that he had receded into isolation, that he took the time for some introspection, some reflection on just what it meant to be an action star in the 1980s. Explosions. Big guns. Massive body counts. He was a master of everything that made action flicks great, and just about all of it was discarded in Twins. I hope he found new purpose, a new center, in his life. But very probably, he was enjoying the new house all that Twins money bought him. Seriously, that movie was a smash hit. And so was his next film, Total Recall, which was released in 1990. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Total Recall”
Schwarzenegger Month: Twins
Arnold Schwarzenegger was a star before Ivan Reitman’s Twins was released in 1988, but of all the movies in Arnold’s filmography before this one, only Conan the Barbarian managed to crack a hundred million bucks at the box office, and quite a number didn’t make much cash at all. In fact, Arnold was being typecast, which is not necessarily a bad thing if that type is international action star. But it was with Twins that Arnold became a crossover star, much to the detriment of the moviegoing public, and myself, who will have to sit through some truly burdensome Arnold comedies this month. And it all began with Twins. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Twins”
Schwarzenegger Month: Red Heat
Most anyone who became aware of both self and American culture after the 1980s has heard of Arnold Schwarzenegger. They’ve probably seen at least one of his films, or maybe heard that he ran California and had terrible taste in SUVs. That’s not all these people would have in common. They would also all be collectively unaware that, once upon a time, Jim Belushi was famous. That’s right, Millennials and those from the generation-yet-to-be-adequately-named, once upon a time there was a mediocre actor and comedian who punched well above his weight, starring in such films as The Principal, Real Men, K-9, and Red Heat, all of which made money. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Red Heat”
Schwarzenegger Month: The Running Man
My Loyal Seven readers know that Missile Test is a big fan of John Carpenter. In fact, he’s the unofficial official director of both the Empty Balcony and Shitty Movie Sundays. He didn’t direct The Running Man, the Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle from 1987, but he should have. In style, flavor, pacing, look, feel, music, inherent mistrust of authority, and its very ’80s-ness, I have never seen a film so Carpenteresque without being directed by the man himself. It’s uncanny. But, this month is not about John Carpenter. It’s about His Arnoldness. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: The Running Man”
Schwarzenegger Month: Raw Deal
This movie is Arnold Schwarzenegger on the cusp. After Conan and The Terminator, people knew who he was, he was a legitimate star, and this earned him more roles. But he was still making movies for Dino De Laurentiis. That man was a producing legend, but not always for the best reasons. For every Blue Velvet or Serpico, there were about five or six Maximum Overdrives. De Laurentiis movies look cheap, like the filmmakers that made them didn’t have the cash they needed, or weren’t competent filmmakers in the first place. Raw Deal was the last De Laurentiis film with Arnold to hit theaters, and Arnold was probably glad about that. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Raw Deal”
Schwarzenegger Month: Commando
What a gloriously stupid movie. When I think about 1980s action, all sorts of flicks bang off the inside of my skull. Cobra, Road House, Die Hard, any of the Rambo flicks, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. It was an amazing genre of film that Hollywood has never been able to fully replicate. That’s not for lack of trying. Last year there were two movies about terrorists taking over the White House, and both could have been Die Hard flicks, circa 1989. Something happened to moviegoing audiences since the ’80s, though. I’m not going to pretend for a second that we’re any more sophisticated as a group, but maybe we grew accustomed to the shenanigans of ’80s action, and that’s why it doesn’t work as well today. But if a viewer happens to be in a nostalgic mood for black and white characters, senseless one-liners, and guns that never run out of bullets, then there is hardly a better movie than Commando. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Commando”
Schwarzenegger Month: Red Sonja
What a putrid mess. The problem with spending a month watching and reviewing a single movie star’s work is that one inevitably comes across some real dogs. James Dean was never in a bad film, but he had the good fortune to die in a horrible car accident before he could embarrass himself. Poor Arnold Schwarzenegger, he was stuck in a contract with Dino De Laurentiis. Continue reading “Schwarzenegger Month: Red Sonja”