Welcome to an exciting year-long project here at The Nerdy. 1985 was an exciting year for films giving us a lot of films that would go on to be beloved favorites and cult classics. It was also the start to a major shift in cultural and societal norms, and some of those still reverberate to this day.
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We’re going to pick and choose which movies we hit, but right now the list stands at nearly four dozen.
Yes, we’re insane, but 1985 was that great of a year for film.
The articles will come out – in most cases – on the same day the films hit theaters in 1984 so that it is their true 40th anniversary. All films are also watched again for the purposes of these reviews and are not being done from memory. In some cases, it truly will be the first time we’ve seen them.
This time around, it’s January 18, 1985, and we’re off to see Avenging Angel, Blood Simple, Ghoulies, The New Kids, and Tuff Turf.
Avenging Angel
Yes, Angel got a sequel almost a year to the day after it was released. While it’s no Breakin’ and Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo turnaround, it’s still a bit fast.
It’s been several years since the events of the first fim, and Molly – now played by Betsy Russell – is studying to be a lawyer. When Lt. Andrews (Robert F. Lyons), the cop who got her off the streets, is killed, Molly wants to find out who murdered him. She heads back to the streets and with the help of Yo-Yo (Steven M. Porter), Solly (Susan Tyrrell), and Kit (Rory Calhoun), she aims to make the streets safe once again.
The movie is fine. A bit less of a ‘yuck’ factor as you’re no longer dealing with the weight of a 15-year-old prostitute, but the story is about as barebones as you can get. The film also, oddly, goes for some slapstick laughs that don’t match the tone of the rest of the film at all.
Don’t worry, there’s two more sequels in this series… for some reason.
Blood Simple
Despite being a fan of the Coen Brothers, I had never made it around to Blood Simple, their first film. This is one of the reasons I love this project in that it allows me to not only revisit films I love, but to fill in some gaps in my personal film journey.
Ray (John Getz) is helping Abby (Frances McDormand) to get away from her bar-owner husband, Marty (Dan Hedaya). Unbeknownst to them, Marty hired private detective Loren Visser (M. Emmet Walsh) to follow them, and when they begin an affair on the spur of the moment, he catches it all. From there, the rest of the story quickly falls apart for everyone involved.
If you’re familiar with the Coen Brothers, nothing that happens here will surprise you all that much. The pair very quickly establish their style and give you a lot to chew on here.
The only complaint I really have with the film a lot of it is very dark. While lighting goes a mighty long way to establish mood in a lot of films, there is a point where you tip over the edge into annoyance. Blood Simple gets very close to that tipping point at multiple points.
Other than that, it’s a great film noir style story that is easily enjoyed.
Ghoulies
This film very clearly wanted to tap into the success of Gremlins and had no idea of how to go about doing that.
A Satanic cult plans to sacrifice a child for… reasons. When members interject, the child is spared and a woman is sacrificed instead because apparently it really could be anyone. Years later, the baby is now an adult and now he finds himself drawn to the same black magic.
Nothing in this film makes sense. It’s just a lot of nonsense with horrible effects. And yet, somehow, it received multiple sequels. It’s amazing how that happened so much in the 1980s, and a lot of that was due to the lucrative, and growing, video market.
The New Kids
This film… is a lot.
Abby (Lori Loughlin) and Loren (Shannon Presby) McWilliams lose their parents in the first few minutes of the film. They move to Florida to live with their Aunt and Uncle who have purchased a Christmas-themed roadside amusement park, and they start a new school where Abby is immediately targeted by Eddie Dutra (James Spader) and his gang of miscreants who make bets about getting with her. What follows is an escalating war between the new kids and Dutra’s gang that results in several deaths.
The story is nothing exciting, but I applaud Spader for his performance here as it’s very outside his normal performances.
Now, as to why this movie is ‘a lot,’ is in the very opening moments. Their dad – Tom Atkins – is a Colonel iand he gets the kids up each morning to train with him. At the beginning of the film he goes to wake his son who complains and he asks if he had masturbated too many times the night before and that is why he’s tired.
Okay…
He then goes to Abby’s room, and she complains tas well bout getting up to “the major.” “I’m a colonel now, remember that. Means more money to spend on buying you designer jeans to put on your sexy ass.”
WHAT?!?
Did we just kick off this movie with a father discussing his daughter’s ass?
I realize this is the 1980s and everyone had a different view on life, but even then did no one sit around and question this line?
What can I say… it was the 80s.
Tuff Turf
There is some dispute over when this film and The New Kids actually released, but the short version is they were close together and both featured James Spader with slightly bleached hair.
Morgan Hiller (James Spader) is an intelligent teenager, but routinely finds himself in trouble. His family moves from Connecticut to Los Angeles to give him a new start, and he immediately falls for Frankie Croyden (Kim Richards), the girlfriend of the leader of a small gang of bad kids. With the help of his new friend, Jimmy (Robert Downey Jr.), he finally faces down the mini-gang to save Frankie who is now on the outs with them.
The film ends on such an upbeat note, as in, ‘yay, we defeated the bad guys!’ I guess we’ll just ignore the fact that Morgan has more than likely just killed multiple people, but I’m sure there won’t be any ramifications from that.
This movie very much fell into the trend we were starting to see in the 80s that carried into the 90s of the disillusioned youth who really was just misunderstood by everyone.
This film is just ‘fine.’ It’s a movie that is neither good or bad, it just simply exists.
1985 Movie Reviews will launch on January 25, 2025, with The Falcon and the Snowman and Fandango!