Incredibly, it’s Burl, here to review you a movie all about trick effects! It’s one of those 80s workhorse pictures – movies that came in
and did their job efficiently and without complaint, but were in no sense
classics! I’m thinking Remo Williams
here, you know, Iceman! Stuff like
that! Sure, Dreamscape! Anyway, that
should give you a pretty good idea of what we’re talking about here,
quality-wise!
But there are personal feelings wrapped up in this one too:
I consider it a Movie of Shame! Ha ha, that’s not as serious as it sounds! But
I was a young lad when this came out, ready to start thinking about the ladies!
I bussed downtown to see a movie all by myself one winter’s night, and by
chance met up with my good friend Matthew along the way! He was keeping company
with two girls from our grade, whom I knew only slightly! (Matthew was a slight
lad whose later coming out surprised no one, yet he always did very well with
the ladies in junior high!) They were going to see Down and Out in Beverly Hills, which was playing at a theatre very
nearby, and invited me to go along with them! With visions of the tempting
stills printed in Fangoria magazine,
I firmly said “No, I’m going to see F/X,”
and, on thinking back, fancied that, at the moment of my principled rebuffal, I
saw one of the young ladies pull a downcast look! In fact, she was no doubt
simply stifling a sneeze! Whatever the case, I regretted for a long time after
that that I didn’t go along with them! Why, I simply should have out of
friendliness! (Actually, all of us probably should have just gone to see Hannah And Her Sisters! Ha ha!)
Well, if you’re Burl, that is the character of your regrets!
But I watched the picture again the other day (still never have seen Down and Out in Beverly Hills) and it
holds up as being exactly the sort of blandly competent action-suspense picture
it always was! It begins with a scene in a restaurant where everybody gets
machine-gunned, but, ha ha, it’s just a movie within the movie, and everybody
was just acting, and the special blood-squib trick effects were done by Rollie,
the trick-effects man everybody’s talking about! Ha ha, he’s played by Bryan
Brown from Tai-Pan, and his
ladyfriend is played by Diane Venora, a fine actor whom we recall from Wolfen!
Well, events escalate, Diane exits stage right, and is
quickly replaced by the imposing form of Brian “Best Seller” Dennehy! It’s all got to do with weasely Cliff de
Young, fresh from pictures like Protocol and
Secret Admirer, who recruits Rollie
for a very special task, which then goes all kapooniak and Rollie is on the
run! Ha ha, and he’s driving a big gaudy van with "F/X" painted across the side
in huge, bright faux-graffito! Way to keep a low profile, Rollie!
All sorts of familiar faces join in the action! We’ve got
Jerry Orbach from Someone To Watch Over Me, Joe Grifasi from Brewster’s Millions, Trey Wilson from Drive-In
and even Tom Noonan from The Monster Squad: these last two playing dogged assassin agents! The climax of the
picture is in many ways familiar from all sorts of 80s lite-adventure movies:
it’s a bunch of creeping around the bad guy’s mansion! But instead of shooting
people, Rollie puts together a bunch of fatal trick effects to bamboozle and
brutally eliminate his enemies!
So, was it worth giving up what I’d have cherished as an
impromptu movie date at Down and Out in
Beverly Hills? Ha ha, well I do remember enjoying it then, but now, with
the lost date water over the dam, I can see it more clearly: a decent if
silly entertainment, a little overstuffed with unnecessary scenes, suspenseful
only in parts and then slightly, but engaging throughout nevertheless! I give F/X two unconvincing hobo outfits, ha
ha!
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