It Came From . . . 1991

“Well, Clarice, have the lambs stopped screaming?” – Silence of the Lambs

I had a professor who devoted an entire class to the movie Silence of the Lambs.  It was a Hannibal lecture.

While I think we have one more year (I’ll have to check) in the 1980s to do, we’re jumping into 1991.  Once again, the rule of no sequels takes out a decent movie or two, in this case Terminator 2, which some (not me) like better than the original.  T2 is much bigger and has better special effects, but, whatever.  It’s not on the list.

You’ll also not see some more popular movies from the year.  That’s okay, I either didn’t see them, or didn’t like them, like that crapfest of nihilism, Thelma and Louise.  Awful movie except the part where the feminists die.  That was good.

Warlock – When I met The Mrs. we quickly realized that we both liked Julian Sands for this very same movie.  It’s about . . . well what it’s about isn’t horribly important since the plot is silly – an evil warlock from witch-burnin’ time travels to the present followed by a witch burner.  The witch-burner goes on a buddy road trip chasing the titular warlock.  (I love saying titular.)  It ends pretty much like you’d expect.  It might have even been better if it was a sequel to Ghostbusters, but then it wouldn’t be on the list.

Julian Sands looks like David Bowie gave him a makeover.

L.A. Story – I liked it when I first saw it, but on a second viewing it seems a lot shallower.  Steve Martin is good, but restrained, and part of what throws me off on the later viewing is the horse-faced Jessica Parker, who I have learned to loathe.  Best part?  Steve Martin having to prove his credit score to get a restaurant reservation.

You could cook a lot of liver and fava beans on that many burners.

The Silence of the Lambs – As far as genius films go, this is one of them.  From start to finish, the tension and connection to the characters is built up, with the real star of the show being a serial cannibal.  Good times!  Technically, this could be considered to be a sequel of the earlier film, Manhunter, but I make the rules, so it’s in.

If Looks Could Kill – I love this movie.  It’s stupid.  The plot is written in crayon.  It depends on stupid coincidences.  But it works for me.  And apparently just for me, because everyone scoffs at this movie.  Scoff away!  Oh, and it features lots of central bankers being assassinated, so it has that going for it.

Toy Soldiers – This particular movie is also very silly, and is mainly on the list because I believe that there was a time in the 1990s when it was required by federal law that Toy Soldiers be available at any time to anyone who had basic cable.  This movie was on all the time.  The cast was awful, the plot was silly, but it did have R. Lee Ermy and his eyebrows in it.

Apparently in this version, Bill Murray plays a cat.  Like he did in Garfield.

What About Bob? – This is Bill Murray as I imagine him in real life, if he didn’t get mad at people.  Murray plays a psychiatric patient who gets very clingy with his therapist, and in the span of a weekend becomes more beloved to the therapist’s family than the therapist is.  Richard Dreyfuss plays the therapist by, I believe, just by being Richard Dreyfuss.  If you couldn’t tell, I don’t like Richard Dreyfuss

Backdraft – Backdraft was a very good movie that could have been great, but just missed because of the muddled morality of the ending plus the good guy and the bad guy dying sorta pointlessly.  As usual, director Ron Howard throws his brother Clint Howard in a role, because Clint Howard uses his amazingly large brain to psychically control Ron.  Not a re-watcher, but one that was a good summer movie.

Hudson Hawk – This is easily the most ill-advised movie that Bruce Willis has ever been in, where he plays a burglar who sings a lot with his crime partner, Danny Aiello on the way to assembling Leonardo DaVinci’s lead into gold machine for secret evil dudes.  Did I mention that Willia and Aiello sing?  Oddly, a movie this stupid has to have someone that likes it, and in this case, both The Mrs. and I enjoyed it.

And it looks like he killed her.  Also, the corgis look suspiciously plump.

Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead – most memorable scene?  A kid is using a shotgun to shoot plates that his brother is throwing off the roof.  When finished, he says, “The dishes are done, dude.”

Hot Shots! – Charlie Sheen back in the days when he was funny instead of borderline insane in an Airplane! style movie spoof of Top Gun and Rambo.  Funniest foreshadowing?  A pilot with the callsign “Dead Meat”.

Doc Hollywood – Michael J. Fox before his Parkinson’s, and Julie Warner who I keep mixing up with the actress Finn Carter who was arrested in Vegas for credit card fraud.  It would be funny if Finn had stolen Warner’s credit cards, but I doubt it.  Plot?  It’s essentially and nearly exactly the plot for Pixar’s® movie Cars.  But Doc Hollywood’s not animated and cars don’t perform plastic surgery.

That one girl has got a crazy eye.

The Addams Family – As a fan of the television show (there’s a reason we named our son Pugsley), I was dreading that this wouldn’t be very good.  It was good, and the cast simply was mostly perfect.  Oh, we didn’t really name him Pugsley, but we do very much call him Pugsley.  I’m glad Child Protective Services never found that out.

The Last Boy Scout – The start of this movie was just amazing – a football player, drenched in rain, starts running down the field and pulls out a Beretta 84FS in .380ACP and shoots the players that are about to tackle him.  Now, there are two problems with that scenario.  First, you’d probably want more stopping power than a .380, I’d think a .45ACP as a minimum.  Second, is there even a rule against using guns during a game?  I mean, the worst thing might be a 15-yard penalty for unnecessary roughness plus an ejection.  I’ve since found out that pretty much everybody involved in the whole movie hated each other, which makes me like it all the more since I feed off of the pain of others.

This is a lame list.  The quality of movies was in steep decline since the 1980s, and, really, on this list only Silence of the Lambs is a classic.  When do I think it started to go wrong in a big way, based on seeds set in earlier decades?

The 1990s.