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 Aug. 16, 1985, and we’re off to see American Flyers, The Bride, Return of the Living Dead, Volunteers, and Year of the Dragon.
American Flyers
Watch out! Evil bicycle riders inbound!
Marcus Sommers (Kevin Costner) is a doctor and bicycle racer who has a family with a history of major health issues. It’s believed his younger brother, David (David Marshall Grant) has inherited the issues, and that leads to the brothers deciding to have one big bicycle race together and make a name for themselves. But, of course, things are quite as cut and dry as they seem at first.
This movie is guilty of one thing that drives me insane in so many films: There has to be an antagonist. Twister was the film that really set me off on this concept when there were ‘evil’ tornado chasers. Here we have a rival bicycle team that serves absolutely no purpose. You had a perfectly engaging story about man against himself, but instead, we have to introduce a rival bicycle team for them to fight against.
How about you just trust your original premise and stick with it? What could have been an interesting human story becomes nearly comical once the rival team is introduced.
It’s vaguely interesting, but it loses a lot of that once the actual race begins.
The Bride
This movie couldn’t decide what it was about and ended up spoiling two potentially interesting stories.
Frankenstein’s monster (Clancy Brown) is about to receive an equal creation he can love, Eva (Jennifer Beals). When the experiment doesn’t go smoothly, The Monster, later known as Viktor, runs off and literally joins the circus, while Eva learns about life while living with Baron Frankenstein (Sting). The two are eventually thrown back together as the connection between the two of them is too strong to ignore.
There was a lot of promise here from a great cast, but it spoils itself by trying too much story at once. The story of Viktor learning about the world is interesting. Eva’s journey of self-discovery is interesting. But the two stories are so horribly short-changed by being crammed into the same film
There was a lot of promise here, but it was executed poorly.
The Return of the Living Dead
This film did a lot for zombies, and it is a key piece for anyone to watch if you want to be in the horror conversation.
Set at a medical supply warehouse, a zombie outbreak begins when a cannister is broken open with a sample from a prior outbreak. The government has been looking for these cannisters, but, of course, they learn where they are when it’s too late to stop the horror from escaping.
The film is a lot. For instance, if you want to see a woman spend the majority of a zombie outbreak naked, this is the film for you!
This is not a high-end film, but it did a lot for the genre and is charming in its own ways. Just be prepared for a lot of gore and nudity when you go in.
Voluneers
There is one reason to watch this movie, and one reason only: John Candy.
Lawrence Bourne III (Tom Hanks) runs off with the Peace Corps to escape some gambling debts his family won’t help him with. He gets his former college roommate to switch places with him and he’s off to Thailand with Tom Tuttle from Tacoma (Candy) and Beth Wexler (Rita Wilson). Once there, he gets involved with some shady dealings regarding the building a bridge, and Tom gets brainwashed by Communists.
Hanks is fine here, but his put-on accent gets old pretty fast, and the whole thing feels like a so-so try at capturing the magic of Private Benjamin. But, as per usual, Candy is amazing in any role he plays. What that man could do with sub-par material was never anything short of amazing.
A totally forgettable film unless you are a completist of Hanks or Candy.
Year of the Dragon
I’m normally pretty forgiving of acting, but when it’s mixed with a mess of a script, it becomes even worse.
Stanley White (Mickey Rourke) is sent into New York City’s Chinatown to clear up the growing violence in the community. Along the way he makes enemies with new boss Joey Tai (John Lone) and falls for reporter Tracy Tzu (Ariane Koizumi) whom he begins using to flush out the Triads into the light.
This film had no idea what it wanted to be. A police action film? A noir film? A budding romance? It tried to be all of these things, and more, and none of them worked.
And then there is the issue of Ariane Koizumi. She was a model and this was her first attempt at acting, and… it’s just painful. Every word out of her just hits so poorly that you are begging for any scene with her to end. I try not to drag actors, but she was painful to watch and made this film feel three times longer than it was.
It’s an awful film and should just be forgotten.
1985 Movie Reviews will return on Aug. 23, 2025, with Better Off Dead and Teen Wolf.
