Hi All,
Thanks again for stopping by and checking out what I have to say this week. Sorry I missed everybody last week, sometimes life gets in the way, I will try to do better in the future. Blue Starlight is doing an excellent job and providing great programming for all of your film needs.
I thought I would mention quickly that Revenge of the Nerds is probably one of my favorite 80's comedies and the effects of this film is still felt today. Today it is actually fashionable to be nerd and the 2 main leads Robert Caradine and Curtis Armstrong host the new reality competition show King of the Nerds and does pretty well for TBS. Of course this movie launched the career of Anthony Edwards who would end up in Top Gun and the long running tv show ER. Check out a comedy he did shortly after Nerds called, How I Got Into College. It cool to see this movie now that you have gone through trying to get into college and has a brief appearance by Armstrong as well and from the maker of Better Off Dead. Final note on Nerds, Fox tried to get a remake going a couple of years ago and even had posters and whole marketing strategy during spring break. But the daily reels going back to the studio were so bad that the studio pulled the plug on the remake and just as well. This is another 80's film that does not need to be remade, but if the studio hated the footage that badly you know it has to be bad.
Ok now on to one of my favorite subjects Raiders of the Lost Arc and the Indiana Jones films in general. Raiders is one of my favorite films of all time and for good reason. This film has action, romance, adventure and horror. I feel this is the film that I realized I wanted to go into the exhibition industry and is truly one of the films that I will watch at any time it is on, even with commercials. Spielberg was a fan of the 1940 and 50's cliffhanger serials that would be played at local movie houses before a film. It was not uncommon to see the latest chapter for Flash Gordon or Dick Tracy before you saw the feature of the day and Raiders definitely captures that spirit but all in a 2 hour time frame so you dont have to wait from week to week. Spielberg was coming off a failure of the film 1941, but I really like it, was looking to capture the magic he had again with Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Spielberg along with George Lucas and Lawrence Kasdan came up with the script for what they thought would be the ultimate action adventure film. Kasdan would go on to make movies like The Big Chill and one of my favorite westerns Silverado. The shoot was intense with many locations across the globe and Paramount was unsure if this was going to payoff for them. Also their main star, Harrison Ford, was not the household name it is now. Problems on the set added to the studios nervousness of the film. I remember seeing a making of special on TV where during the well of souls sequence some the snakes used actually were not afraid of fire and created problems during filming and of course the plexiglass which we all see in the sequence as well but I think it adds to the charm of the movie. Also there was a train sequence in the original shooting script that was supposed to happen after the caravan sequence when the arc is taken out of the desert, but due to time constraints and budget it just could not become a reality to the movie. The wrath of God sequence is still a beautiful sequence in its brutality. The part of the film I think is what started me wanting to watch horror films and got me interested in make up special effects, which seems to be a dying art form now thanks to cg.
Not only is this a great movie and doesnt get old over time, its one of the best part of my childhood and life. I remember seeing this movie first with my father at the Showcase Cinemas in Pittsburgh, Pa. I was on a visit because my parents were seperated and it was the first thing I wanted to do on the visit and my father wanted an excuse to go see it again. I remember him thinking I might be scared a bit by it but I prepared myself by reading a copy of Newsweek at the time that had a huge story on the special effects and stunts so I knew what I was getting into. When the wrath of God sequence started my dad asked me if I was going to be ok and put his hand on my knee, besides I was only 11 when this film came out but I remember as horrifying as the scene was I couldnt look away either. The good thing about having divorced parents in the 80's was I got to normally see movies twice, once with mom and the second time with dad or vica versa depending on who got to me first. Second time I saw this film was with my mother at a drive in and the feature that it was playing with was The Road Warrior, talk about a night of action and adventure. It still is one of the best times I had with my mom before she passed away. I got my love of movie and music from her and I hopefully get to pass that on to my son.
Now onto Temple of Doom. It was now 1984, three years since Raiders and there was no action adventure movie that even came close to Raiders. The main hype to Doom was the graphic scenes of violence that were portrayed in the movie or at least that is what I heard on the news. This was released memorial day weekend that year and I think this started the trend of the big movies coming out for the holiday and the unofficial start of summer. So I was determined to go see it, not to mention it was the sequel to my favorite movie. I got off school early that friday and went with a couple of my friends and hopped a bus into the wilds of downtown Pittsburgh to go to the Fulton Twin, which at the time was the grindhouse theater in Pittsburgh and it did not have a great reputation. So we felt we were cool going to what may have been considered a little dangerous for 1984, and 3 teenage boys in Pittsburgh. We waited on line and got in but the theater was packed and of course the other screen at the time was some God awful horror film that we thought about sneaking into after Doom. Doom also started the crusade by the MPAA for a stronger rating something in between R and PG and this is how the PG13 rating came about, although it would not be until Red Dawn that a film would actually get this rating. With scenes of human sacrifice and crocodiles eating people my friends and I wondered how the horror film on the other screen could be worse than what we were watching.
No doubt this series has had an impact on pop culture and launced the career of Harrison Ford. This series is often imitated like King Solomons Mines, but never duplicated. I could go on and on about this but I know you have better things to do with your time. As an added bonus, I will be at the drive in Saturday night to introduce the movie. I hope to see everyone there and look forward to talking to everyone.
Peace, Love and movies,
Andy
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