Forbidden Zone (1980)

Forbidden Zone (1980)

[7] Diminutive Herve Villechaize (TV's Fantasy Island) stars in this gift from cult movie heaven for which no summary could do justice, Forbidden Zone is a prolonged crash of the whacky and perverse. The utterly irreverent storyline tests my patience in…
Dune (1984)

Dune (1984)

[8] Dino DeLaurentiis foots the bill for this gravely ambitious film adaptation of Frank Herbert's classic sci-fi novel about the messianic rise of an off-lander who rallies a reclusive desert civilization in a fight against galactic takeover. Hot off The…
Maniac (1980)

Maniac (1980)

[7] More of a verite, psychological approach to the slasher genre than most of the '80s slasher windfall, William Lustig's Maniac rises above its exploitation roots by putting us inside the killer's mind and keeping us there, even as his sanity…
Xtro (1983)

Xtro (1983)

[4] As far as I could tell, Xtro is about a father who is abducted by aliens, then returned to his family as a strange alien-human hybrid. But I'm not sure. First, there's a weird crabby-looking monster in the woods,…
Alone in the Dark (1982)

Alone in the Dark (1982)

[6] After a city-wide blackout allows their escape, four criminal psychotics terrorize a new doctor and his family. The script is wobbly well into act three, and I'm not all too happy with how the escapees are characterized, but Alone…
Rocky IV (1985)

Rocky IV (1985)

[6] I know I'm being too kind to this over-produced piece of cheese, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy it at least a little bit. It falls short of all previous installments primarily because the justification…
Poltergeist III (1988)

Poltergeist III (1988)

[4] There really isn't a compelling reason for those ghosts to continue haunting poor little Carol Anne (Heather O'Rourke). But if it were a stand-alone movie outside a famous franchise, Poltergeist III might not have been half bad. There's inventive…
Beverly Hills Cop (1984)

Beverly Hills Cop (1984)

[7] This film and Top Gun are the ones that really launched the Simpson/Bruckheimer brand of action/comedy that would dominate the box office through the late 80s and 90s. (Even after Simpson's death in '96, Bruckheimer is still a top…
Blood Simple (1984)

Blood Simple (1984)

[8] The Coen Brothers broke onto the film scene with this claustrophobic mystery/thriller featuring Frances McDormand, John Getz, and Dan Hedaya in a murderous love triangle. M. Emmet Walsh complicates matters for all of them as a hitman for hire.…
The Bounty (1984)

The Bounty (1984)

[6] This Dino DeLaurentiis production of the infamous tale of mutiny welcomes more shades of gray into the characters of Captain Bligh and Fletcher Christian than the 1935 original film, though I wouldn't say it's a better film overall. Bligh…