Dangerfield was the king of riff

Though he had some notable supporting roles in the 90’s, “Back to School” would be the last successful time Rodney Dangerfield played a comedic lead. In a way, you get it. Dangerfield was never much of an actor. But as a comedic riffer he was the best, with absolutely no equals. This had many of the same problems as Caddyshack, but Dangerfield is almost as good here at making you forget all about them. He plays the very rich Thornton Melon, a “Big and Tall” clothing manufacturer who enrolls in the same college as his son (Keith Gordon) to help the kid adapt. Melon is an asshole. His clothing store has a Hindenburg line and he takes pleasure taking shots at his philandering wife and all her snooty friends. In college he’s equally flippant, pointing out that business ethics is a bunch of crap, paying his way through courses, and replying that he saw the movie during English Lit class. Dangerfield is always great fun and the persona he adopted in “Caddyshack” just kept working: a middle-class “everyman” who somehow got rich and used it to convey his real super power which was laying into snooty assholes. Also part of the fun is the whose who of cameo turns here, from Robert Downey Jr. playing a hipster, Burt Young as Dangerfield’s tough-guy bodyguard, 80’s bully William Zabka playing a bully, a funny cameo by comedian Sam Kinison that may only work if you remember Sam Kinison, and a really funny cameo by a world-renowned author. The plot, especially involving a love interest teacher (Sally Kellerman, doing all she can) and a rival teacher (Paxton Whitehead, doing all he can), is one contrivance after another but serviceable for a Dangerfield comedy that is very good at taking its shots.

**Part of a series i'm doing on 1986 in film, part of a larger review/ranking series on the 80's.
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