Listen to the City

"A man wakes up from a 20-year coma and teams up with a young musician and poet to fight corporate crime." That's what the TV guide blurb used to say.

I remember the only thing more common than seeing this on TV in Canada throughout the late 80s (functioning as the usual CanCon timeslot filler that nobody watches) was seeing the soundtrack record at every public library branch. There was no need to place a hold on it, it was always conveniently available. It's THAT Canadian.

Despite Jim Carroll as the disoriented coma patient (neat casting), as well as two of my 80s crushes, Riff Randall and Spoons bassist Sandy Horne (who will forever be the crimped hair of my dreams), there's nothing much going on here. Full of left-wing utopian dreams that muddle around and go nowhere. Oh well, at least the Parachute Club aren't in it.

Hupar wakes up from a coma to walk the streets as a modern day prophet. Arete (Sandy Horne) is a music student artist. Sophia (P.J. Soles) is a TV reporter. A corrupt corporation threatens to devastate the city with mass layoff.

This is an experimental left-wing anti-corporate Canadian indie. Who doesn't like P.J. Soles? Although in this movie, she's not doing anything fun. She looks 10 years older and with half the energy. More than anything, I love the ethereal 80's look of Spoons bassist Sandy Horne. Her synth music is probably the only interesting thing about this movie. I wouldn't say it's good and she's not a good singer. There's a reason why she's the backup singer of the group. It is fun to return to an era in Toronto, Canada but this movie is a headache. I suggest fast forwarding to the songs and skip everything else.

If Goin' Down the Road is the quintessential 70s Canuck movie full of under-educated losers from the Maritimes who dream of moving first to Toronto and eventually to Alberta to work for a living, this is the quintessential 80s Canuck movie full of lazy leftist id1iots bloviating about evil capitalists and a glorious workers revolution. My favorite scene is when the diverse collection of dopes sit around a restaurant/bar whining about lobbying city hall - CITY HALL ! - to keep their factory open, and then one of the dopes suggests the workers buy the company and run it themselves. "Where are we gonna get the money?" "It's easier than you think." Yah, when your economics education comes from a first-year university course at UVic, maybe. Check out the fat guy who cuts film for the late news wearing a Ban The Bomb T-shirt. Or the big-haired singer (is that a beaver pelt on her head?) who wanders around like she's about to break into ''Romantic Traffic." Or the one-person ''riot." Even measured against all the terrible Canadian films made in my lifetime, this is at least tied for the worst-ever. Well and truly a bona fide 1-star movie.