Director: Savage Steve Holland / Writer: Savage Steve Holland / Starring: John Cusack, David Ogden Stiers, and Kim Darby
For some reason or other, every time I saw Better Off Dead sitting in my netflix queue before it finally arrived in my mail box, I thought it was One Crazy Summer. I guess that’s just the default spot in my mind for “mid-1980s John Cusack movie.” But when I watched this one, I did find that it really didn’t seem to vary all that much from my limited recollection of OCS. I guess that with the writer/director Savage Steve Holland teaming up with Cusack for nerdy-hip teen romance films two years in a row is a good excuse for being confused. Nevertheless, Better Off Dead did prove to be an entertaining, albeit quaint, look at 1980s culture.
The premise of the movie basically involves Cusack’s character, Lane Meyer, being dumped by and subsequently pining over the incredibly shallow Beth. This young woman, and the hot-shot skier she falls for who is “more popular… better looking… and drives a nicer car” than Lane, both seem to represent pretty much all that 80s yuppie-dom stood for. Filling his usual role as heart-sick underdog, Cusack periodically finds himself racing cars with a couple of Asian dudes (one of whom got his butt kicked by the Karate Kid in Okinawa) and contending with a menacing young paperboy intent on collecting the month’s newspaper fees, all while seeking to win Beth back by proving he’s a great skier.
Suicide! Haha!
There are some interesting side characters along the way, such as Lane’s goofy sidekick friend and his precocious genius little brother who reads books like “How to Pick up Trashy Babes” and is hard at work constructing a spaceship in the garage. As is typical of the 1980s romantic teen comedy genre, we quickly see the outcast or misfit young woman on the periphery who will prove to be the Universe’s answer to our protagonist’s libido deep existential loneliness. In Better Off Dead, that young woman is a foreign exchange student from France staying in the home across the street and pretending not to speak English as a way to avoid having to tell her obnoxious host family what she really thinks of them until she’s managed to snag herself a nice American boy whose loving arms she can escape to. Will Lane be able to ski the K2? Will he ever get his awesome car running so he can beat the crazy Asian guys, or at least not have an accident while trying to do so? Will he end up with the right girl? Chances are good if you’ve ever seen a movie before, you can answer all these questions already with very little effort. But what fun would that be?
If you're about to ski into something, just turn.
All in all, this movie seems to be exactly the sort of quirky, offbeat romantic comedy that all too many indie movies I’ve seen lately seem to draw some sort of inspiration from. I thought it was good for a few laughs, but it seems like it’s definitely one of those movies that is best watched with a handful of friends for making fun of. So what say you, PopBunker.net readers, am I in for a surprise when I watch One Crazy Summer, or will I feel like I’ve just watched the same movie a second time?
Trailer: Youtube
I love both Better Off Dead and One Crazy Summer. I don’t think you’ll feel like you’re watching the same movie, but maybe like they’re part of a series, though I couldn’t say which is the sequel.
I haven’t seen OCS, but I saw ‘Better Off Dead’ when it came out (I’m 43.5 years old). At that time, a lot of the “quirkiness” you see in the movie was completely new to mainstream audience-goers and came off as really hysterical (meaning funny, not insane). A lot of that movie was just plain bad, but it had many moments of awesomeness. It’s one of my favorite movies from the time. Also, this movie, since it came out in the 80s, was a reflection of 80s culture, not a quaint look back at it. ‘Hot Tub Time Machine’ is a quaint look back at 80s culture! (And it rips off a lot from ‘Better Off Dead’ and stars John Cusack). Worth watching soon after seeing ‘Better Off Dead’ and, like BOD, pretty stupid at times and semi-brilliant at times. Oh, and I just have to say it, “I want my two dollars!”
Quaint? Not cool. I love Better Off Dead as well, and don’t see much quaint about it, except of course that it’s been ripped off (or paid homage to) a bunch of times. Not everything works, but I think enough of it does to make it worth more than something to gather friends around to make of it.
If for no other reason, consider this: the movie makes fun of a genre (’80s teen comedy) WHILE existing as an ’80s teen comedy. All movies are ironic now, but films just didn’t do that back then. Just One of the Guys didn’t know how awesomely bad it was–it thought it was actually a “girl pretends to be a guy” journalism comedy.
OK, Duder, Better Off Dead isn’t a romantic comedy. Whatever your definition of romantic comedy is — you’re wrong. Trust me. I know more about this than you do.
Wow, I guess I hit a nerve with that one, eh?
To be fair, I don’t think I really meant to come off as being that critical of it. It definitely is fun and entertaining, and I also concede that it was certainly an outlier for the era. But then in all honesty I may be a little biased against John Cusack. I think he’s really funny, but something about the similarities between so many of the roles he’s played just makes me a little weary.
And maybe I’m too simplistic about this, but I tend to see any movie as a romantic comedy if 1) has more levity than gravity and 2) the right boy and the right girl (or boy and boy/girl and girl) finally end up with one another in the end.
Chris, you just happened to review a movie a lot of people respect and love, and reporting you had it confused with another movie set a bad tone from the start. I don’t think people expect you to love everything they love, but this came off as if you just didn’t “get” it. “Quaint” and “make fun of” didn’t help either.
I think Chris Lites puts the whole “rom-com” thing a bit stronger than I would, but yes, I think your definition is too simplistic. I took Logic in college, and have to admit I don’t really remember much of it, but that seems like a fallacy to me. Just about all comedies have romances–in fact, there aren’t many movies EVER which don’t end with them.
Case in point: yesterday was Star Wars day. Is Return of the Jedi a romantic comedy? Han and Leia are together at the end, and it sure as hell isn’t a serious movie. Ocean’s Eleven? Superbad? Commando? (Ok now I’m just pulling DVDs from my collection at random.)
I get the Cusack bias–he is certainly one of those actors who plays the same guy every time. And Savage Steve Holland only did 3 movies total I think. I’ve never seen the last one, and the second–the one you asked about, One Crazy Summer–is definitely inferior. But both Cusack and Holland got it right with this one. Cusack isn’t as Cusacky as he would be later, and the quirky notes Holland hits pay off well.
I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this movie. Heather can attest that it is the reason my current BF & I became friends back in 1994. We quote it back & forth to each other to this day. Some people (younger) watch it and don’t understand it. I tell them to watch it again and try to find the parody of the earlier teen movies (the beach movies, etc). They did what the Wayan’s brothers did with Scary Movie, Epic Movie & Disaster Movie, although I remember Disaster Movie when it was called Airplane.
Still it’s my favorite & always will be, of Cusack’s work, even though he doesn’t like the fact that he made it.
@Steve: The plot is about a guy trying to win back his girlfriend. I think that makes it a slightly stronger candidate to be called a “romantic comedy” than Return of the Jedi. Speaking of logical fallacies, remember the straw man from your logic class?
I def think BoD is a rom-com, but a CUSACK rom-com, which is key. John Cusak made it okish for dudes to like rom-coms. That is really his legacy. So many of his movies of this era have cross sex appeal. He worked with Savage Steve when Savage had some weird crazy vision wrt the type of movies he wanted to make – which detached it some from the rom-com teen genre, but not much different from John Hughes style comedies, which also boarded on rom-com and teen-com and teen-rom-com-coming of age. And he worked with Cameron Crowe in SAY ANYTHING which is an all time safe rom-com for dudes to like. Anyway, I don’t think attaching a genre to a movie really matters so much.
@Colinski: No.
@Dale: I hear what you’re saying, genre really doesn’t matter. But rom-com is just such a derogatory term right now–when I think of rom-com, I think of horrible Jennifer Aniston or Katherine Heigl movies. Rom-coms usually have nothing else of value in them besides the “rom” part, and BOD definitely doesn’t fit that definition.
Yah, but the same goes for PHILADELPHIA STORY – maybe the first of the formula and certainly the first ultra popular of the formula. I think the only difference is that there are some good ones and some bad ones. A lot of the modern ones are terrible, that is for sure. But I don’t think I can declassify something just because I don’t like what the genre represents today.