Title: Class of 1984 (1982)
Director: Mark L. Lester
Cast: Roddy McDowell, Michael J. Fox, Timothy Van Patten, Perry King
Review:
The story is about a music teacher called Andrew Norris. He has just moved into a new town and is set to begin in a new high school called Lincoln High. What he doesn't know is that the new school is one that is ruled by a gang of evil punk rocker kids who sell drugs and bully and harass anyone who tries to mess with them. When Andrew tries to defy the gang and its leader Peter Stegman, a confrontation erupts between teacher and student. A confrontation that slowly develops into violence, rape and murder. Sounds like the type of school you want to send your kids too huh? On the DVD extras for this movie, which our good friends at Anchorbay Entertainment recently released, there's a very interesting documentary that covers some interesting details that went into making this film. They interviewed the cast and the director and they reveal lots of interesting little details that went into this production. In the doc, director Mark L. Lester goes on saying that Class of 1984 was a 'prophetic' film about how slowly but surely violence was going to escalate in public high schools to the point where it would be almost uncontrollable. Now in all honesty, I don't really think that while Mr. Lester was making his film he thought, "well I want to address this subject matter because it's a growing problem in our school and this could get out of hand". I believe his thoughts ran more along the lines of "Lets make a film that exploits the violence in schools! And well make tons of money of of it!" Now 20 something years later, he says that his film was prophetic and that the people didn't listen to his warning when they made this film. Puh-lease. I seriously believe Mr. Lester wasn't interested in warning anyone, he was more interested in making a violent shocking film that would make some dough. And it did. This movie was a hit when it first came out. And there's a couple of reasons for that.
Its got a good premise. Who doesn't want to see teachers going crazy because of the pressure of dealing with violent, psychopathic and disrespectful students? In one crucial moment in the film actor Roddy McDowell goes completely bonkers and pulls a gun on his students as he asks them questions from the lesson he had just given. If they get the answer wrong they die! A truly tense sequence that was exploited in the marketing campaign for this film, it was in the posters and in the trailers. It's a landmark image of a teacher truly loosing it. Of course it's a sequence made all the better thanks to Roddy Mc Dowells (Peter Vincet from Fright Night) performance.
Which brings me to another good point about this movie. The performances coming from some of the cast members were very good. Specially Roddy McDowell. That sequence I mention before plus another one where he completely breaks down psychologically and expresses his frustrations about not being able to teach anymore because of the students not caring. Or the scene where he goes berserk and tries to run down students with his car. The movie was greatly enhanced by Roddy. Of course there's a bunch of other extremely cheesy and just plain bad acting spread all through out.
The movie isn't a masterpiece by any standards but it's a fun film to watch. Specially when the teachers go insane. There's some gory fun to be had here when Andrew the good music teacher goes on a Deathwish/Charles Bronson type of revenge spree. Of course his actions can be considered a little extreme and unrealistic, but it all makes for some good bloody fun. Now don't get me wrong, the movie isn't really a bloodbath or particularly gory film, but it does have one really gory scene that I loved and that I wont spoil for you guys.
This movie actually feels like a watered down version of "A Clockwork Orange". One watch at Class of 1984 and you just know that director Mark L. Lester was going for a poor mans version of Kubrick's classic. Lets seethe students have their own weird jargon that only they understand and the leader of the gang is an extremely unstable and violent guy who just happens to love classical music just like Malcom McDowell's Alex D Large did in Clock Work. So be on the look out for some heavy parallels to that movie.
All in all, this was a fun film to watch because of its violence, its over the top situations and its villains. Lets face it, those teenagers were a bunch of evil little runts who deserved some type of punishment, maybe not as severe as what they got, but they needed to be taught a lesson alright. Anyhows, I'm now looking forward to seeing Class of 1999 which I saw when it first came out but don't remember anything about except that the teachers were robots and that Pamela Grier is in it. Class of 1999 was also directed by Mark L. Lester. Lets see if its as "prophetic" as Class of 1984 and maybe sometime soon we will see Robot Teachers who shoot missiles from their breasts. Here's hoping! Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5 P.S. Be on the lookout for a very young Michael J. Fox in one of his first movie roles playing the "good kid" amongst all the evil punk rockers. Also you can groove to Alice Coopers "I am the future" since it is part of the soundtrack of the film.
Director: Mark L. Lester
Cast: Roddy McDowell, Michael J. Fox, Timothy Van Patten, Perry King
Review:
The story is about a music teacher called Andrew Norris. He has just moved into a new town and is set to begin in a new high school called Lincoln High. What he doesn't know is that the new school is one that is ruled by a gang of evil punk rocker kids who sell drugs and bully and harass anyone who tries to mess with them. When Andrew tries to defy the gang and its leader Peter Stegman, a confrontation erupts between teacher and student. A confrontation that slowly develops into violence, rape and murder. Sounds like the type of school you want to send your kids too huh? On the DVD extras for this movie, which our good friends at Anchorbay Entertainment recently released, there's a very interesting documentary that covers some interesting details that went into making this film. They interviewed the cast and the director and they reveal lots of interesting little details that went into this production. In the doc, director Mark L. Lester goes on saying that Class of 1984 was a 'prophetic' film about how slowly but surely violence was going to escalate in public high schools to the point where it would be almost uncontrollable. Now in all honesty, I don't really think that while Mr. Lester was making his film he thought, "well I want to address this subject matter because it's a growing problem in our school and this could get out of hand". I believe his thoughts ran more along the lines of "Lets make a film that exploits the violence in schools! And well make tons of money of of it!" Now 20 something years later, he says that his film was prophetic and that the people didn't listen to his warning when they made this film. Puh-lease. I seriously believe Mr. Lester wasn't interested in warning anyone, he was more interested in making a violent shocking film that would make some dough. And it did. This movie was a hit when it first came out. And there's a couple of reasons for that.
Its got a good premise. Who doesn't want to see teachers going crazy because of the pressure of dealing with violent, psychopathic and disrespectful students? In one crucial moment in the film actor Roddy McDowell goes completely bonkers and pulls a gun on his students as he asks them questions from the lesson he had just given. If they get the answer wrong they die! A truly tense sequence that was exploited in the marketing campaign for this film, it was in the posters and in the trailers. It's a landmark image of a teacher truly loosing it. Of course it's a sequence made all the better thanks to Roddy Mc Dowells (Peter Vincet from Fright Night) performance.
Which brings me to another good point about this movie. The performances coming from some of the cast members were very good. Specially Roddy McDowell. That sequence I mention before plus another one where he completely breaks down psychologically and expresses his frustrations about not being able to teach anymore because of the students not caring. Or the scene where he goes berserk and tries to run down students with his car. The movie was greatly enhanced by Roddy. Of course there's a bunch of other extremely cheesy and just plain bad acting spread all through out.
The movie isn't a masterpiece by any standards but it's a fun film to watch. Specially when the teachers go insane. There's some gory fun to be had here when Andrew the good music teacher goes on a Deathwish/Charles Bronson type of revenge spree. Of course his actions can be considered a little extreme and unrealistic, but it all makes for some good bloody fun. Now don't get me wrong, the movie isn't really a bloodbath or particularly gory film, but it does have one really gory scene that I loved and that I wont spoil for you guys.
This movie actually feels like a watered down version of "A Clockwork Orange". One watch at Class of 1984 and you just know that director Mark L. Lester was going for a poor mans version of Kubrick's classic. Lets seethe students have their own weird jargon that only they understand and the leader of the gang is an extremely unstable and violent guy who just happens to love classical music just like Malcom McDowell's Alex D Large did in Clock Work. So be on the look out for some heavy parallels to that movie.
All in all, this was a fun film to watch because of its violence, its over the top situations and its villains. Lets face it, those teenagers were a bunch of evil little runts who deserved some type of punishment, maybe not as severe as what they got, but they needed to be taught a lesson alright. Anyhows, I'm now looking forward to seeing Class of 1999 which I saw when it first came out but don't remember anything about except that the teachers were robots and that Pamela Grier is in it. Class of 1999 was also directed by Mark L. Lester. Lets see if its as "prophetic" as Class of 1984 and maybe sometime soon we will see Robot Teachers who shoot missiles from their breasts. Here's hoping! Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5 P.S. Be on the lookout for a very young Michael J. Fox in one of his first movie roles playing the "good kid" amongst all the evil punk rockers. Also you can groove to Alice Coopers "I am the future" since it is part of the soundtrack of the film.