This early 80's film brings together a young group of actors on the rise, Patrick Swayze pre-Dirty Dancing, Lea Thompson pre-Back to the Future (as Lorainne McFly), and Charlie Sheen in his feature film debut.It also reunites some of the cast of the previous years hit The Outsiders, including C. Thomas Howell (Randy), Patrick Swayze (Darrel), Darren Dalton (Daryl), and William Smith (Store Clerk).
I assumed from the movie poster this was some sort of fighter plane Top Gun-like film, but was suprised to find it was about a group of high school friends becoming guerilla fighters after the Soviets & Cubans invade the United States sparking World War III.
The plausibility of this events occuring are somewhat far-fetched but did make for a fairly entertaining film. The best scene by far is when three Russians are standing in front of a forest sign stating that President Roosevelt dedicated a 45,000 acre forest for some purpose and they translated it as "45,000 people died in the greatest American battle lead by imperialist leader Roosevelt over the Native Americans." For a war film there were very few scenes that challenged the groups character and little was done to develop the individual characters throughout. The scene dealing with treatment of prisoners was the only challenge of the group leaders character and there is debate on if they handled this correctly. This is considered one of Patrick Swayze's best films alongside Dirty Dancing and Road House, and is a must watch for Swayze or Charlie Sheen fans.
Look for the remake coming out in 2010, it will be Dan Bradley's directorial debut. He was the Stunt Coordinator in the Bourne and Spider-man series, and with a screenplay done by Carl Ellsworth (Disturbia and Red Eye). This could be an interesting flick next November.
Vote: 6/10
IMDB Link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087985/
This will be a difficult movie review review because of Mr. Larsen's complete mis-understanding of the cult classic "Red Dawn". Let it first be said that "Top Gun" was a love story written for Tom Cruise, and comparing it to Red Dawn at any level is a travesty.
Trả lờiXóaMr Larsen's review is, as always, well written and seems to make some substantial intellectual points, but his perspective is completely wrong. Would Mr. Larsen comment on "The Grapes of Wrath" by saying it showed poor use of color, and lacks special effects? Of course not. The 1980's was the peak of the arm's race with Russia, and although the Cuban missile crisis was over a decade old, it had not been forgotten at all. Red Dawn spoke directly high school boys across America who thought for sure they would be part of WWIII, and day-dreamed of military heroics, as all boys do. Red Dawn had no intention of developing and challenging characters, but want to live-out and explore most teenage boys war fantasies and, I dare say, fears of a USSR invasion during the mid-80's. Of course the movie took many creative liberties, young boys know that their living room couch is not a battlefield bunker, but the "couch" plays it's role in living out the war fantasy, just like the Roosevelt Plaque played it's role in the Red Dawn fantasy. It is difficult to remember also, but the stars of the movie, were practically unknowns, which helped the target audience relate to them as just any typical teenager from middle America, not as Hollywood stars.
Mr Larsen's review did not do justice whatsoever to this classic, we look to him to get really excited or really dis-appointed with movies, and his fans certainly want to hear him spark debate on movies from our past. But this ho-hum review of a movie that left millions of teenage boys saying "WOW!, that is exactly what I would do when Russia invades" leaves this movie review reviewer wondering if Mr. Larsen really has what it takes to get to the heart and purpose of some of our favorite movie classics.