Science 101: 1985 Style

 

This is my entry in the Back to 1985 Blogathon hosted by yours truly and Hamlette's Soliloquy.

So. In 1985 Hollywood decided to educate the public on the wonderful world of science, specifically on such topics as quantum mechanics, like time travel (Back to the Future), space exploration (Explorers), and the always interesting topic of robotics (D.A.R.Y.L.). While science fiction movies are "science" related (hence the name "science fiction", duhh...), most sci-fi movies have a more serious bent. And many times Hollywood has produced what are essentially horror movies, just with a science fiction aspect. (The Alien series comes to mind there.  Essentially Alien and it's sequels are horror movies taking place in a sci-fi setting).

But sometimes the movie bigwigs used a science or a sci-fi trope for a comedy movie, and in 1985 there were not one, not two, but three movies thrust on the public that were comedic views of that theme. And, coincidentally, all three were released within a week of each other, from August 2-9 of 1985. The three movies in question were Weird Science (which premiered August 2) and Real Genius and My Science Project (both of which debuted the following week, August 9)

All 3, put together, paled in comparison to the big money maker that year, (Back to the Future), in terms of box office draw. Back to the Future made $210 million dollars, while the top dog of the three in question, Weird Science made only $39 million (and that probably had more to due with John Hughes' involvement than the subject matter...) Real Genius pulled in $13 million, while My Science Project pulled in a paltry $4 million. Put together, that means all three barely made a quarter of what the top dog made.

Yet there were still some entertaining movies in their own right, despite the fact that neither of them cracked 80% on the Tomato-meter Scale (the determining factor of critical reception). In fact, one of them, My Science Project, is only ranked at 11% on the Scale.  

Whether or not they got any raves by the critics, the fact is that they can be seen as a microcosm of the science study community of high school and college  (albeit from a comedic standpoint). It is at least a refreshing diversion from the standard sci-fi of the era, one that typically had some rather aggressive aliens or other typical horror aspects involved.

 

Weird Science:

John Hughes, by 1985, had already had some success, both as a writer (he had scripted three of the National Lampoon Vacation movies) as well as a director. Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club (which is sure to be a choice in this blogathon) were both Hughes films. You could be forgiven if you though his directing career was a lot larger, I think.  Only 8 movies.  But writing scripts seems to have been a better forte. (30 scripts to his credit, including both Macaulay Culkin Home Alone films).

One of those 8 movies he directed fails to get the attention I think it deserves. In most of the online ranking lists I checked, Weird Science ranks either last or at least in the bottom half of the list. Although, to be fair, if you only rank the ones he directed, as opposed to wrote, I imagine anything above 4th place might be playing favorites on my part. So just for clarification, before going any further, I'll post my ranking. And note: this list is ONLY movies Hughes directed, not ones he wrote the script but were directed by someone else...

1. Planes, Trains and Automobiles  2. Ferris Bueller's Day Off  3. Uncle Buck  4. Weird Science  5. The Breakfast Club  6. Sixteen Candles 7. She's Having a Baby  8. Curly Sue

In this film, Gary (Anthony Michael Hall) and Wyatt (Ilan Mitchell-Smith) are two high school nerds who, as nerds often do, have no success in the female relationship part of their lives. They begin the film by standing around watching the girl's class gymnasts work out and fantasizing about the ultimate geek dream: A whole room full of naked girls pining for their over-amplified libido.  

 

 

 

But, unbeknownst to them, standing right behind them are two jocks (the mortal enemies of nerds worldwide), Ian (Robert Downey, Jr.) and Max , who pull down their shorts and yell for the girls to look. 

 

 

 

So within three minutes of screen time we already know where this is going to go...

 

So Wyatt and Gary go home where, guess what, there is no parental supervision... (is there every any in a Hughes film? I mean adult parental supervision... Not in any I've seen...) So while watching a video of the classic movie Frankenstein, these whiz kids decide to create their own girl friend.  But with the limited capabilities of Wyatt's PC, they are really getting nowhere.  So they hack in to a government system. Which is apparently pretty damn easy.  But chaos ensues, havoc ensues, irrationality ensues, and the system goes haywire.  And after the smoke clears, not only have the created a perfect woman, it's a real woman, not just a computer program... from a doll (think Barbie, not a blowup plastic fun toy, here.)

 

So. What would you little maniacs like to do first?

 

 

So, their first action?  Why, what else?  Take a shower with her. 

(If you thought I was going to post a picture of Kelly in the shower, sorry... Gotta keep this blog at least marginally family-friendly.)

 

 They decide that the girl's name will be "Lisa" (which saves me from having to refer to her as "The Computer Generated Woman" for the rest of this blog entry...)

 

Lisa and the boys are next driving down the road in a car, and it becomes apparent that Lisa has some powers, computer generated, that may (or may not) become useful.  She didn't steal this car, she tells them basically that she can do anything that she wants.  So she takes the boys to a bar. Of course, both boys being under 21, this could be a problem (and maybe it would in the real world, but this is the movies), but as Lisa keeps telling them, she can do whatever she wants, so she produces fake IDs for them.

 

 

 

Upon returning home, Wyatt is apparently able to hold his liquor, but Gary is plastered.  The boys run into Chet (Bill Paxton), Wyatt's older brother, and typical hard ass jerk. He blackmails Wyatt or he is going to tell the parents when they get home. 

 

 

The riot continues, whether at the mall or at Gary's house, where Lisa is up front with his parents about her intentions to take Gary to a good old-fashioned blowout party, whether the parents like it or not. (I saw a documentary about this film where one guy said this movie is "over the top.  But it KNOWS it's over the top. and it doesn't care." And believe me from here on out it goes places so far over the top you won't know whether you are up or down.)

 

At Wyatt's house the entire school shows up for a party.  Suddenly Gary and Wyatt are now the school's favorite people. And the party is going to be talked about at school for years... The bullies, Ian and Max, show up along with their girlfriends, Hilly (Judy Aronson) and Deb (Suzanne Snyder).  

 

 

 

Ian and Max try to trade their girlfriends for a chance at Lisa.  (Nobody said they were upstanding gentlemen).  But the boys decide to try to make another girl for the bullies instead.  But they forget the one key ingredient, a doll. 

Instead they get a full size nuclear missile.  And an appearance of a few motorcycle hoodlums straight out of Mad Max movie. (In fact, at least two of those actors were in Mad Max movies).  Wyatt and Gary finally show some balls and stand down these hoodlums.  The result is that both the bullies leave the party and suddenly Wyatt and Gary are the new boyfriends of Hilly and Deb.

Eventually it the party has to come to an end (and also the "party" that is this movie). But, as usual in a Hughes film, all's well that ends well.

Weird Science is absolutely one of the best teen movies of the 80's, but it would have probably gone the way of the dodo by now if it didn't have Hughes' hand on the direction, or for that matter, Anthony Michael Hall in the lead.  Hughes worked on the script for this movie during the off time he spent making The Breakfast Club.  (The man was a workaholic, I think.)  He already had his sights set on Hall for his main character and approached him during the filming of the previous movie.

If you've seen Sixteen Candles and/or The Breakfast Club, there are a lot of similarities between Gary and Brian in The Breakfast Club and Farmer Ted in Sixteen Candles.  Interestingly enough, Hughes wrote the parts of Cameron in Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Duckie in Pretty in Pink for Hall, but Hall, afraid of being typecast, turned them down.

The movie had mixed reviews.  Roger Ebert gave it 3 out of 4 stars, but some other reviewers though it tried a little too hard to reach a wider audience than what was basically meant as a "teen" movie.  My personal opinion is this movie still has something even though I'm 40 years older than the relatively young person I was when it first hit the screens.  It's endearing in it's sentimental side, and still riotously funny during it's comedic moments.

 

 

 

Real Genius:

Real Genius moves from the high school geeks of the previous film to the college geek scene. 

 

The movie opens with the credits, but instead of some 80's new wave or pop hit playing over it, we are treated to a 50's jazz  song, Carmen McRae's cover of "You Took Advantage of Me". Considering the basic premise of the movie, it fits, at least in title, but we are off to a weird start, if you ask me.

 

In a secret laboratory, several top brass watch a promo for a laser weapon that can find and blast an individual person, without causing any damage in the area surrounding him.  David Decker (Ed Lauter) tells the assemblage that it is not a tactical weapon for war, it's a "peace time" weapon. One of the personages present takes offense at where this is going and leaves and it is intimated that George is going to find himself a non-entity in the immediate future. Serious business for a comedy.

 

 

To get the weapon built, Professor Hathaway (William Atherton) is recruited to use his students to do the work.  Hathaway wants Mitch (Gabriel Jarret), a high school phenom, to come on board. Mitch is only 15, but he is at least Einstein level IQ. And a physics whiz kid.  So Mitch agrees to come to enroll at Pacific Tech.

Here's where the movie finally starts to take off.  Mitch, it turns out, is the only one grounded in reality. Chaos rules in the physics department at Pacific Tech, as well as in the dorm rooms.  It turns out that Mitch's roommate is going to be Chris Knight (Val Kilmer), the previous phenom at the institute. But Mitch has a couple of screws loose, or at least it seems.  The first time we meet Chris is when he walks in wearing an "I Love Toxic Waste" t-shirt and a headband with springy bobble balls (wish I could remember what those things were called). One of hist first lines is, when he is complemented as 1 of the top 10 minds in the world: "Maybe one day I'll be 2 of them..."

 

 

 

At the dorm room Mitch encounters more chaos, including finding his suitcases ransacked.  No, nobody stole his clothes.  Chris just decided arbitrarily to file them in his own bizarre system. Mitch also encounters a weird guy who comes into the room, says nothing and disappears into the closet.  But when tries to follow there is nothing there but a closet, just like you'd expect.

Meanwhile we discover Hathaway is remodeling his house. I know college professors with tenure make good money, but probably not this good.  It turns out, of course, that Hathaway is not a good guy.  He's been funneling money from the government grant for his own purposes. (Gotta love William Atherton. He plays the a-hole role well, no matter what he's in.  Check out his smarmy government stooge in Ghostbusters, or another classic role as the reporter in Die Hard.)

 

 

It seems like everybody is just slightly off kilter here at Pacific Tech. I remember when I went to college there were a few, like Big Ed at my junior college, but it seems like maybe the whole university is a little wiggy.

Back at the dorm, the science nerds turn the entire dorm floor into an ice rink. Much to the dismay of the (seemingly) only normal guy on campus, Kent (Robert Prescott).  Kent, however, is not straight laced as he might seem.  He is a typical brown noser, who reports any shenanigans to daddy, I mean Professor Hathaway. 

 

 

 

Mitch meets Jordan (Michelle Meyrink), who is quite a bit different from the only other movie I saw her in, Revenge of the Nerds. I gawped when I saw the credits and found out it was her.  Sure she had some attractiveness to her as Judy, but she was gorgeous as Jordan.  Jordan is a hyperactive girl who claims she never sleeps (and it's believable...) Meyrink only had a brief 5 year career as an actress, but decided to leave it for the private sector.

Mitch approaches Chris and tells him he had a weird night. 

"Was it a dream where you're standing in a robe next to a pyramid, with 1000 naked women screaming and throwing pickles at you?"

"No."

"Why am I the only one who has that dream?"   

 

Eventually Mitch finds out about the strange guy and his hidden basement behind the closet. Chris tells Mitch that it's Lazlo (Jon Gries), a former phenom who got so over-stressed that he became the recluse that he is now, and that Lazlo is the reason why he stopped being so serious and went a little haywire. And it's also the reason why he is trying to keep Mitch from ending up like Lazlo.

 

Chaos continues at the dorm, including a scene where Chris helps Mitch get revenge on Kent by dismantling Kent's car and reassembling it in his dorm room.  Meanwhile Hathaway is getting pressure from the government big wigs to get his project completed.  Getting no results from Chris, Hathaway tells him he is going to flunk him.  Chris and Mitch finally get together and make the laser a success.  But then they find out about the future use of the laser and decide to change the minds of the people involved.

 

 

The long story short is more chaos as all of the students involved in the project, except Kent, of course, plot a major plan to cause the laser to function in a way that will make neither the bigwigs or Hathaway happy. Popcorn and houses are apparently not a good combination.

Real Genius may not be quite as funny as Weird Science, but it does have a lot going for it, especially in terms of how the real science really plays a larger part in how it all plays out.  Who knows.  Had I been about 5 years younger by the time it came out, and still debating on my future, I might have decided a physics degree might have been a cool thing.  (I majored in history, which my long time readers already knew, but some of you may be reading this blog for the first time.)

Val Kilmer showed incredible acting ability in this early feature.  I had seen him in Top Secret! which was hist first role, and was starting to notice him and like him. It would be another 6 years before I saw him again, in The Doors. (Again, if you have read my blog, you already know I would NEVER have watched Top Gun, and you also know why..)

There was an episode of Mythbusters where the guys tried to see if the end scene could actually happen.   They decided popcorn, although it could expand using a laser, probably wouldn't cause that much damage. Oh, well. Still a cool revenge.

 

 

My Science Project:

The least familiar output of these three would have to be My Science Project. At least the other two had some big name associated with it. John Hughes (Weird Science)  and Val Kilmer (Real Genius) are the most likely candidates for each.

But My Science Project didn't even list any of the actors/actresses in the credits part of the movie poster.  John Stockwell, the star of the film, had been one of the main stars of John Carpenter's Christine and he had a few roles before that, but he wasn't a name yet (whether you could say he is now is a matter of preference...) The only real big name attached to it was Dennis Hopper, but even his name doesn't appear on the poster...

The rest of the cast is made up of character actors who really had no recognizable impact on Hollywood. That's not to say they wouldn't be familiar in any sense of the word, just that they weren't the headline making kind of people. Fisher Stevens, for instance, was the star of Short Circuit, but unless you were paying attention you might miss him in other films. Barry Corbin might be familiar as John Travolta's father in Urban Cowboy or a few other movies.  He has that familiar a face, but mostly he was a sideline character in those movies.  

 

The movie was pretty much a bomb, so much so that it was only in theaters for 2 weeks before they pulled the plug on it. I remember hearing about the movie, but it never made it to where I was living at the time,  so I didn't get to see it in theaters.  It's pretty much a typical mid-80's romp, featuring high school students trying to pretend they know what they are doing, but barely having a clue what their future holds.

So the movie begins in 1957. A U.F.O. crashes and is taken to a nearby Air Force Base.  President Eisenhower tells an Air Force officer to just "get rid of it". The film never really establishes the source of U.F.O. crash and it's resulting capture, but I think we are supposed to believe it was the famed Roswell incident.  There are a couple of dead aliens (only mentioned, not seen) and Eisenhower getting involved puts it around the same time as that event.

28 years later. In a science classroom, the science teacher, Mr. Roberts (Dennis Hopper), is asking his students what their science project is going to be. The science project is going to be a major portion of their grade.  Mr. Roberts, who is obviously a 60's burnout who wangled a job with "the man", insists that his students call him "Bob", because the only people who call him "Mr. Roberts" is "The Man"...

Mike Harlan (John Stockwell) is a typical car enthusiast who is just hoping to get through high school so he can devote his time to his one true love. Cars.  He spends more time obsessing about cars than he does about his girlfriend, which causes her to break up with him.   He is devastated, of course.. for about 10 seconds... Then he chisels off her name plate on his car and gets on with life, with some sage advice from his pal, Vince (Fisher Stevens).

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Ellie Sawyer (Danielle von Zemeck) is a friend who is smarter than the average girl.  We know this because, not only is she a psych major (or a journalism major... it keeps changing...), but... she wears glasses. 

 

 

 

 

(This movie is rife with cliches; the 60's adult who is forced to take a day job, the guy who barely gets by in school because he just knows only one thing, the girl who is actually pretty, but is a wallflower because she wears, gah!, glasses). Ellie manages to wangle a date with Mike.  Only the date involves breaking into an abandoned Air Force base, because Mike thinks he can find something there that he will be able to pass off as his science project.

 

Mike falls through some loose floorboards into a basement in the base and finds a weird object that he thinks will do the job.  It, of course, is something that came from that U.F.O.  (And a brief warning: Children shouldn't play with alien technology. But do these kids stick to that rule?  Well, honestly... no.) The thing sucks all the energy from two flashlights and ultimately disables Mike's car, at least the electrical part of it.  He calls his buddy Vince to come bail him out, because, God forbid the kids at school find out his car broke down.  (And, BTW, how come Vince's car doesn't break down while he is pushing Mike's disabled car...? This thing does suck energy, and that other car is just right behind it.)

 

 

 

When Mike hooks up the object in the school shop classroom, it starts to absorb energy from everything around it.  It gradually gets a little more powerful.  And starts bringing in objects from somewhere in the past, a clear  indication of it's capabilities. So, Mike brings his friend Vince into the secret.  But since neither of these mental giants know what they've got, they go get Bob to come look at it. And despite being a little burned out, Bob seems to have a line on what it really is.  It creates some kind of a vortex that opens up the space-time continuum.  Don't ask me how he knows... I guess in addition to doing drugs back in the 60's, he was also an enthusiast for the kind of esoteric knowledge that was later passed on to Fox Mulder.

 

 

In playing around with the (admittedly cheesy looking) vortex, Bob disappears.  Mike and Vince decide the only way to stop the object from getting any stronger is that they have to blow up the power towers outside of town.  Which they do.  But this thing is even bigger than they thought.  When they get back to town they find out that the whole school has been engulfed in the vortex.  And at this point, I have no idea what the hell is going on. 

(I later thought it through and came up with this, which may or may not be right. The aliens had to have some sort of technology to bend space so that could travel across light years without it taking, literally, years.  This contraption is what helps them do it.  If used right.  But then, Mike and company have no clue how to use it the right way...)

Anyway, on returning to town, Mike and friends have to do battle with all sorts of threats, including a caveman, Viet Cong soldiers, Cleopatra and even a T-Rex. (The T-Rex scene is probably the only part of the movie that anyone remembers....)

 

Ultimately things do turn out well, although how anybody is going to explain the demolished school is anybody's guess.  And maybe, just maybe, things aren't completely hunky dory at the end anyway...

 

My Science Project differed from the other two movies in this post in one major respect. The others centered on a character trope of what we called "nerds". Nerd was a term, often used derisively by the other cliques in high school for the class bookworm. I was considered a nerd, but I for one always liked the appellation.  I proudly wear my "nerd" badge with honor.  Mike would have probably been a "greaser" in my school, and there again, I knew "greasers" who were not shy about accepting that term for themselves. Thus, as one who is no where near a "nerd", Mike's character stands out from the characters in the previous two, though he no less susceptible to getting into trouble.

 

The only real part of this movie that makes absolutely no sense is the development of a relationship between Mike's father and a cosmetics sales woman, Delores (played by Ann Wedgeworth).  The whole affair does nothing to advance the plot and could have been left on the cutting room floor without taking anything away from the movie proper.

My opinion of this movie, after watching it, is that it does have some entertainment value.  Even though it's riddled with enough cliches to make it seem like a hunk of Swiss cheese... Swiss cheese from when Swiss cheese was invented, no doubt... The movie hearkens back to the first movie in this post, because in both we have a couple of guys who are clueless about the technology they are dealing with and make every mistake known to man trying to correct their mistakes, to intermittent success.

 

Overall, all three of these movies are entertaining, taken as they are.  Personally, I think the movies rank with Real Genius narrowly beating out Weird Science as the best movie in the three, with My Science Project bringing up the rear. If you really want to see Hopper overact, go with Speed, or maybe  coincides with my view of their entertainment value.  If you only delve into one, it's your choice, of course.  Some of you who absolutely love Val Kilmer will probably gravitate toward Real Genius, and those of you who admire John Hughes will probably stick to Weird Science.  Except for those who are fans of Dennis Hopper's typical over the top characters post Easy Rider, I imagine most of you won't pick My Science Project (and on that, I must warn you, Hopper's character is only in the movie for about 15 minutes total. If you really want to see Hopper overact, go see Speed, or maybe Super Mario Brothers).

 

Well, I'm about to fire up the Plymouth and see if I can turn it into a spaceship.  Then maybe I can really go HOME!

 

Quiggy