MovieChat Forums > Real Men (1987) Discussion > Kinda funny, no kind of story, good acti...

Kinda funny, no kind of story, good acting, and the strangest music ever

posted 14 years ago by mail-2775
7 replies | jump to latest

Somehow I never saw this until 2010! Hero At Large was my 2nd favorite film for many years, and ET was my favorite film when I was a young teen, so it almost seems impossible that I wouldn't see a John Ritter film with aliens in it.

I'm reasonably certain that they started filming without a script and made it up during bathroom breaks, and the onscreen announcements (Las Vegas - Monday) were an afterthought somebody had when editing. Most of it is pretty funny, though, and the acting is very good. Having only seen him in the unwatchable According to Jim, I'd no idea that James Belushi was actually an okay actor.

The locations are the second worst I've seen in my life, second only to Drive on Fox (which was the first worst in all other categories, probably). At least 95% of this was filmed in Canoga Park (L.A.) and downtown L.A., with most of it in Canoga Park. During constant filming in downtown L.A., the words on the screen keep changing, telling us they are in Las Vegas, New Mexico, Indianapolis, etc., when they haven't moved three blocks!

The music is the strangest music I have ever heard in a film---by far! Most of it is a strange superimposition of one style over another, totally different style. For example, a really smooth soulful rhythm track that sounds like Shaft or Barney Miller will have a gypsy violin over it, and maybe some country picking, then the meter changes to the style of an oom pah pah band, but it still has the instruments from the smooth soulful rhythm track. Early on, it is just traditional movie score music, but very, very overly melodramatic (i.e., the Gone With the Wind orchestra style while they are in a suburban home). All the rest of it is a wildly eclectic mash-up of incompatible styles.

If you can see it for free, do it, you'll have fun.

This movie really missed the mark, but I'll say this:

If this movie had been twice as bad, it would be a runaway cult classic with kids dropping acid and laughing their asses off at midnight showings.

[–] mikessler 14 years ago

All I can say is that I haven't seen this movie since it came out 23 years ago and the music is one of the things I remember most about the film...along with the clowns.

Welcome to the 21st Century.
"Even in the future nothing works." - Spaceballs

[–] intexor 12 years ago

I think I'm in agreement because I liked the movie for its quirkyness. It's probably my James Belushi movie I've seen so far and the whole script is so far out there that I think it can only be hit or miss for people. For me it was hit (mind you, I wouldn't rate it above a 7 out of 10), it's so strange that I just kind of like it a lot.

I've probably stated this for about 50 movies in the past 2 months but I'm very glad to have TV channels like MGM or TCM. In my country it costs me a few extra money to watch them (not much at all though) and they offer me a whole selection of movies that are simply not available on DVD in my country or never shown on the popular channels. It's really broadening my movie knowledge, sometimes in a good way but sometimes also in a bad way. This is one of the good examples in my opinion. It's not perfect at all but I'm glad I've seen it.

[–] mail-2775 12 years ago

I'm very glad to have This TV in L.A. for the last 2-1/2 years, it has allowed me to see at least 100 films, many of which were great, that the industry wouldn't bother having on home video

[–] arentol 12 years ago

Actually it had a great story that was planned out very well and in great detail. So well in fact that, as intended, it leaves you with no idea what is really happening pretty much ever. This is intentional, the audience is intended to feel just as lost as Bob Wilson (John Ritter) while also at times convincing themselves they do know what is going on, like Bob Wilson. You can cause that effect on accident if you are a truly horrendous film maker, but to do it on purpose and make a good movie at the same time is almost impossible. But Dennis Feldman pulled it off, and did so with style. It is unfortunate that he fell apart after this movie with the mediocre Species series, but the stuff he wrote before it was really good... Just One Of The Guys, a classic high school movie that I think compares quite favorably to the stuff John Hughes was doing at the same time, and The Golden Child, also a great movie.

Personally I think Real Men has one of the top ten most well written comedy stories ever. It was way ahead of its time in terms of being both real and surreal at the same time. People like David Lynch and Bryan Fuller could learn a LOT from this movie and be greatly improved as film and TV show makers if they studied it in detail. Real men was set in totally normal environments, and stayed that way the entire time, yet at the same time nothing that happened in the movie was even vaguely realistic or normal. Trust me, it takes a certain genius to pull off a movie like this. The reality is that if you put this script in the hands of a famous and "great" director they might make a bigger hit out of it, but they would do so by simplifying things and making them more real, which would make it an entirely different movie and miss the genius of the story entirely.

[–] SpanishFlyman 12 years ago

I love this movie! I watched it dozens of times as a child!

Saw it for the first time in about 20 years last night, and the very first thing that came flooding back was, "Oh god...that music!"

But that wacky music just adds to it. It is a weird movie, and the weird music just adds to it!

[–] JackHammer69 11 years ago

I think people need to watch this movie at least 5 times before they form an opinion. I've seen it countless times since I saw it for the first time at the age of 13 or whenever it was... I'm 32 now.

When I was looking for a girlfriend, it was one of the movies I'd use to test her humour for longterm compatibility!

I don't really have too many favourite scenes, but I have heaps of favourite lines.

"DUCK! GET UP!"

"Stupid son of a b*tch walking around dressed like that just ASKING to be shot..."

"Who are those clowns?"

"Holeee SH*T, Clown attack!"

After being told he beat the entire clown unit (and taking out Hartman for the second time), "They never learn..."

The bar scene:
"That was MY seat."
You wohn' do somethin' about it?
"If I have to."
Uh we thought you'd left... Is your friend coming back?
"He MIGHT!"
Can we buy ya a drink?
"Don't you think if I wanted you to buy me a drink I woulda tolllld you to buy me a drink? HUHHH!! Get lost. You too."

[–] 11 years ago

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