slowcurl

I revisited this movie in 2018 because I seemed to remember it had some redeeming qualities. I was wrong. This movie is f---ing DUMB! It's like the stylized film adaptation of some Wall-Street-frat-boy's rushed first-draft script written on napkins at the bar of a TGI Friday's. It's the purest cinematic nightmare of the worst traits of the 80s projected through a cocaine lens. Just shockingly moronic. Cocktail would make a great double-feature with Less Than Zero if your goal was to experience nauseous shame about the 1980s.

The Thing. Escape From New York. The Fog. They Live. Halloween. And THIS?! I'd be willing to cut Carpenter some slack if this film wasn't so tragically lousy on every level.

Should be required viewing for all first year film students, serving as a cautionary study in how the seduction of technology can turn even the brightest talents into boiling fecal fudge. I'm actually angry that this film exists.

Aspiring Dictators and other practitioners of mechanically inhuman torment should welcome the news that film DOES in fact exist. Escape From L.A. will certainly find its way (along with the theatrical release of Highlander 2: The Quickening) into the dens of filth & suffering utilized by those most cruelly ambitious men.

If Christ were alive today, he might submit to a viewing of Escape From L.A. to save us from our sins.

Regarding other films from the 70's which took a stab at documenting the feel of life for the average suburban kid, I'd put them in this order...

(1) Kenny & Company (2) Over The Edge (3) The Bad News Bears (4) Breaking Away

I'm a longtime Phantasm fan, and I just watched Kenny & Company for the first time tonight. It's clear that the studio COMPLETELY dropped the ball when they shelved this film in the US.

Anything I'm inclined to say about how good this film is has already been said by other equally impressed viewers here on the boards, though I have to add that I have a new-found respect for Phantasm's bartender, the Tall Man's handyman, and the foxy granddaughter of the mute fortune teller. Reggie is in top form. And Fred Myrow-- the composer of Phantasm's score-- is present here, as well.

Now that it has seen the light on day on DVD (and it's a beautiful transfer with great sound, by the way), I'm certain Kenny & Company is destined to become a classic as news of its existence spreads.