Welcome to an exciting year-long project here at The Nerdy. 1984 was an exciting year for films giving us a lot of films that would go on to be beloved favorites and cult classics. Imagine a world where This is Spinal Tap and Repo Man hit theaters on the same day. That is the world of 1984.
We’re going to pick and choose which movies we hit, but right now the list stands at nearly three dozen.
Yes, we’re insane, but 1984 was that great of a year for film.
The articles will come out on the same day the films hit theaters in 1984 so that it is their true 40th anniversaries. All films are also watched again for the purposes of these reviews and are not being done from memory.
This time around it’s August 3, 1984, and we’re off to see Grandview, U.S.A., Joy of Sex, and The Philadelphia Experiment.
Grandview, U.S.A.
Grandview U.S.A. has to be one of the most tonally confused movies I’ve ever watched. It had a lot of ideas of what it wanted to be, but it couldn’t settle on any of them.
Tim Pearson (C. Thomas Howell) wants to get out of his small town and become a marine biologist, but he can’t find it in himself to tell his family what he wants to do. (Because I’m sure they can’t pick up on this when he practices using his rebreather in the family tub.) Following a mishap on his prom night, he ends up meeting Mike (Jamie Lee Curtis) whom he seems to not even know exists in his tiny town, and he will run into multiple times over the next few days.
Mike runs the local speedway that Tim’s father wants to purchase. This is also where we meet Slam (Patrick Swayze), the king of the demolition derby, who is in the middle of his marriage falling apart.
Wait! Don’t go anywhere! There’s more semi-developed stories to tell you about!
By the way, Tim just turned 18 a month ago, and that’s important, because he’s going to end up sleeping with Mike who is 27.
The movie wants to be a story of a man making his way in the world and finding his way out of his small town, but at the same time it wants to tell you a story of Mike and Slam falling for each other and finding their love by staying in their small town.
The film is simply trying to do too much and tell too many different stories at once to be successful at any of them.
Joy of Sex
What if you tried to remake Fast Times at Ridgemont High, but you had no idea what made that film work?
The movie centers around Leslie Hindenberg (Michelle Meyrink) who has just entered her senior year of high school. Shortly after school starts she goes to the doctor to have a mole looked at, when she overhears the doctor talking about a plant that is going to die, she’s sure he means her and starts living her life as if she has no time left.
The whole movie revolves around sex. It’s all anyone talks or thinks about, but it is also one of the least sexy films I’ve watched in this project. It’s just not even remotely on the mark.
I looked into the production of the film, and it seems it was a rushed job to fulfill a licensing deal for the book of the same name. When the film was finally completed, the director considered taking their name off of the final film because it wasn’t something they were proud of, and I can see why.
Even Paramount does not seem to want to acknowledge this film at this point. It was released on VHS in the 1980s but has never received a DVD release and is not streaming on any service at the time of this review. It seems everyone would like to forget about this project.
Just a horrible movie that played to the worst instincts of the decade.
The Philadelphia Experiment
David Herdeg (Michael Paré), is in the Navy in 1942 when an experiment with making a stealth ship goes wrong and flings him and his friend Jim (Bobby Di Cicco) to the year 1984. The time connection then begins to ‘the present day’ begins to expand and begins causing destruction. And while that is happening, both David and Jim both beginning to feel ill effects of their journey.
Along the way, they meet Allison (Nancy Allen) who not only ends up helping them, but falling for David along the way.
As random sci-fi stories go, The Philadelphia Experiment isn’t horrible. Yes, it’s extremely predictable, and there is a lot of silly moments, especially how the word “hyperspace” just randomly shows up at one point, but I was still entertained throughout.
It’s about a basic as a sci-fi romp as you can get, but you’ll at least have an enjoyable time watching it.
1984 Movie Reviews will return on August 10 with Cloak & Dagger and Red Dawn!
