POSSIBLY IN MICHIGAN (1983)

"Arthur longed for that sexual scent that smelled like home."

Unless you’re a highly paid film critic like myself, then there's little reason for you to sit through all of POSSIBLY IN MICHIGAN. Yeah, it’s only 12 minutes long (or 10:25 if you discount the end credits), but even then nothing cool happens after the first few minutes.

Two young women are at the mall doing a little shopping when they notice that they are being stalked by a creepy dude. Even worse...he’s not attractive! Barf. Instead of telling the suede/denim secret police that an uncool guy is breathing, they simply leave, but the unattractive guy follows them because he is longing “…for that sexual scent that smelled like home.” Sounds reasonable enough.

The first four minutes of POSSIBLY IN MICHIGAN are awesome and maybe even ahead of its time. Hell, I can’t think of anything off the top of my silly clowny clown clown head that was like it before 1983. That said, the rest of the film was like watching a recording of a boring dream that I forgot about because it was so boring.

As far as the story goes, I’m not even going to attempt to tell you what it means. I have no clue. The acting is what it is and the look of the film is fun to watch. Overall, I’m very happy that POSSIBLY IN MICHIGAN was made. (I was even fortunate enough recently to see it in a movie theater.) If you have a curious nature, then the first half is perfect enough to endure the boredom of the second half.

QUICKSILVER (1986)

Hot shot stock trader Kevin Bacon loses all of his money (and his parent’s duckets) in a bad business deal. He gets depressed and decides to become a hot shot bicycle messenger instead. The End.

While doing research for this review, I was kinda surprised to discover that QUICKSILVER was a box office dud back in 1986. For some reason, I thought it was popular movie. But nope, it stunk up the joint so bad that it didn’t even make its budget back. Fun fact: in its 3rd week of release, QUICKSILVER was only a few hundred grand ahead of BACK TO THE FUTURE which was in its 35th week. Yikes!

Anyway, box office poison or not, I enjoyed watching QUICKSILVER (in 2024) for the nostalgic value but can understand why it didn’t connect with audiences back in 1986: it’s way too serious, the stock market stuff didn’t even make any sense, the soundtrack was weak and there just wasn’t enough Kevin Bacon. Audiences were probably expecting some kind of FOOTLOOSE-style party movie with everyday man Kevin pedaling in and out of traffic showing off his tight buns while romancing a local rich girl who is too snooty to date a lowly bicycle messenger.  (Think, Billy Joel's 1983 music video for Uptown Girl.)  They also probably expected it to be set in New York City, because even though I saw this movie back in the 1980’s I still expected it to be set in NYC! I totally forgot that it was set in San Francisco.

Solid acting, disjointed story that’s too depressing, weak direction, a cool looking person in the art gallery scene that needed way more screentime, up and down pace, exciting bicycle scenes, stock market storyline that probably alienated some audience members, good supporting cast, a quick Michael Myers (from HALLOWEEN II) sighting, an even quicker Al Leong sighting, wall ads for CORRUPT (1983) and THE HUNGER (1983), a car sparking before it grinds against a wall, zero nudity, zero gore, two depressing scenes with Kevin's spiritbroken parents that were huge bummers, an interesting bicycle / ballet dancing scene early on that I wish had changed the tone of the movie into something more uplifting, a backyard dinner scene that kinda reminded me of the backyard dinner scenes from the Fast & Furious movies.

Worth a watch for Bacon completionists, but nothing to get overly excited about. I'd love to see a remake or reboot.