“Hey, everybody, we’re all gonna get laid!” – Back to School
Yeah, someone’s gonna tell me that M-16 isn’t Vietnam accurate and that Morgan Freeman never carjacked Miss Daisy.
This may be the last of the movie series. I suppose I could do more in the 1990s, but movies today are just depressing. I’ll likely just review a few series and movies when they really tickle my fancy. Enjoy the list, it is what it is.
1985 Best Picture: Out of Africa
Out of Africa is boring. Really boring. It’s 161 minutes of a woman talking about her problems. I don’t want to hear anyone talk about their problems for 161 minutes, let alone Meryl Streep, who I hate with the fire of a thousand suns. I. Hate. This. Movie. I. Hate. Meryl. Streep.
1985: Should Have Been Best Picture: Vision Quest
This is such a low bar to beat. A documentary on the production of aluminum foil would beat Out of Africa in my book, and by a lot, since that might be interesting. How about Vision Quest? It has a chick in it, right? And it’s something much more than the dreary story of a woman in Africa who gets V.D. from her husband. Nope, it’s about a man who is on a . . . well, vision quest. Arthur Sido, frequent visitor had a great post on this a while back and I hope he posts it below because I’m too lazy to look it up.
1985 Best Actor: William Hurt, Kiss of the Spider Woman
William Hurt can act. He was really good in the TV movie of Dune. But this movie? It’s horrible. It’s a commie talking to a gay guy after being put in a prison by a right-wing South American dictator, so real fantasy material for the GloboLeftistElite that vote on awards for this kind of crap. Me? I would have made a movie congratulating the dictator and asking if he got all the commies.
1985: Should Have Been Best Actor: Jeffrey Combs, Re-Animator.
You guys know me by now, and I’m a sucker for H.P. Lovecraft done well, and Re-Animator is perhaps the best. Yet, best actor to a guy in a B-level horror movie? Why not? Seems like the last winner in 2026 was in a B-level horror movie, and Jeffrey Combs knocks this role out of the park, managing to capture the manic energy of crazed scientist Herbert West. How good was he? Combs could have remained famous for just this role. If you don’t like horror, this one isn’t for you, but if like Lovecraft, jump on in.
1985: Hottest Actress: Kathleen Turner.
Sure, she looks like Jabba the Hut® before Ozempic® now, but she was smokin’ in the 1980s, and Jewel of the Nile showed her off pretty well.
1986 Best Picture: Platoon
I saw Platoon once, in a theater. It was utterly demoralizing. I’m not discounting the quality of the writing or acting or cinematography. Those were there. And Oliver Stone did spend time in-country and got two Purple Hearts, so realism might be there, too. But I think this was a priming movie for the 1990s and making America doubt itself. Making us ask ourselves “Are we the good guys?” is just one step away from “let’s import the third world to replace us, because we’re evil.”
1986 Should Have Been Best Picture: Highlander
The joy of this movie for me is that it was so fresh, so new, and such a great take on an older idea of what would an immortal man do? Queen’s® soundtrack meshed perfectly, and although it was a dud at the box office, it had long lasting cultural impact. Plus? It celebrates good people doing the right things.
1986 Best Actor: Paul Newman, Fast Eddie Felson, The Color of Money
Just like Elon Musk forgot Bernie Sanders was alive, The Color of Money was a movie that I forgot existed. It was meh. And Paul Newman was a Hollywood GloboLeftElite favorite due to his hard-left positions, so they decided to give him a pity Oscar™ in 1986 for playing the same character he always played in movies.
1986: Should Have Been Best Actor: Rodney Dangerfield, Back to School
If you’re gonna give someone an Oscar® for playing the same character in every movie, who better than Rodney Dangerfield. But he got no respect, let me tell ya.
1986 Hottest Actress: Helen Slater, Ruthless People. What can I say? I have a type.
1987 Best Picture: The Last Emperor
I thought I saw this? On video, maybe? But reading the summary, probably not. An alternate title: Sucks to be This Guy.
1987 Should Have Been Best Picture: Predator
This coming-of-age story about a young girl in Victorian England and the struggles she faces with class . . . HA! NO! Bombs. Guns. Aliens on hunting trips. Killing commies. GET TO THE CHOPPA! Again, more cultural impact than The Last Emperor. I mean, did they make six sequels to The Last Emperor? No. I do think the last few sequels to Predator have been yet more targeted demoralization, but Predator? No.
1987 Best Actor: Micheal Douglas, Wall Street
Yeah, yeah, greed is good. Whatever.
1987 Should Have Been Best Actor: Arnold Schwarzenneger, Predator
Hear me out.
In that scene where Arnold is covered in mud and at the bank of the river and the Predator™ doesn’t see him? I actually bought that Arnold was scared. Rather than just being a big dude, he actually started acting in this movie.
1987 Hottest Actress: Kim Catrell. Fight me. Loser has to bench press 2026 Kathleen Turner. Or we could make it a contest: Kathleen Turner-Overdrive.
1988 Best Picture: Rain Man
I guess Han Zimmer’s music was good, especially for a movie that’s all about taking advantage of your retarded brother. And that’s all I have to say about that.
1988 Best Picture Should Have Been: Willow
I had no preconceptions when I walked in to watch Willow. It’s a charming Tolkien-esque story about dwarves and brave men (Val Kilmer) who bang hot women (Joanne Whalley) who aren’t nearly as tough as they think they are. It also stars Warwick Davis, who I really have no desire to imprison in my basement and torture with hand tools during a thunderstorm. No desire at all.
I promise.
The Warwick Davis digression will make sense to about three of you, but that’s okay.
1988 Best Actor: Dustin Hoffman, Rain Man
Another proof (like Forrest Gump) that you always win an award if you go retard, but not full retard. Dustin Hoffman is tool who starred in demoralization movies for most of his life intended to destroy the basic fabric of American life, plus he’s an insufferable gaping GloboLeftElite member, probably only second to Richard Dreyfuss in this club. Outside of that I’m sure this talentless commie hack who hates you is an okay guy.
1988 Best Actor Should Have Been: Chevy Chase, Funny Farm
Chevy Chase is another person who has a reputation as being insufferable and serving the GloboLeftElite, but at least he’s funny and racist. This is easily his best movie, and he plays a self-absorbed liar who is pretending to have talents he doesn’t actually have. So, it’s a natural for Chevy. Good movie, and I can’t imagine anyone better to play the part.
1988 Hottest Actress: Kathy Ireland.
Yes, she’s hot, but she can’t read so therefore doesn’t know any of her lines. But she’s hot, which is what this category is for, not acting.
1989 Best Picture: Driving Miss Daisy
Who was this movie for? Why was it made? It’s a made-up story that is (again) a demoralization show about how awful Americans are. The only thing good about this movie is that, again, Hans Zimmer did the music. I don’t remember the music, but, Hans Zimmer sounds like a name that could have been a Prussian infantry commander against the French in 1871, and I’m really in favor of that. All the copies of this movie should be dropped in a pit and everyone involved in the production (except Hans Zimmer) should be sent to Tuvalu without air conditioning until they write 100,000 words of apology without ChatGPT®. I am likely alone in this opinion, but the rest of you can just be wrong. Also, how damn long has Morgan Freeman been 70?
1989 Best Picture Should Have Been: The Experts
John Travolta and Arye Gross and Kelly Preston and Deborah Foreman and James Keach. What a cast! The plot? Stupid Americans from New York are kidnapped and drugged and taken to “Nebraska” which is really somewhere in Siberia to a Soviet spy camp. Their job? To teach Soviet spies how actual Americans act. The hidden remoralization: the “experts” end up corrupting the Soviet spies who were raised based on a 1950s set of American values. The ending shows that those values are far superior to the 1980s “modern” values. It’s a comedy, not a documentary, but, damn, it’s funny.
1989 Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis, My Left Foot
Never saw it. Daniel Day-Lewis should be banned from Oscar® contention because he can’t figure out what his last name is and he’s Irish Catholic. Or Irish Protestant. Whatever. I guess he was okay as Batman®.
1989 Best Actor Should Have Been: Anthony Edwards, Miracle Mile
I think about six people saw this movie, which is about a guy who picks up a wrong number at a phone booth (two things that don’t exist now) and discovers that nuclear war (one thing that still does) is inbound in an hour or so. Or is it? Great tension, and Anthony Edwards really knocks it out of the park, especially when he pretends to be attracted to Mare Winningham. Seriously, why would you name your daughter “Mare”? Good movie.
1989 Hottest Actress: Kelly Preston, The Experts
Pump it up, homeboy. Indeed.
That’s all folks. Foodfight below. Where are you wrong do you disagree?
It stops at 1989 because a good movie hasn’t come out of Hymiewood since then?
Don’t forget the OG Red Dawn, Big Trouble In Little China, Rivers Edge, Lethal Weapon I.
One of my favorite desktops has F’ You instead of the Hymiewood sign in Satanic Kalifornia.
Nah, stopped then because it was the last half of the 1980s.
Highlander…a movie about Scottish clans. Who was running the casting? The only guy that comes close to Scottish was Sean Connery…and they made him play a Spaniard…go figure
And the French guy who played Connor couldn’t speak English.
I fully agree with your list, and I think most guys would vote similarly. The problem is that women have completely different tastes in movies and they also get a vote.
There is nothing wrong with women liking different genres than men, but the disparity in interests means we often end up with “winners” that are a compromise (and 5 yrs later, no one can even remember the movie). Why not let men and women vote separately on their favorites? If a movie is able to win over both gender’s awards, then we know it is something special (and that hell is also about to freeze over).
JBird
Why do we let women vote??? Seems like a system flaw.
My problem with Highlander is a boring villain. His entire thing is just “Ha ha ha-a-a-a!! I’m evil!!!” I don’t have to have “sympathetic” villains, but I want at least ones that look a little bit like real people.
The scene in the church is still pretty awesome
It’s all awesome.
Yeah but Sgt Zim does it well.
But he was immortal, and three thousand years might have impacted his overall sanity.
Ask and you shall receive. I actually wrote two posts about Vision Quest, I think you meant this one: https://www.arthursido.com/2023/04/stolen-youth.html but there was also this one about the book: https://www.arthursido.com/2023/04/book-review-vision-quest.html
Such a great film, at least if you were a wrestler in high school.
Thank you!
snip:
Such a great film, at least if you were a wrestler in high school.
/snip
Yes, and yes.
I might be the seventh person to watch Miracle Mile (a couple of days ago, actually.) I think Anthony Edwards is deserving. The movie itself is good, although another example of how sci-fi can turn into comedy given a few decades to age. Also interesting is how we were being groomed to accept the whole LBGT rainbow people thing even back in the 80’s.
Yes, it is very dated and cell phones dismember most of the plot.
1985: Best Actor is Charles Bronson for Death Wish 3. I would say I’ve watched DW3 a hundred times more often than I’ve watched Out of Africa, except I’ve never made it all the way through the latter.
1986: Best Actor: Forrest Tucker, Thunder Run. Lifetime achievement awards are common, the actual winner was getting one as you point out. If Peter Finch wins posthumously for what was essentially a supporting role in 1976, then Tuck, the greatest actor who ever lived, should win for an actual leading role in his swan song. Kurt Russell would be my serious pick for Big Trouble in Little China, but Kurt has many more worthy roles ahead of him. He should have been a slam dunk for Miracle, for example. China and Back to School can duke it out for Best Picture.
1988: The Naked Gun and Leslie Nielsen in a sweep.
re: Kelly Preston. She would have duked it out with Catherine Mary Stuart in a 1985 hottest actress award for Mischief IMO.
I love ’em!
As for Daniel Day-Lewis best movie, I recommend the black comedy “Stars And Bars”. Plays a NYC-Based British art expert that gets sent to Rural Georgia (Luxora Beach, but in the North Georgia mountains???) to evaluate if a purloined Monet from WW2 is real. And Harry Dean Stanton “owns” the painting. Steven Wright & Spaulding Gray appear too. With a niece who fakes being blind and his son named “Freeborn” that sells black market medical supplies out of his car trunk.
Proved to me Daniel could handle comedy quite well. He was also quite good in “The Last Of The Mohicans”.
Sounds good – I haven’t seen that one.
The movie thst should have been made is The Wanting Seed..it’s today
https://youtu.be/qtvXcRRiH3s?list=RDqtvXcRRiH3s
Nice!
1985 Best Movie: Brazil
1985 Best Actor: Clint Eastwood, Pale Rider
1989 Best Movie: Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure
1989 Best Actor: John Cusack, Say Anything
McChuck-
1971(or 72) Best Actor: Clint in “Dirty Harry”. Best soloquily ever(sic)…”This is a .45 caliber, the most powerful handgun in the world. It can blow your head off. You don’t remember if I fired 5 or 6 shots. And I don’t remember either. So, do you feel lucky…punk?”
Spring of 1971 in Starkville. Perhaps 1972. When Clint blew him away, the whole theater stood up, screamed “Hell Yeah, whoa yeah and applauded for a minute or so.
.45? Hand in your man card.
“This is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world…”
Bill and Ted was close to making the list.
Linda Fiorentino smokin hot. She was also in one of the Men in Black movies. Still an all time favorite movie. Read the book last year.
She was.