Light of Day

MJ Fox may have done his best serious acting here, but jett is better. A strange thing about the 70's runaways group. One chick, the one Dakota played in the biopic of the runaways recently, Cherrie Curie, did a great job acting in the 1980 movie Foxes.....and Joan nails it in 87...go figure....

A simple, very depressing, but realistic movie....slice of life stuff. Which, as someone mentioned, is obviously why it flopped at the BO. Very good bar band stuff from Jett here.....

Paul Schrader has never made a movie without merit. Keep in mind this is the guy who wrote the script for Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, so even his least movies have something to offer. Schrader deals in some very heavy, deep human motivations and inclinations in his flicks, and never made a movie that was light fluff yet. This is the closest to that claim, and even this movie has merit and substance. Prob the worst movie he made, but even this is good....

Let's face it, the guy has never made a bad movie...

In 1987, who would have guessed that the smirky kid from "Family Ties" had such range or that a punky girl rocker could deliver such a moving performance? "Light of Day" is a small but powerful film carried by incredible performances by Michael J. Fox, Joan Jett, and Gena Rowlands. Director Paul Schrader just lets the cameras roll while Fox and Jett deliver the goods in this simple tale of dreams, family, and redemption. The power of this film resides in the realism and sincerity of the interactions between Fox, Jett, and Rowlands. Seventeen years later, it still wrings more than few tears and leaves the viewer deeply satisfied. *****5-Stars! Bravo!

Back when I was 21, I went with a few friends to see another film (I forget which, now) that had sold out, leaving us with this film as an option that we took.

I was so pleasantly surprised that a film I would otherwise never have bothered with turned out to be so resonant with me.

I expected a teenybopper rock'n'roll picture. This film is nothing close to that. This is a gritty, hard-edged slice of life. It is full of realistic human emotion and genuine observation of actual "rock'n'roll" lifestyle, which for the vast majority of rockers means nightly sharing of a van and a motel room and splitting up a few hundred bucks five or six ways before expenses. The scene in "Motel Hell" where Fox doles out the money (after enumerating the expenses including "forty-five dollars for that tire, and eighteen for the Chinese feast") just struck such a ringingly true chord with me.

The secondary drama, which plays out as you understand that the primary drama (will the band make it?) is already moot (Fox knows that the Barbusters have no chance; Jett continues to chase the dream regardless) commences with the discovery of their mother's illness.

The interplay between Jett and her mother in the hospital as the mother lays dying and they reconcile their long-hardened differences is surprisingly well-played, especially on Joan Jett's part. I expected great acting from the superb Gena Rowlands; I expected zero from Jett and was blown away instead. I'm surprised she never got any other real roles; I found her to be extremely easy on the eyes and quite a lovely and talented actress. Whatever.

The film has a terrific ending. No, they don't make it to the big-time, but you never expect that to happen anyway. It is simply a satisfying ending that matches the size and scope of this terrific film, which was never intended to be anything more than a look at a Cleveland family who has two members who happen to play in a road band.

Catch it once in your lifetime.

Joe (Michael J. Fox) and Patti (Joan Jetti) play in the band `The Barbusters'. They use to play in bars in the suburbs. Patti is the singer of the band and a single mother, has a beautiful son and is very rejected by her mother Jeanette (Gena Rowlands). They do not accept and understand each other. The father of Patti's son is unknown by her family. Patti wants to follow the career of musician, but her brother uses the band indeed as an alternative for the lack of job. Joe is the link between Patti and Jeanette, trying to resolve and absorb their problems. A terminal cancer in Jeanette changes the relationship among the family and cruel revelations are presented in the end, with a final redemption of the characters. The melodramatic screenplay of this movie looks like a Mexican soap opera, but the soundtrack is great. There is a minor participation of Jimmie Vaughn, as the singer of another band (`The Fabulous Thunderbirds'). This movie is not a masterpiece, but entertains, especially if the viewer watches it without any expectation, just for killing time. My vote is five.

This was another attempt by MJF to step away from Family Ties (the other at the same time frame was Bright Lights Big City).

Bright Lights is probably a slightly better movie but this is a better character for Fox. He is helped considerably by his seriously convincing (lol) co start Joan Jett playing a musician (not much of a stretch I know!)

That co star helps Fox be convincing enough.

It has its cheesy moments but they are over come by the 2 stars :)