SCREWBALLS (1983)

Made at the height of the teen sex comedy boom of the early 80's, this Roger Corman produced comedy is so over the top that it's almost like a parody of other films like PORKY'S, H.O.T.S. and FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH.

Five male students of Taft & Adams High School (T&A get it?) make a pack that they are gonna see the hottest girl in school's tits before school is out.  Problem is the girl, Purity Busch, is a total tease.  So for the rest of the movie it's pretty much like a live action cartoon as these nerds pull off one absurd plan after another to see her topless.  A few examples would be hypnotism, posing as a teacher, hiding in the sand at the beach, sneaking into her house and so on.  Of course, when they're not chasing Purity Busch, they take out time to get busy at the drive-in, play strip bowling with some girls and go to a strip club.

As far as 80's teen sex comedies go, SCREWBALLS is alright.  The comedy is often more confusing than actually funny and very lowbrow (example: when an overweight girl gets horny there's a pig squealing sound effect played), but there is a nice amount of nudity.  Unfortunately, we never get to see any nudity from the main chick.  According to the commentary, her topless scene was done by a stand in.  Fucking lame.

Worth checking out if you're into 80's sex comedies.  Also, what was the time period of the story?  It almost seems like it was set in the 60's and at other times even the 50's, but at the drive-in they showed clips from two movies from the 70's?  Bizarre.

BROKEN ARROW (1996)

Stealth bomber pilots John Travolta and Christian Slater are on a practice mission flying around a desert in the western United States when Travolta tries to murder Slater and then ejects him so he can steal the two nuclear weapons on board.  From that point on, it's just these two numbnuts (and various unimportant bad guys) battling it out in the desert.  Only thing is, since it's a huge desert and the writing is so poor, they have to constantly telling each other their plans or they would never see each other ever again.  Also, they repeatedly get the other one dead to rights, but hold off long enough to smirk and let the other one get away!  At one point there is a fucking nuclear bomb counting down just a few feet away and Slater actually has a tire jack in his hand, cocked to cave in Travolta's skull, but he puts it down and punches him instead.  That kind of shit is enough to drive a logical person batty, but like any good train wreck you can't take your eyes off it. 

Travolta hams it up nonstop to the point where you begin to believe he's fucking with the audience, Slater gets a forest ranger sidekick, explosions all over the joint, lots of gunfire and not many people getting hit, zero nudity, overacting, helicopters exploding, train exploding, absolutely horrible boxing scene, cheesy special effects, slow motion overdose, shooting two guns at once.

Honestly, BROKEN ARROW is awful...but still a fun watch.  Hell, I own the damn thing.

RAISING CAIN (1992)

A child psychologist (Lithgow) takes a few years off to raise his daughter.  Sounds innocent enough, except for the fact that he's crazier than a shithouse rat (thanks to the severe abuse he suffered as a child).  Things get even worse when he finds out his wife is cheating on him.

Released just a year after THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, I suspect that the studio was wanting something more like that, but then when De Palma turned in this more challenging (both visually and in the storytelling) mind-bender he was pressured into changing it into a more straightforward narrative.  At least, that's what I've gathered from different interviews and articles over the years.

The official release though is still pretty good and although it's aged horribly it's a fun watch...Lithgow being creepy as fook, dream sequences, zero gore, very little blood, zero nudity, hardly any violence despite the gruesome subject matter, flashbacks, interesting visuals, nods to a bunch of different suspense films, 90's fashions, Cliff Clavin's mother,  90's cars, Satan awful looking 90's clocks, good supporting cast.

I've never been a fan of De Palma's style, but this is still an interesting time capsule of early 90's cinema.  I would love to see his original version.

If you need me, I'll be in my room watching Dexter season 4.