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 May 10, 1985, and we’re off to see Creature, Rappin’, Rustlers’ Rhapsody.
Creature
Someone really, really enjoyed Alien and decided it would be a good idea to film another version of it, but with way less lighting.
Two companies are attempting to commercialize space, but all of that grinds to a halt when they find the galactic equivalent of a butterfly collection on Saturn’s moon, Titan. After one ship’s crew goes missing, and a satellite gets destroyed, the two companies both send their own teams, and things don’t go well.
Creature truly is just Alien, but, honestly, it’s not horrible. I was entertained throughout, which even surprised me. The production is about as barebones as you can get, but it adds a certain charm to the film to be sure.
Rappin’
Creature had charm, this… this was just bad.
John Hood (Mario Van Peebles) is fresh out of prison, and just in time as his neighborhood has been targeted for development. Add in he has a chance at a record contract, and Jon just has a lot on his plate. Thank goodness he has a band of merry men to help him.
Supposedly this film exists in the Breakin’ universe, although there is not a single mention of those other two films. Rappin’ has some of the worst ‘rapping’ you will ever hear, and the Robin Hood aspects of the story are so ham-fisted as to be groan-inducing.
I never though there would be a film that would make me long for the innocence of Breakin’.
Rustlers’ Rhapsody
I’m not sure why we needed two cowboy comedies in the span of a year, but here we are.
What if the cowboy movies of the 1940s were suddenly made in the 1980s. That’s the whole conceit of the film, and then it just goes into making fun of various tropes.
Honestly, there is nothing here worth even bringing up other than the very odd performance by Andy Griffith as the film’s villain.
The film is so devoid of any substance that you really just want to stop it halfway through and turn on Blazing Saddles instead.
1985 Movie Reviews will return on May 17, 2025, with Streetwalkin’.
