IMDb RATING
5.6/10
1.5K
YOUR RATING
A teenager in love, who needs money to arrange his future life with his mistress, kidnaps his own father for ransom, but nobody cares.A teenager in love, who needs money to arrange his future life with his mistress, kidnaps his own father for ransom, but nobody cares.A teenager in love, who needs money to arrange his future life with his mistress, kidnaps his own father for ransom, but nobody cares.
- Awards
- 4 nominations total
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- Writer
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- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Featured reviews
Do not read the critics reviews because they're just a desperate group of people in need of a colonic.
Rotten Tomatoes especially.
Anyway this is a typical 80s movie It fun and full of exactly what the 80s were about. Journeys of self discovery complacted youth mad clothes and cool music. I'm not telling you the plot because you should watch it. Keanu had an most excellent talent and it has developed over time into a unique talent.
Miss placed love a desire to leave and look for a new life Trapped dysfunctional family Poverty Loneliness Dispare Love Friendships
Great watch👍👍👍👍
Anyway this is a typical 80s movie It fun and full of exactly what the 80s were about. Journeys of self discovery complacted youth mad clothes and cool music. I'm not telling you the plot because you should watch it. Keanu had an most excellent talent and it has developed over time into a unique talent.
Miss placed love a desire to leave and look for a new life Trapped dysfunctional family Poverty Loneliness Dispare Love Friendships
Great watch👍👍👍👍
10JuiceZee
It is fun from first moment til last. Reeves is in nearly every scene in all his pre belly scar youthfulness. The story is preposterous but we have seen how he is on board for that over the years. It's LOL funny in some scenes. Well cast. Filmed in the writer/directors hometown in, get this...Pennsylvania. Rupert is smart and adorable and the cinematographers were savvy enough to get plenty of closeups. The love story is what dreams are made of as well as the intimate moments, one in particular that involves an erotic, in the moment, and sensually sloppy kiss. Over all it was a wonderful way to tell a story about small town issues, the 80's, teenaged angst, and intimacy problems. Of course, and it is right and good, that Rupert/Keanu solves all the personal problems in the end. I am seeing a lot of Henry's Crime here but that's just me. It made no sense that Bonnie Bedelia & Amy Madigan were nominated for Indie Spirit awards and Keanu was not, as it was clearly his movie. I will say no more. Make every effort to see it. Enjoy the wayback machine for 87 minutes.
I remember seeing this film in my late teens and I just could not get over Keanu's haircut: I think it's brilliant and only K could pull it off (Mike Patton's close second in the Epic days)! Also Fred Ward is quite funny in it and Amy Madigan rocks too (lucky girl...)
High school drop-out Keanu Reeves (as Rupert) gets a weird haircut (long on the left side, short on the right). A biker dude, slash aspiring poet, Mr. Reeves works with conservative father Fred Ward for a coal-mining company. But, Reeves does not want to follow in his father's sooty footsteps. After tailing busty mother Bonnie Bedelia, Reeves confirms she has a sex buddy. Soon, Reeves has one too; it's ex-hippie ice-cream trailer owner Amy Madigan (as Carla). The couple decide to kidnap Mr. Ward, for money
The potentially interesting father/son dynamic never really amounts to much. Instead of working on its own, you're liable to flesh it out by thinking of how well the theme worked in other films. Writer/director Ron Nyswaner includes the intriguing potential for a one woman/two man familial relationship; not with Reeves' parents, of course, but in the proposition he receives near the film's end. The Pennsylvania locations are refreshing (check out the IGA), and Mr. Nyswaner gets good performances from his cast.
***** The Prince of Pennsylvania (5/15/88) Ron Nyswaner ~ Keanu Reeves, Fred Ward, Amy Madigan, Bonnie Bedelia
The potentially interesting father/son dynamic never really amounts to much. Instead of working on its own, you're liable to flesh it out by thinking of how well the theme worked in other films. Writer/director Ron Nyswaner includes the intriguing potential for a one woman/two man familial relationship; not with Reeves' parents, of course, but in the proposition he receives near the film's end. The Pennsylvania locations are refreshing (check out the IGA), and Mr. Nyswaner gets good performances from his cast.
***** The Prince of Pennsylvania (5/15/88) Ron Nyswaner ~ Keanu Reeves, Fred Ward, Amy Madigan, Bonnie Bedelia
This unlikely sleeper poses an essential question for disenchanted teenagers: is quality time with your family better than being chained to the door of a refrigerator? For coal-miner's son Keanu Reeves the answer is a no-brainer: his father is a Vietnam War veteran turned ultra-conservative; his feisty mother is having an affair with dad's best buddy; and his only friend is a socially marginalized, die-hard hippie. Meanwhile everyone thinks Reeves has problems, but he's only trying to avoid conforming to Middle America's messy ideas about normality. And since a rebel in the 1980s needs some sort of cause, he invents one: kidnapping his own father and holding him hostage. There's more than one contrivance in the otherwise original and unpredictable screenplay: the young protagonist's mechanical aptitude and closet intellect (he likens himself to Socrates, who was killed for daring to tell the truth) don't fit his delinquent image, and the kidnapping scheme carries the plot too far into fantasy. But if nothing else the film is an offbeat satire of modern domestic friction, and a refreshing change of pace from the usual condescending screen treatments of adolescent angst.
Did you know
- TriviaFred Ward is first billed, while Keanu Reeves had a bigger role.
- GoofsEarlier in the movie, Rupert puts a lighted electric ice cream cone on the roof of the Twin Twisters diner, and as he and Carla step back and admire it, we see that the sign on the rooftop of the diner reads "Carla's Twin Twisters" - with the name "Carla's" appearing in twinkling lights. Yet a few scenes later when Rupert drives up on his motorbike, the "Carla's" portion of the sign is no longer there, and the sign reads only "Twin Twisters."
- Quotes
Jack Sike: I vote no.
Rupert Marshetta: You don't vote in my revolution.
- ConnectionsReferenced in Pump Up the Volume (1990)
- SoundtracksHammerhead
Performed by Flotsam and Jetsam
Written by Eric Knutson, Edward Carlson, Kelly David-Smith, Jason Newsted, Michael Gilbert
Courtesy of Metal Blade Records
- How long is The Prince of Pennsylvania?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- The Prince of Pennsylvania
- Filming locations
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $3,500,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $5,415
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $3,174
- Sep 18, 1988
- Gross worldwide
- $5,415
- Runtime
- 1h 27m(87 min)
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1
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