Prepare for a 90 minute penis measuring contest.

Donkey: There are few relationships that are more interesting than that of the coworker. Much like family, whom you have no choice but to allow a certain level of access into your life merely because somewhere along the line two people shot out of the same woman’s crotch, coworkers are usually uninvited participants in your life that, more often than not, simply don’t deserve the amount of company that you are forced to keep with them. In those very rare best cases they can turn out to be lifelong friends, while in the worst cases, sworn enemies with whom you’ll battle until the end of time. But most of them fall in that broad category of mildly irritating people that you would simply never choose to purposely spend 40 hours of your life with each week. When looking back on their quirks and exploits with the safety of hindsight, they can be a truly hilarious. I’ve met some real classics in my time, like the fellow cook whom on my last day on the job before returning to university thought that the best way to send me off was to try to convince me to go behind the restaurant’s dumpster and smoke crack with him (an interesting side note: I went on to get a degree and last I checked, he’s still actually in that dumpster). But during the time when you’re actually spending all your days with these people, they can make you so blisteringly angry that you strongly consider the merits of a forced sterilization program to be carried out with a dull butter knife strapped to a malfunctioning Weed Whacker. And we’ve all had them, whether it’s that middle aged guy that calls endless meetings that seem to have no other purpose than to show off the fact that he knows how to use PowerPoint, the cocky young fuck who insists on using buzz terms like “leverage”, “synergy”, and “ruptured hemorrhoids”, or that older woman who forgoes any semblance of showering in favor of apparently swimming laps in a pool of perfume every day, making her smell like an outhouse threw up while going down on a fucking garbage truck, giving you the added bonus of making sure that her stench will linger long after she’s actually left the building.

So as we sit back and enjoy Tango & Cash, a tale of two disgruntled coworkers, won’t you join me in recalling all those people that you’ve worked with over the many years with fond regard and just take comfort in one small comfort: Thank God I never had a gun.

The Plot:

Donkey: Despite sounding like a cleverly disguised brothel or possibly the next televised dancing competition serving as an intravenous lifeline to briefly sustain the inevitably terminal social relevance of some obscure celebrities or disgraced Texas Congressmen (CAUTION: Modern science has proven that watching the eye-raping hip gyrations of Tom DeLay for 30 seconds will cause complete testicular ascension and/or nuclear taint explosion. We cannot endorse witnessing this event under any circumstances.), Tango & Cash is actually one of the critical pioneers of yet another action movie cliché of the 80’s: the buddy-cop film. But unlike its more notable forbearers such as Lethal Weapon, 48 Hours, or possibly Cops & Robbersons, this film has the courage to dismiss the successful formula of pairing two completely different character types together that answers the age old question of “what would The Odd Couple be like if they were heavily armed?”. Instead the studio executives involved in this film apparently held a marathon 30 second brainstorming session where they concluded, “Hey, you know what would go with kick ass? An equal or greater amount of kick ass! BRILLIANT!”

Enter Sylvester “Tango” Stallone and Kurt “Cash” Russell. One is a take-no-prisoners cop who breaks all the rules in search of justice, discount sporting goods, and 45 caliber boners, while the other is…um…yeah pretty much the exact same thing. So what is the difference between the two, you ask? The answer is simple: Personal grooming. Stallone is the prissy button-down, banker-looking, possibly gay cop from the rich part of town, while Russell is the blue collar, mullet-sporting, possibly gay cop from the city’s mean streets. But working separately for years, they each become prominent enough to earn not only their own personal pride parade floats, but also the attention of Jack Palance, the haggard figurehead of the LA crime scene. In an attempt to neutralize them, as they’re apparently the only two productive cops in the entire city of LA, our heroes and are set up for a crime that they didn’t commit. Locked in a viper pit of convicts that they themselves arrested in the first place, our heroes become unwilling partners as they must join forces to break out of prison and wreak their unholy vengeance upon those that set them up. It’s all perfectly bad ass as long as you happen to forget that killing people by the boatload when you’re escaped felons isn’t exactly legal.

The Case for Greatness (aka The Lowlights):

Donkey: Unlike most of our adventures into the land of pain and despair captured on film, this entry is polite enough to prepare us for the ordeal ahead by beginning with an ominous warning. Just as the Warner Brothers logo fades away from the screen, the disembodied voice of Sylvester Stallone mutters, “Okay, let’s do it” while in no way sounding like he has a mouthful of goat semen. This might as well have been followed by the sound of rubber gloves snapping onto his hands while he asks me to touch my ankles, because at this point it seems pretty clear to me that I’m going to feel like a finger has been up my ass by the time this movie is done.

Exhibit A: The Good, The Bad, & Unnecessary Self-Promotion

Sure it may seem like he's putting himself in mortal danger, but every truck driver knows that even a rig is no match for the sheer girth of the 1989 Chrysler Le Baron.

As one may expect from any hero-based story, our festivities begin with an introduction to our main characters. And as anyone who has followed along through our exploits thus far would expect, those introductions are goddamn ridiculous. Thus we begin with Stallone, playing the part of Ray Tango. We see him for the first time as he’s chasing a runaway rig down a long desert highway, just as he dismisses his police helicopter backup in favor of a much better tactic: engaging the rig in a high impact game of chicken using goddamn face. Yes, he speeds off past the truck and into the distance before slamming his car to a halt, getting out, and standing in the middle of the damn road. At that point, with either too much courage or too little brain function to acknowledge that he is likely about to become a steroid-filled red blotch to be casually removed by windshield wipers, he calmly pulls his gun and faces the rig as it slowly bears down on him. He fires a few shots into the windshield and front tires as it gets closer, prompting the criminals inside the truck’s cab to declare that “this guy’s crazy!” But instead of putting their heads down, hitting the accelerator, and giving Tango a 90 MPH makeover, the thugs instead decide that the smartest thing to do in this situation is to slam on the breaks, bringing the rig skidding to a halt conveniently within 10 feet of their target. Then after a few awkward seconds, the two thugs suddenly come crashing through the windshield of the truck and land at Tango’s feet, almost making it seem like they didn’t fly out as a result of their sudden stop so much as a sincere and overwhelming desire to hump Stallone’s leg. This, of course, sets him up for his first epic line of the movie:

Stallone: “Glad you could drop in.”

Man, I'm glad we actually came to a stop. That was rough. Say, do you want to go get a coffee? No? Well how about....WAAAHHHHH!!!!!

Once the rest of the police force, including his captain (played by a familiar face that just happens to belong to the dude who was Frank in Double Impact) finally arrives on the scene, they all demand to know what’s going on, claiming that they can’t find anything illegal on the truck. When Tango explains that this truck is running coke, the other cops scoff, dismissing him as “a city guy” and demanding to know who he thinks he is. A “city guy”? How fucking far did he chase this truck? Do cops in the furthest suburbs of LA think their days of ticketing soccer moms give them some kind of hardcore street cred over the downtown forces, or did he actually chase these assholes all the way to Alabama? But before he can respond, another cop chimes in, setting up Stallone’s second epic line and what might be the single greatest moment in the movie:

Random Sans-Mustache-Ergo-He’s-Not-Bad-Ass Cop: “He thinks he’s Rambo.”

Stallone: “Rambo is a pussy.”

But wait…that’s him! Stallone just essentially called himself a pussy! HA! That’s so goddamn meta that it feels like Sly completely broke through the fourth wall just so that he could stab me in the eye with his junk! I haven’t seen that kind of completely unnecessary self promotion since Julia Roberts played Julia Roberts in Ocean’s Twelve, which may be the single biggest moment of ego masturbation in cinematic history. And with everyone standing in stunned silence, Tango pulls out his gun and fires on the truck’s cargo tank, gambling that it’s not actually filled with a flammable substance whose eruption would destroy them all (even though he was told that it was only seconds earlier). But of course, it begins to spout a stream of coke. Take that, other cops! Today we spell redemption T…A…No, seriously, did he just reference his own character from another movie?! Fuck me.

A mullet AND aviators? Goddamn. This guy couldn't be any more 80's cop if his life were soundtracked by Banarama.

While that extreme cornholing of our collective psyches would suffice for most other movies, this film then has the balls to go back for some psychological sloppy seconds, courtesy of Kurt Russell, playing the part of Gabriel Cash. He rolls into the film on his way home from work, accompanied by some surprisingly and rather inappropriately whimsical music. Seriously, the score for this scene sounds like it should be the theme song for a dancing purple dinosaur with questionable motives rather than for a relentless killing machine whose sole function in life is to perform involuntary steel-toed boot lobotomies. After walking into his apartment, looking forward to a quiet evening of red wine, bubble baths, and Brazilian Fart porn, he stands reading the paper in his kitchen when someone bursts out of a closet and shoots him in the chest a couple of times. It seems like it may be the shortest role in action movie history as Kurt is blasted out a window and onto his fire escape, but mere bullets are no match for his glorious mullet powers. Cash quickly fires a gun strapped to his boot, causing his Asian assailant to flee. And since this movie is basically dares you to find any common sense in it, the assailant forgoes the easy route of, say, the front fucking door and instead jumps out a second story window where he bounces of a car, landing with such ease as to suggest that the feat were less physically taxing than an underwater jazzercise session at your local seniors’ home, before hauling ass down the street. In hot pursuit, Cash ends up engaging this Asian bloke in a tired and predictable chase scene, somewhat reminiscent of Big Trouble In Little China, where the two of them run into a parking garage only to have the assailant steal a truck and attempt to hit Cash with it. But after jumping out of the way, rather than just declaring that the son of a bitch must pay, Kurt instead commandeers a vehicle of his own and begins a vehicular game of tag. After a few moments of sheer boredom, the movie tries to get our attention by showing that the chase is causing enough commotion for two people to stop fucking in the back seat of a car long enough to sit up and see what’s going on, giving us a completely unnecessary titty shot. Moments later, the scene finally comes to an end when the Asian aggressor crashes his truck long enough that Cash has the chance to pounce and be arrest him.

Just to prove that our heroes don’t corner the market on abject stupidity, the introduction to the film’s third pivotal player, an aging crime lord played by Mr. Napier himself, Jack Palance, also stumbles onto the screen with all the grace of a three-legged hippopotamus with an inner ear infection. Back on the highway where Tango had brought the rig full of coke to a hilariously retarded stop, we see a limousine pass by the crime scene that police are frantically establishing around the truck. That limousine is hauling Captain Wheezy and his mini-boss subordinates, the heads of two local crime families, James Hong (the Chinese guy who has literally played every Asian guy in every movie made since 1964) and some random dude that is destined to have a bright career in hemorrhoid infomercials. Palance looks out the window at his confiscated shipment of coke and curses the names of Tango and Cash, declaring them the proverbial crotch fungus that itches his balls, and vows to his delegates that he will do something to fix the problem. If you guessed that this is foreshadowing to him finding a way to give them herpes, you’re incorrect, but award yourself 100 bonus points for coming up with a scheme no more fucktarded than his turns out to be.

They say crime never sleeps and that may be true, but judging by these villains, at the very least it takes a break to hit the Early Bird special at the Country Kitchen Buffet.

Exhibit B: Who Could Have Guessed That Being Reckless Dicks Would One Day Backfire?

So young, so naive...before she was raped by the unstoppable handsome of Dean Cain. Damn you, Dean.

With our introductions complete, both cops return to their respective offices, too busy basking in the glow of their own self-satisfaction to notice they’ve becoming entangled in the first threads of a web of deception. It begins at the Beverly Hills office, where Tango takes a break from lecturing his stock broker and then his younger sister (played by Teri Hatcher before anyone knew, forgot, and then remembered who Teri Hatcher was) to quickly chat with his captain. After being asked why a rich wanker who dresses like a banker would bother working as a cop, Tango delivers a single word response: “Action”. Seriously? That might be recorded history’s fourth worst reason to be a cop, falling just behind “free handjobs from hookers”, “penance for all those children buried in my backyard”, and “I’m Batman”. Are there honestly no flags that go up in anyone’s mind when someone in the LAPD says they’re just in it to shoot people? That whole Rodney King thing makes a whole lot more sense every day. But instead of being horrified, Tango’s captain simply shakes his head and tells him about a drug deal that in supposedly going down that night. Tango, mentally cancelling his plans to dress up like Dame Edna, put on some Joan Jett, and dry hump his favorite Popple, declares that he’ll be there. Meanwhile, across town in the slums, Cash arrives back in his police station to a heroes welcome, which when you’re a bad ass from the mean streets means that you’ve earned a reception somewhere between passive indifference and flat out mockery. After acknowledging his greatness by mentally smelling his own armpits while remembering all the times he gave nerds a swirly in a high school toilet, he jumps straight into investigating the case of “who made the reservations for me at Chateau Dirt Nap?” He begins by bursting into the station’s washroom where he finds his Asian attacker is being carefully guarded while taking a piss. Despite being warned that this guy doesn’t speak English, Cash dismisses the other cops for some private time so that he can lay the Asian dude out on the floor and put a chair across his throat, demanding to know who is trying to kill him. But the answers that he gets are in the form of details of a drug deal, which just so happens to be the same drug deal that Tango will be showing up for that night. Call Admiral Akbar and check for an Adam’s apple because I smell a trap!

Had this dude not relented, Cash was prepared to deploy the harshest of interrogation techniques: the Hot Carl.

That fateful night begins at the industrial meat locker/failed discount electronics retail outlet that serves as Jack Palance’s hidden base, where he meets with his two associates to reveal his master plan just before its to be put into motion. He explains that merely killing Tango and Cash would not only be the quick and easy thing to do, but it would be the only solution that actually makes any goddamn sense if you don’t end all your sentences with an ampersand and long, sardine-flavored belch. So naturally, he’s not going to do that. Instead Jack declares that their revenge should be much more diabolically dim-witted. He pulls out two mice to convey his point, stuffing them into a large glass maze while describing his plan as holding “a game that only we can win” before yammering on about a massive shipment of drugs and guns. At this point the details really aren’t that important, as any man that constructs a giant maze for two mice just to explain a very basic plan to two of his subordinates is obviously a few Fruit Rollups short of a molester van.

He's either supposed to have an English or an Australian accent in this movie. It doesn't really matter though, since he just ends up sounding like he's gargling balls the whole time.

With that completely redundant moment of grandiose illustration at an end, the movie then turns to a dark building where we watch the master plan unfold. Tango and Cash arrive on the scene separately, each thinking that they’ll be wading into the darkness to bust up a major drug deal. At this point it’s entirely necessary to point out that apparently neither of them has the common sense of even the most mentally challenged of police officers, who wouldn’t dream of trying to break up so much as a Magic: The Gathering card exchange between two high school students without a full SWAT backup. I mean, there’s being brave and then there’s just being Darwin-award winning stupid. At best – AT BEST – if that drug deal only consisted of two men exchanging two briefcases, they’re still both likely to be armed, which still means that they outnumber and outgun one damn cop. So really, at this point they both deserve to die. Regardless, after catching sight of Jack Palance’s head goon, a man that we’ll simply call Dr. Flint GiggleTrousers, played by the dude from Blade Runner who joined Rutger Hauer on a quest to ask his creator about incept dates and why the hell he was designed without a chin, our heroes begin running around the dark building in futile pursuit. Eventually, after sneaking around just long enough to suck all entertainment value out of the scene, our heroes finally meet face to face with one another. But rather than being happy that they’re not about to meet certain death alone, they immediately start a pissing contest before running off and storming into the room that they suspect the deal is going down in. But rather than the deal, they instead walk in to find a lone dude who happens to be wearing a wire slumped over dead in a chair. And before the two champions of steel can figure out what the hell is going on, cops suddenly flood into the room around them, led by an FBI agent. After establishing that they’re all cops, one of the officers notices a gun on the floor behind our two heroes. When he picks it up, Cash identifies it as his gun, which had been stolen from his locker. This is another one of those situations where actually following the correct procedure and filling out the paperwork saying that your gun was stolen might have actually really helped, rather than just doing the equivalent of screaming “WHO STOLE MY GUN?” at a ham sandwich.

That's right, now you show us yours. Um...yeah...badge. That's what we meant. Badge. Totally. No one said penis.

As Tango and Cash are swiftly arrested on suspicion of murder, their fate is sealed when a doctored audio tape is delivered to the cops by the evil Dr. Flint GiggleTrousers. On it, a fake conversation between Tango, Cash, and the dead dude that was found in the chair details a situation where our heroes were attempting to sell confiscated drugs when they decided to execute the dude instead and, one can only presume, snort about 17 pounds of coke between them. With this damning evidence coming to the light of day, our boys are quickly taken to trial where a lineup of people come out of the woodwork to testify against them, including an audio expert who verifies the authenticity of the tape. With no chance to clear their name in sight, Tango and Cash enter a plea of guilty, hoping to get as little as 18 months in a minimum security prison. But of course, Jack Palance has other plans for them…

Exhibit C: Stop! Or My Ass Will Chafe!

After pleading guilty and bringing their trial to a shocking end, when Cash eloquently says that the entire proceeding fucking sucks, our heroes of glory and ball sweat are sentenced to serve time in their sought after minimum security facility. But of course, this wouldn’t be much of a movie if they spent 18 months sipping 20 year old Scotch while playing croquet with CEO’s caught misappropriating funds, so instead they soon find themselves being unloaded at a maximum security prison. And as their respective captains receive word that they didn’t arrive at the facility they were expected at and begin to search for their whereabouts, Tango and Cash do what all of us would naturally do upon we realizing that we’ve been mistakenly thrown into a cutthroat den of sodomy, and jump straight into the shower. If nothing else this gives us a completely unnecessary ass shot of the two of them, presuming that someone actually wants to see that, before they stand around arguing about who it was that has managed to frame them so successfully. And once they’re finished polishing up their sweet ruby starfishes and spent an unnecessarily long period of time pointing out how small each other’s dicks are, Tango and Cash are finally marched into their cells in general population where they are greeted with a hale of litter and flaming shit. Things don’t get much better once they are finally stuffed into their cells either, as Cash quickly discovers that he is bunking up with a huge black guy who looks like he could forcefully remove a pair of pants from an unwilling victim using no more effort than it would take to crack open a box of Shreddies, while Tango finds himself staring down the face of pure evil in his new cellmate…Clint Howard? What the fuck?

Since jumping directly into the shower was already stupid enough, the boys figure they might as well practice their rendition of Guys And Dolls.

What mousse do you use, because I just can't seem to get that kind of bounce.

Undoubtedly wondering if their days of actually making noise when they fart will soon be coming to an end, T&C settle down for their first night in prison. But the inevitable soon rears its ugly head when they’re both dragged from their cells and tossed down a laundry chute together. They slide down what one has to imagine is at least a couple of stories before finally landing hard, head first, on a cement floor with miraculously few adverse affects only to find themselves surrounded by a room full of thugs. At this point it definitely seems like they are not going to be the only things forcibly thrust into a chute tonight. But just as they try to formulate a futile strategy that they can only hope might result in them being raped the least, Jack Palance calls out from the shadows, unable to resist gloating over the hell that he is subjecting his enemies to while still remaining safely anonymous. Instead they end up facing his henchman, Dr. Flint GiggleTrousers, as he steps in front of Tango and Cash just long enough to wave a straight razor around their throats before setting the pack of drooling sodomites on them. Undaunted, Dance Slippers and Hard Currency start kicking as much ass as they can manage until they’re finally overrun. Hung up with heavy industrial chains over a couple of tubs of water, our heroes are then threatened with electrocution, as an electrical line is waved causally around the water at their feet. But before the villains can finish the job, prison guards suddenly bring the festivities to a halt. And before we can ask why the hell the guards, who were clearly bought off for this trap to have been set up in the first place, would bother to break things up, we learn that the assistant warden is an old friend of Cash.

After their narrow escape from death by severe rectal bleeding, Ballroom and Loose Change meet with their assistant warden ally only to be warned that they have no choice but to escape, as he won’t be able to save their puckered virgin asses for much longer. He ends up showing them blueprints for the prison ventilation system, outlining the one shaft that they could use for their getaway. He promises to leave all the supplies they’ll need just outside its entrance while having the giant fans blocking their path shut down at a certain time, giving them a small window for victory. With those plans in place, Cash visits Tango’s cell just before their scheduled moment of destiny, asking him to come along for garbage detail…wink, wink. But with their freedom almost within their grasps, Tango refuses to go, concluding that this whole scheme is obviously going to be a trap. Being a consummate team player, Cash simply deems Tango to be an idiot and leaves him behind.

Oh hey, shit, there's Waldo!

Quite used to going it alone, like a middle-aged Kinkos night manager with a Babylon 5 t-shirt collection and a waistline expanding faster than a muskrat trying to birth a Buick, Cash attempts to carry on with the slapdash escape plan only to discover that – hey, guess what? – It really is a goddamn trap. He busts into the ventilation system to find the giant fans turned off and the supplies left for him as expected, but with one added surprise: the assistant warden with a throat so sore, courtesy of a hunting knife, that even Robitussin would fail to provide any relief. Or as Cash describes it to Tango, “they cut his throat from ear to ear. Know what I mean?” No, actually, I don’t. What you just said leaves so much room for interpretation. Could you describe that a little less literally, perhaps in the form of a sonnet? And just as guards and prisoners alike come in to spring the trap, the giant fans behind Cash are powered back on, ensuring that there is no escape. But moments later, after nearly falling into the spinning blades of death and being copped into a mullet-sporting pile of coleslaw that would likely have been sprayed all over his fellow inmates, one of the fans suddenly grinds to a stop. Cash looks up in amazement to find Tango on the other side waiting for him. If you, like us, are wondering how the fuck Tango managed to get on the other side of that fan, then be prepared to be screaming at your TV in futility because there’s no answer coming. He just did, motherfuckers, and that’s all you need to know.

In the dark AND the rain? Pfffttt...maybe if you're a pussy. Real men would make this jump while on fire.

The two heroes make their way down the proscribed escape route with guards on their tails, until they finally arrive on a rooftop after scrambling through a random and unnecessary tube and weaving through a small power station that’s spitting sparks in their faces as rain falls around them. Faced with one last obstacle while their freedom stares back at them, Cash gets the most brilliant idea born unto humankind since someone thought to add bacon flavoring to mayonnaise: he runs and leaps off the roof, loops his belt over a power line that’s hanging just far enough away that while physically possible to make the jump, their odds of successfully probably wouldn’t be much worse if they just waited for Falkor the Luck Dragon to swoop down and carry them to safety, and zip lines his way over the prison’s gates where he falls to safety. After watching Cash go first and contemplating whether or not to follow his path of stupidity, Tango is just about to make the leap for himself when an old friend – the driver of the rig that he stopped at the beginning of the movie – pop’s up and stops him. They grapple for a while, fighting both each other and the utter pointlessness of the scene until Tango finally tosses him back into the power station to meet a shocking end, quite literally. With nothing left to stop him, Tango finally takes the Slip-And-Slide routeto safety, joining Cash just beyond the prison walls.

Exhibit D: Wonder Twin Power Activate! Form Of…Tranny!

After successfully pulling off the nearly unheard of feat of breaking out of a maximum security prison using nothing but an intense love of urban gardening and the power of teamwork, our dashing heroes of strength and genital warts do what is obviously the most appropriate course of action and decide to immediately go their separate ways. But before we think that they might die alone, leading hollow and closeted lives while lamenting that they had taken the time to learn how to quit the other, Tango explains that if Cash wants to find him, he just needs to look up his sister, who will in turn lead Cash to him. Meanwhile, back at Chez Palance, Sergent Bronchitis meets with his subordinates via shitty 80′s video conference, assuring them that everything is under control. And…that’s it. But this scene, which takes about 20 seconds, is quite indicative of every damn scene in this movie involving Jack Palance. With very few exceptions, he basically shows up just long enough to rub his nipples in delight over his own genius in front of his two pet crime family bosses while assuring them that everything is going according to plan. They could have shot his entire roll in this movie within a day, which is coincidentally about how long it takes to forget that he was ever in it.

Meeting adjourned, gentlemen. The doors are opening in a few minutes and I have to sell some of these TVs today or this Circuit City will close in a month.

Now that our unbridled heroes are back on the street, they waste no time in beginning the process of cracking skulls while undoubtedly engaging in some inappropriate fondling in search of those that set them up. First Tango visits the FBI agent who led that raiding party that arrested them on that fateful night, whom in turn admits that he was bought off to set them up rather easily before trying to escape, only to climb into the car in his garage and be blown to Receding Hairline Hell by a car bomb. Meanwhile, after visiting Owen, a friend in the crime lab, and loading up with guns, Cash visits the voice analysis expert that testified as to the authenticity of the forged tape that served as damning evidence against them. Within seconds he too admits ridiculously easily that he was paid off and offers a recording of the conversation he had when receiving instructions on how to frame them.

Now before you see some tits, who wants to hear me play Tom Sawyer?

With that incredibly minor amount of detective work done, Cash decides that it’s time to reunite with his begrudging partner in crime, so he journeys to the dance club that Tango’s sister works at. Of course, it turns out that she’s a stripper, so we get to watch Teri Hatcher dance. Or at least I think that’s dancing. Either that or this club has hired Teri Hatcher to do a performance piece on the dangers of epilepsy. Or perhaps she believes that she can fight off HIV with spastic contortions. Who knows? All I know is these Corn Chips are delicious. But just as Cash and Teri make their first eye contact and share a spark that could be due to attractive, recognition, or severe gastrointestinal pain, which is just before she starts playing random giant drums (what kind of fucking strip show is this?!), cops arrive on the scene. Not ready to return to prison and be forced to eat more luke warm cream corn or undercooked mashed potatoes, Cash dodges them by making his way backstage where Teri meets him and introduces herself. Looking for a way to sneak him past the converging cops and get him the hell out of that, she takes him into the stripper change room, giving us gratuitous titty shot numero dos. Moments later, the two of them strolls out of a back door and past a group of officers with Cash dressed in drag and following behind Teri Hatcher, looking less like a woman than George Burns in a cocktail dress. As the two of them climb onto a motorcycle, one of the randoms cops suggests that they have themselves a freaky three way. After getting two cigarettes flipped at him as a response, the cops shakes his head and concludes quite loudly that since these two women didn’t immediately jump at the chance to be disappointed by all two of the weapons in his sexual arsenal, they must be a couple of “dykes on bikes”. Awesome.

All I can think of right now is the female Gremlin from Gremlins 2: The New Batch.

After their successful getaway, Cash and Teri Hatcher end up back at her place where she gives him a back massage. And of course, just as she really gets him moaning in delight, Tango slides in through the front door and immediately thinks that Cash is plowing his sister. But as he sits back and contemplates the moral implications of making a Chinese finger trap out of a family member, he sees the shadow of someone hanging around on the patio. And unlike fucking his sister, loitering is something that he just cannot abide. Swiftly jumping into action, Tango dives through the patio door only to find that it’s Mr. Lahey, his own captain. As Cash and Teri Hatcher come out to see what the hell is going on, the predictable “I can’t believe you’re banging my sister” argument begins on the lawn, only to be interrupted moments later when Tango’s captain informs them that they’ve only got another 24 hours before the whole department is going to be on their ass as the feds have taken over the case of finding them. Realizing that it’s time to get down to business, Cash hands over the tape that he got from the voice analyst, and in return the captain gives them the address of a one Dr. Flint GiggleTrousers. That’s right. Strap in. It’s on now, bitches.

Exhibit E: The Best Revenge Is Living Well. Oh, Except For Maybe Killing Everyone. That’s Kind Of Better. But After That, It’s Living Well.

After a painfully unnecessary and awkward attempt at a bonding moment between brother and sister, Cha Cha and Coin Purse finally get down to the business of exacting their brutal revenge. They arrive on the scene of Dr. Flint GiggleTrousers’ apartment, where Cash bursts in to catch his prey off guard, preferably half way through dropping a deuce. Instead he finds the evil henchmen ready with an ambush of his own and ends up looking down the business end of a gun barrel. But just as all seems lost, Tango pulls the old double whammy and pops up just behind the villain, putting a gun to his head. From there they take the goon up to the roof for interrogation time, hanging Dr. GiggleTrousers over the side of the building by his feet. But when he still refuses to divulge either the identity of Jack Palance, the man who has set them up, or the recipe for his signature spinach dip, our heroes change tactics and instead opt to tie Flint up and strap a grenade to his face while playing the world’s most transparent game of good cop/bad cop. But of course something this simple is enough to make the supposedly hardened criminal not only break, but also piss himself as he finally relents and gives them Palance’s name.

Not wanting to say anything to ruin the tension, Cash suddenly remembered that this was actually his grenade filled with Reese's Pieces.

With the identity of their enemy finally known to them, Macarena and Small Bills decide that it’s time to suit up and kick some ancient, wrinkly, and most likely soiled ass. But before they can do that, they know that for an idiotic job, they’re going to need some idiotic equipment. So with an ideal friend to turn to, they once again visit Owen in the crime lab, cementing his role as this movie’s Down syndrome version of Q from the 007 series. He begrudgingly issues our boys a shitty SUV equipped with ridiculous guns plastered all over it and an onboard computer that would rival the finest Collecovision that you could find in your local flea market. Looking at this monstrosity, one has to hope that Chez Palance is within a 1o mile radius, or these assholes are going to have to gas up about 4 or 5 times. Seriously, that thing looks like it gets about 3 feet to the gallon.

The only way that this truck could possibly make them look like bigger douches: a bumper sticker saying "Honk If You're Horny".

After presumably making those dozen refueling/Skittles and Big Gulp refill stops, Tango and Cash soon find themselves overlooking the Palanace compound, surveying the dangers that lay ahead. With their moment of destiny finally facing them, the boys mount up and launch their assault, thus beginning the epic final battle. After bursting through the front gates and racing around with no discernable pattern or strategy, they end up being chased by random trucks and dune buggies (wait…dune buggies?…yes, dune buggies) in a scene that basically consists of a shitty demolition derby highlighted by an absolutely ridiculous amount of arbitrary explosions. The climax finally comes when our champions eventually come face to face with a goddamn Bigfoot truck, which is just indescribably stupid. Who the fuck actually owns a goddamn Bigfoot truck? And why is that in a crime lord’s compound? Do they actually think that fucking thing is practical, or is Palance just making sure that he’s prepared in the off chance that he has to entertain an arena full of rednecks? At this point Cash reveals that they’re almost out of gas, which makes sense considering that they have been driving around for about 4 minutes. So either my predictions on their fuel economy is dead right, or they were too fucking stupid to actually fill up before arriving on the scene. Regardless, they continue to take out everything around them in a escalating series of giant explosions until they’re suddenly sandwiched on either side by the next entries in the series of fucking ridiculous vehicles that Palance has on his lot, two huge industrial mining trucks. Faced with this opponent, they finally manage to fire off enough brain synaptics to realize that having a Hemi isn’t going to save them, so the dynamic duo bail out the windows of their own truck and instead fight their way into the cabs of the industrials ones. Once at the helm, they finally bring the scene to a close by ramming directly into the largest building on the compound.

Climbing out of the wreckage that they created only to find themselves surrounded by guns and drugs, Achey Breakey and Chedda spring into action, standing back to back so that they can Uzi the shit out of any guards, random goons, hapless janitors, or visiting relatives that manage to wander onto the scene. After finishing with the pawns, they then make their way up to Palance’s office just as we see him start the building’s automated self-destruct countdown sequence, basically ruining any feeble attempts at suspense that may have built around the climax of the film. Not only do we know that Palance plans on dying at this point, but he’s also given us a convenient timeframe in which he plans on doing it. When Tango and Cash finally burst into the room, they end up killing James Hong and the head of the Random Ass Pain family, Palance’s two mini-crime bosses, before coming face to face with the one and only Dr. Flint GiggleTrousers as he holds a knife to Terri Hatcher’s throat. They stand in awkward tension just long enough for another dude to walk into the room, then break off to fight individual battles, at the end of which Tango knocks the random dude out and Cash finally delivers on the promise they made on the rooftop, throwing Dr. GiggleTrousers down a flight of stairs while cuddling an active grenade.

Stop right there boys! Let me tell you about the complete history of the mirror! It all began back in ancient times when...

With all obstacles finally cleared out of the way, Mambo and Bad Cheques make their way into the final room where this time it is now Jack Palance’s turn to hold a gun to Teri Hatcher’s throat while standing in a room of mirrors. So just to interject for a moment to review, this asshole built his an evil fortress equipped with a miniature maze for mice, a self-destruct system, and a room of goddamn mirrors. Fuck, I wish they had fought on further and inevitably found the ball pit room, just past the hallway of compactors and random acid pits, and to the right of the bathroom filled with spitting cobras. Making his last stand against the only two men who would dare to stand in his way, Palance drones on and on about something that nobody gives a shit about while both his opponents sit back, figure out which mirror he’s actually standing behind, and simply shoot him directly in the goddamn forehead. Problem solved! But they’re not quite out of the woods yet, so they grab Terri and run, making it out of the building just in time to give us a diving-away-from-the-explosion shot. Not bothering to ponder how incredibly lucky they are that the timer on the self-destruct sequence wasn’t so much as 30 seconds shorter, the three of them sit in the dirt where Tango and Cash bicker about which one of them is the better cop like two teenagers desperately wanting to ask the other to make out before finally ending the movie with one of the single greatest images you could possible go to credits on: a high five of glory that slowly morphs into a front-page newspaper high five of redemption! FUCK YEAH!

Like any good porn knows, you always end on the money shot.

The Verdict:

Donkey: While stacked with random moments of shitty magnificence, this movie surrounds those gems with deliberate attempts at comedy that fall flat on their ass, stereotypical action that is less exciting to watch than an Alzheimer’s patient repeatedly check his mail for Christmas cards in July, and two main characters lashing at each other with barbed tongues so much that you could easily mistake them for two cats cleaning each other’s assholes, which would be less homoerotic than their relationship, by the way. Seeing as this movie begins by showing us the downfall and resurrection of two supposed Super Cops rather than telling the story of what they actually did to earn those reputations, you can’t help but come away from this movie feeling like you missed the best part of it – a part that isn’t there in the first place. Instead you have two action heroes who are happy to wander around in the shower, bare-assed and quite content to tell you that they know that you like it. I give this movie four one-armed pushups at the Oscars out of five “Hey, I played Rambo!”s.

What We Learned:

Donkey: You know how when some of your favorite bands split up, start mingling, and form so called “Super Groups” that are never as good as their original bands were in the first place? Well that’s not limited to music, my friends.

Don’t forget to check back every Sunday for a new fresh review! Next week shittymovienight.com presents: a classic treat as we wrestle with classic dialogue and Rowdy Roddy Piper in…THEY LIVE.

Back To The Main Page.

Pssst...Stallone...that's not where a legwarmer goes...

Donkey: Mental disorders are sweeping the nation, and who can blame them? If you find yourself alone on a Friday night and looking for someone imaginary to talk to, have always wanted an excuse to walk down the street while cursing the sun in urine-soaked pants, or have always wondered what it would be like to live a day in the life of Crispin Glover, then a bad wiring job in the brain just can’t be beat. It’s quite common to varying degrees in my family and the easiest way that this can be seen is with the mild Obsessive Compulsive Disorder that myself and my brothers share. It can manifest itself in rather bizarre ways and it’s on this topic that we come to our next film.

I first saw Over The Top years ago, when it was first released on SuperChannel, the only movie channel available in my day. I liked it, mostly because at that age I was stupid enough to like anything that passed a couple of hours of my time with bright colors and fabulous Hollywood starlets, but I never considered the movie to be particularly remarkable. My younger brother, however, loved this fucking film and it quickly became one of his greatest obsessions. For years after we saw it, he was convinced that he needed to drive a rig instead of any normal car. Not for working in the long haul truck driving profession, mind you, but just for taking to the corner store for candy and back. To this day when I think of this movie, I can’t help but think of my younger brother as a six year old kid, wearing sleeveless shirts and dreaming of hauling ass down a highway in a massive truck loaded with Food Fighters and Smack-Ups. If only you had known about that whole pissing in a bottle thing as a kid, Jeff, it might not have seemed so glorious. But regardless, let’s salute that dream by looking at the cinematic Lothario that slipped you a roofie and impregnated your mind with it in the first place.

The Plot:

Donkey: Some movies sound like great ideas, but lose something in the translation between screenplay and the actual screen, turning out to be a disastrous cock fondue. Think Ernest Scared Stupid. Some movies sound like they’d be as much fun to watch as puke hardening in a fat man’s ass crack after a night of hard drinking, and yet they turn out to be remarkably good. Think Ernest Goes To Jail. And some movies are so mind bogglingly stupid in their concept alone that you know they couldn’t possibly be good, no matter how drunk the producers were when they read the screenplay or what effeminate gymnast they hired to star in it. And that’s where Over The Top comes in.

Sylvester Stallone is Lincoln Hawk, a simple truck driver who has only one regret in life, besides a poor vocational choice. And to correct that mistake, he decides to defy common sense and and dangerous father-in-law, played by Robert Loggia, to win back the love of his estranged son. But as so many men have discovered in the past, it’s not easy earning back a love that you willingly discarded. So to accomplish this, he’ll need a cunning plan, and never one to back down from a challenge, Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot!’s Sylvester Stallone decides to lay it all on the line to win custody and the love of his son by…entering into the World Arm Wrestling Championships? Yes, you read that right. Arm wrestling.

Sound intriguing? No? Exactly.

The Case for Greatness (aka The Lowlights):

Exhibit A: Two Tickets To Body Odor Paradise

Trust me, there are a lot of nights spent in that truck "polishing the hawk".

Donkey: As the curtains part to reveal the cinematic crotch fungus that is Over The Top, we begin by watching the two main characters go about their lives in the few remaining moments before their paths collide for all eternity. Sly enters the movie riding a giant metal steed on a saddle made of power ballads, setting his steeled gaze on the road ahead through the aviators of a champion. In other words, shitty music is playing while he drives his shitty rig. But goddamn if I don’t just want to go do some push-ups of glory right now! He’s on his way to pick up his estranged son, with whom he is going to attempt pick up the shattered pieces that remain of their relationship with all the grace of narcoleptic on a Valium bender. Being a man of class, Sly wants to make a grand entrance, so he stops to tend to his truck by giving it a good scrub down and polishing his hawk, his signature hood ornament.

Fruitastic.

Meanwhile his son Mike is graduating from his class in military school, and judging from his mannerisms throughout the rest of the film, I’m going to guess that it was a military hairdressing school. After the ceremony concludes, the kid wades through happy families doing happy bullshit, looking around for someone, anyone, to share in his rather pedestrian accomplishment of finishing another year of elementary school. And while Mike continues to search in futility, Sly pulls up to the front of the academy in his rig, showing a lot of sophistication by wearing suspenders and a tie with a denim shirt. As a dejected Mike’s about to get into a limo and head home alone, he gets called into the Colonel’s office, one would undoubtedly assume to share in some delicious chicken or possibly tacos. But alas, it’s not to be as instead the kid finds only the deadbeat dad he’s never known. To silence a very modest amount of protesting and prove his identity, Sly presents a picture of him and Mike’s mother in their wedding gear, which is probably the last time before today that he had worn a shirt that both had sleeves and was free of chili stains. Satisfied that he’s not a pervert, Mike reluctantly agrees goes with him. As they climb into his sweet diesel ride, Sly tells him that they’ve got a couple of days together to drive back to California before his mom goes into surgery. As they’re about to depart, Mike asks Sly if he really expects to make up ten years in two days. Stallone says no, but I humbly disagree. I think two days in a rig with Sylvester Stallone would seem exactly like ten years.

Not long after the caravan of awkwardness and fermented body odor gets going, Mikey complains that he hadn’t heard from Stallone for ten years. Naturally, Sly protests, saying that he’s written over a hundred times, for every one of Mike’s birthdays, every Christmas, and every time that Mikey popped into his mind while he was burying a transvestite prostitute. Not buying it, the kid then demands that Sly pull the rig over, exclaiming that he’s going to be sick. When Sly complies, the kid proves the exact value of an expensive, private education by jumping out of the truck and running straight into highway traffic.

Since they're too young for cyanide capsules, Army regulations mandate that when captured by hostile forces, children just run straight into the first oncoming Buick they find.

While Stallone is busy wrangling his idiot son off the freeway, who’s scrambling around like a slow witted chicken, the first of many useless scenes featuring his father-in-law, played by the immortal Robert Loggia, begins. Robert shows up at the military academy with two henchmen in tow, demanding to know where his grandson is. What is Robert Loggia in this movie that would require him to have henchmen? Damned if I know. His profession is never once mentioned, so I’m assuming that those men are there more as a result of it being THE Robert Loggia than for the sake of what Robert’s character does for a living. Hell, I’d follow that guy wherever he wanted me to go. But when he hears that his daughter called ahead and requested that Mike be picked up by Sly, Robert gives us a taste of his signature unpleasantness. He growls that he can’t tolerate stupidity and that he’ll be bringing this to the attention of the school’s board. So this dude, who’s badass enough to have henchmen, is going to lodge an informal complaint? Perhaps even write a sternly worded letter? Wow. Don’t cross this ball-buster. He’ll tear you a new one, if you needed your bag of potato chips opened, that is.

Don't make me have one of my thugs rough you up with an editorial letter in the New York Post.

Exhibit B: See…Isn’t This Fun? Whoops, Your Mom Is Dead.

I don't care if I'm interrupting your lunch, I have to know what kind of mousse you use!

The movie turns back to the truck just in time to catch Mikey giving Sly a lecture on cholesterol after lunch is suggested at a nearby truck stop. What a charming kid. I’d hand him a bottle of water, three Tic-Tacs, and leave him in the sun, telling him to stay slim while I go have a goddamn sandwich. Instead they stop at the truck stop anyways, which is filled with more people than I’ve ever seen in a fucking truck stop anywhere before in my life. They work their way through the crowd of unwashed masses and sit down for lunch, where Mikey delivers another outstanding speech on nutrition that makes me want to shove fistfuls of lard down this little shithead’s throat just out of spite. But once Hal Johnson has finished his Body Break and actually orders his goddamn pompous lunch, the fun and games come to an end. Sly is approached by a dude with a sweet blonde mullet proclaiming himself to be called The Smasher. This dude has heard that Sly’s the man to beat on the trucker arm wrestling circuit and demands that he be given a shot at the title. Hesitation turns to reluctant agreement once a thousand dollars is put on the line. The entire fucking diner, which has stopped all activity to hang on their every word, lets out a mighty cheer and starts migrating to the back. The kid, like the rest of us, is confused as to what the hell just happened and asks Stallone where he’s going. Sounding as cool as he can possibly muster when he’s doing something as retarded as arm wrestling for money, Sly says that he’s gotta go to work. See, that’s a shame. I remember when arm wrestling was all about the love of the game. Now it’s all about the bling. As Hawk walks through the parted crowd, over to the truck stop’s very official arm wrestling table, which is just insanity to think that they would actually have, he and his blonde opponent both psych themselves up by looking like they’re three quarters of the way through shitting their pants. Meanwhile, back at the bar, Mikey sits alone, watching from a distance when he’s approached by what is obviously a child molester and Sly’s chief nemesis, a massive man named Bull. After revealing that he’s Hawk’s son, Mikey discards the man’s advances and walks away to see the fight. Just before the grunting display of mindlessness is about to begin, Sly turns his hat backwards, letting everyone know that it’s party time. Finally the match begins and, of course, after the obligatory moment of looking like he’s about to lose, Sly destroys his opponent. He walks back to the bar to return to his meal, where he’s greeted by Bull, who asserts that Sly got lucky and challenges him to another match. Sly declines and tells the cartoonish villain that he’ll have to wait until Vegas.

Your dad ever tell you about his friend that likes to touch inappropriately, kid?

Having realized that his father is cripplingly psychotic at this point, Mikey demands to talk to his mother and heads out to a pay phone. She gets his frantic call and soothes him from her hospital bed, telling Mike that he’s got so much more to see and experience in life. She reassures him that his father had his reasons for leaving, so try not to be too hard on him. Apparently that’s enough for Mike. They get rolling again, and after the standard fight where Michael doesn’t approve of listening to radical 80′s tunes on the radio, we discover that he’s has been told by his grandfather that Sly was a drug dealer. Sly denies it, of course, and says that the only mistake he ever made was leaving. And after another feeble attempt at character development, they end the scene with an awesome shot of Sly driving the rig on the wrong side of the road.

First you abandon him and now you drive on the wrong side of the road with him...you really don't like your kid much, do you Sly?

Back in her hospital, Robert Loggia and Stallone’s wife argue over her decision to hand Mikey over to his father. Not giving an inch, Robert Loggia patronizes her before he walks out of the hospital room and demands of the nearest doctor that he be informed of all calls to her personal line. The doctor, who doesn’t seem the slightest bit surprised by this request, says sure thing. What? How the fuck does Robert Loggia think a hospital works? Is he presuming that a doctor had nothing more to do than sit around and monitor her phone calls, or does this moron think that hospitals actually have phone tapping gear? Regardless, he continues his march out of what I’m presuming he thinks is Our Lady of CIA Tactics hospital, Robert Loggia is followed closely by his two henchmen. The stereotypically skinny and therefore obviously smart one tells him that all reports say that Sly and his son can’t be found while the big muscle-bound motherfucker stays silent. Never a fan of details, Loggia tells them to just do what they have to.

Ever been to a chiropractor before kid? Well, you will...

The movie goes back to the rig just as the sun falls. They pull over into a rest stop and Sly proposes that they sleep in the rig that night. Mikey rises to the challenge, exerting that if Sly can do it, he can do it. And now that they’ve committed to a full week of neck cramps, they make the most of it by putting their hands behind their head and leaning back slightly. Ahhhh…now that’s comfort. But before they begin to fight their way into unconsciousness, Sly offers his shoulder to Mike as a pillow. Wow, dad. Thanks. Ten years without seeing you and you can’t spring for an actual pillow. But I can use your bony shoulder? That’s love, baby. The next day they get up, ready to greet the day with…another awesome musical montage! They start with some light stretching before moving on to push-ups, some simulated air-arm-wrestling, and doing one-armed standing push-ups using the rig’s front grill. Fuck, that’s so ridiculous that I just want to stab my face repeatedly with an overripe slice of cantaloupe.

Oh, THAT'S how you'd exercise one arm? And here I was just sticking with porn this whole time.

Today's forecast: Cloudy with a 90 percent chance of 'roid rage.

But there’s more to come. After ripping the sleeves off of Michael’s jacket to make him both a super badass and somehow illiterate, Stallone reveals his ultimate training device. Inside the rig, between the driver’s and passenger’s seat, he’s got a simple weight pulley system which he uses to exercise his one arm while driving. Fuck, that’s so hardcore. Goddamn now I don’t know want to do more: arm wrestle, or train to arm wrestle! But now that we’re so pumped, how do we end this scene? We start with Mikey insulting Sly, saying that there’s more to life than muscles, noting that he doesn’t see any books in the truck. He then basically calls his father retarded, which may not be far from the truth if you consider the film thus far. In response, Sly pulls the rig over to the side of the road and says that if Mikey’s so smart, he should be able to just get behind the wheel and drive the rig. Never one to pass up a challenge, the kid gets behind the wheel and after some coaxing and encouragement from Sly, not to mention enough bunny hopping with the clutch that you’d think the truck was on hydraulics, actually starts to drive the rig down the road. Goddamn it. There are two problems with that. First, Sly, haven’t you just proven that you are, in fact, the moron that you’ve been accused on being if your kid can drive that thing and do your job? I know you want to be encouraging and bond through positive reinforcement, but didn’t you do that at the cost of proving to your son that you’re a dunce? And second, once they start driving, we see that they’re on a two lane goddamn highway. Some quiet back road is one thing, but you let your kid drive a fucking rig on a two lane highway? Okay, you really are a fucking moron, Sly.

Feeling envious of all the jaw dropping ridiculousness that’s going on elsewhere, Robert Loggia draws us back to his office where the search for his grandson continues. Apparently getting an idea, he calls his brainy stooge over to his desk to request something, which we can’t hear, and then…the scene ends. It is literally seventeen seconds long and basically shows you NOTHING. Awesome.

Before we can recover from the beating that our throats have taken laughing their way through the last two scenes, we turn to Sly and Mikey having lunch at another diner. As they pack up to leave, Sly gets an idea almost as good as just walking out on this movie before it can damage his career any further. He takes Mikey back to the small arcade area where a group of local tough kids are playing videogames. And you know they’re tough because the leader is wearing a sleeveless vest with no shirt underneath, black BMX gloves, and is sporting some of the worst 80′s hair I can imagine. Before he can give his son the chance to object, Sly challenges them to an arm wrestling match with Mikey, betting a whole ten dollars that his kid will beat their ringleader two of three times. After a couple of minutes of Mike refusing to participate and the punk kid slathering on the preteen bravado, Stallone manages to convince Mike to do it. The match is on! On ‘til the break of dawn! They begin and of course, Mikey loses. This fucking kid is way bigger than him, so what the fuck did Stallone expect? As soon the match ends, Mikey runs out of the diner and into the parking lot, thoroughly humiliated. No shit. I would be too. Not giving up on his bad investment, Sly runs outside and gives him an inspirational speech about how he lost because he let himself get beat. Nope, I’m pretty sure it’s because the other kid is about three years older and much bigger than him. Stallone continues, saying that Mike’s a special kid, but that he’s also a rich brat who needs to learn to do things for himself. Because the world meets no one halfway, baby. Sly finishes by saying that he knows that Mike can win, but even if he loses, at least he loses with dignity. Inspired, Mikey goes back into the diner and steps up to take on the punk again, suddenly with balls steel. The other kid agrees and we’re back on! Stallone turns Mike’s hat backwards for him, telling the kid that it’s time to go to work. FUCK. I think that just took about a year off my life expectancy. The remarkably unentertaining match begins and Sly starts saying “over the top!” For reasons I can’t explain, Mike somehow knows that this is a term for putting your fingers over the top of the other kid’s fist. So he does that and manages to win. Seriously, how the fuck did he know what that phrase meant? Stallone hadn’t explained it, or even mentioned it offhandedly up to this point. I didn’t know what it meant, and trust me, I’m a lot goddamn smarter than this kid. But even better than that is how that looked the first time we watched this movie. We hadn’t seen this movie in well over a decade, so we naturally didn’t remember the phrase’s meaning or notice the small gesture that Mike does as a result of Sly’s yelling. So at the time, it just looked like Stallone was repeatedly shouting a useless catchphrase, and the movie’s title at that. It looked about as stupid as it would have if Kurt Thomas had yelled, ”GYMKATA!” after every time he almost hit one of his opponents with one of his flipping attacks. Enraged, the cyberpunk demands the third and deciding match, which again, Mikey wins even more handily.

I love the Power Glove. It's so bad.

After some recklessly vicarious living through his child, Sly and Mikey are in high spirits and decide to call back to speak to his mother. Mike regales his mother with the tedious details of his victory before he hands the phone over to his dad. But as Sly takes his turn talking to her in the phone booth, Mikey gets kidnapped outside by a couple of random goons who carry him off into a pickup truck. Stallone notices the kidnapping and runs out in pursuit, where he is attacked by a third man who is considerate enough to get his ass kicked within seconds. Sly then jumps into his rig and chases after the two dudes driving off with his son in the pickup truck. After a stereotypical and yawn inducing chase scene, Sly runs the truck off the road and the two dudes flee the truck, leaving the kid behind.

With all that non-excitement done, it’s time to check back into the House of Ball-busting, where his lawyer tells Robert Loggia that no court will give him custody of the boy over Stallone unless he can prove that Stallone can’t support him. Robert argues that there’s always a way to bend the law. And with that, another pointless scene ends. Fuck, these scenes are a bigger waste of goddamn time than commercial breaks.

As they are entering the final stretch of their journey, Stallone shares his big plans in life with Mike. If he wins the big championship in Vegas, he wants to start his own trucking company. Mikey counters by asking why Sly left him and his mother. Sly stumbles around the issue, preferring to continue his poor attempts at dodging the subject rather than coming out and telling the truth, simply replying that he had his reasons. Luckily for him, the subject is dropped as they finally make it to the hospital. They stroll in with flowers in hand and looking as good as you can when you’ve spent two straight days in a metal box, just to find out that their wife/mother died in the operating room earlier that day. Devastated, Mikey runs out of the hospital with Sly in tow, getting back to the truck where he says that if he had just flown home instead of coming with Stallone, he would have seen his mother again before she died. As Sly tries to stammer out a futile rebuttal, Mike jumps into a nearby cab, which takes off immediately before Stallone can stop him. That’s more than a little bizarre. What fucking cab drives off instantly when a ten year old gets in?

Exhibit C: What Happens In Vegas…Stays Ridiculous

From that point, the movie skips straight to the mother’s funeral. Sly strides up in the middle of the priest’s speech and drops flowers on the casket before walking away again. Robert Loggia looks on in seething anger while Mikey looks on in sexual confusion. Another great scene, but at least it doesn’t end there. Later that evening, Sly is sitting down by the ocean on the back of his rig, plotting his next move. Apparently the best that he can come up with is to drive to Robert Loggia’s estate, smash through the front gate, and drive his rig right into the front of his mansion. After doing just that, Sly climbs out of his truck and wanders into the foyer of the mansion, calling for Mike just as the kid and Robert Loggia appear. As you can probably guess, after asking Mike to come away with him and getting chastised by Robert Loggia, Stallone gets tackled by goons that subdue him until the cops arrive seconds later to arrest him. Wow. Great fucking plan, Sly.

Here's the deal: if you don't want to rot in prison, I've got this little picutre with Estelle Getty that you can sign on for...

The next stop on this magical journey is a jail, where Sly is visited by Robert Loggia’s personal secretary who presents him with a contract. It demands that he leaves the state and doesn’t pursue custody of Michael, and in return they won’t prosecute him for being clinically retarded. When he asks what Mikey’s got to say about it, the kid comes in and asks some surprisingly realistic questions. If he comes with Sly, what kind of home will he have? Where will they go? What school will he be enrolled in? Will Stallone help Mike set up an aggressive investment package using the insider trading tips that he’s received on third quarter growth in the soy bean sector? Sly’s acknowledges that he doesn’t know the answer to pretty much any of those questions, and that all he can promise is that they’d be together. Having already seen the stupidity that would entail, the kid concludes that he can’t go with him. Dejected and facing several years of prison-wine-inspired sodomy, Stallone relents and signs the contract. But before the secretary leaves with Mike, Stallone takes one last moment to remind him that the world meets no one halfway, that he’s got to do what’s right for him. Yeah, I think that’s what he just did, Sly. Thanks, though. And seriously, how much do you want to keep saying that when it just sounds like a shitty philosophical excuse for having abandoned him for years? “Hey, I had to do what was right for me. So suck it, kid.” But now that everything appears to be settled, we see Sly back on the road in his rig, exercising his one arm with as much sadness as human growth hormones can allow him to muster.

What I need to find now is a convenient yet implausible plot device...and that will do.

Things have gotten pretty heavy right about now, so to pick things up, it’s time for another musical interlude featuring our two heroes. While Hawk sells his truck to make it to Vegas and bet on himself in the big competition, Mikey pokes around the house and finally finds all the letters that Sly wrote him over the years. Wait…if Robert Loggia kept those from Michael, why would they be sitting around in a pile somewhere? Wouldn’t he just shred them? Nevermind. Suddenly all is forgiven, so as we see Stallone weighing in at the big tournament, we also see Mikey sneaking out of the house and stealing a pickup truck. As he races off to be with his father, it cuts back to more montage shots of arm wrestlers preparing for the competition, including a dude with one of the sweetest white man afros ever to grace the silver screen.

Yo, I got some cameras here with me...can you sing The Final Countdown for them?

As Sammy Haggar continues to serenade us, the movie continues to jump between Mikey and Stallone on their paths of glory. Mikey races to the airport, ditches the truck there, and gets on a plane to Vegas. Since we’re never shown how the fuck that kid came up with the money to pay for a plane ticket or who the fuck would sell one to a lone child, I’m going to assume that he used three packs of Major League Chew and a Rod Brind’Amour rookie card to buy a ticket off a ticket agent who was looking for a way to be fired so that he could pursue his dream career in sock puppetry. Robert Loggia gets wind of this, of course, and follows Mikey to Vegas on his private plane. Meanwhile, back in Vegas they set up the backdrop of the big competition before kicking it off in full. It’s first explained that the best arm wrestlers have come from all over the world to compete in the greatest competition of athletic prowess that no one’s ever heard of, giving Italy and Japan as examples. They also explain that it’s a double elimination tournament, which means you have to lose twice to be out. Once that clarification is stammered out of the announcer with as much poise as it would have if he had tried to say it while belching, the competition begins and we see a bunch of random matches between random sweaty dudes who apparently have for too much time on their hands.

At this point the montage has gone on long enough, so to cut to the chase, we’re told that the competition is now down to the semi-finals. Once again the movie sees fit to remind us that people have come from all over the world and that it’s a double elimination tournament before finally revealing the grand prize for winning: a hundred grand and a brand new rig worth a quarter million dollars. Whoa…hold the phone. The grand prize is a fucking rig? Isn’t that pretty fucking convenient, not to mention ridiculously narrow in scope? It’s not like all arm wrestlers have to be fucking truckers, so how many contestants would win that prize and just say, “thanks,but, um…now what?”. And since you assholes keep reminding us that people have come from all over the world to compete, how about you take a moment to tell us how those people would plan on taking a fucking rig back with them, even if they wanted the thing? It’s not like that shit fits in the overhead bin if you just push hard enough. Goddamn it, that’s just lunacy. But with the groundwork set, it’s time to introduce our eight remaining contestants. As they’re called up one by one, it cuts to a brief clip of each one of them being interviewed where they spout out stereotypical bullshit that result in absolutely no character development at all. That would have been more useful if the dudes gave the standard Playmate profile information, like bust size, turn-ons, and turn-offs. And not only do they waste my fucking time, they don’t even bother to waste as much time as they said they would. They say that they’re going to introduce the eight semi-finalists, and yet they only actually introduce six men. I guess first grade math isn’t a prerequisite to arm wrestling.

Had those Over The Top action figures ever seen the light of day, I still wouldn't have bought any of these clowns.

Mikey arrives in Vegas just as the semi-finals begin, and Stallone prepares to face his first opponent. With the minuscule amount of tension building, the movie decides to ratchet it up a notch by filming the match in super slow motion to really, really drag it out as Sly unexpectedly loses the match. WHAT?! NOOOO!!!!! Could this be the end? Did we just sit through this whole movie for Stallone to lose his son and the competition? As fucking hilarious as that would be, which already has me imagining the suicide scene that would close the movie, the fucking ring announcer doesn’t wait more than four seconds after the end of the bout to remind us once again that it’s a double elimination tournament. It’s like this movie is working it’s ass off to make sure that you don’t just turn it off at this point. And just as Stallone walks away from the stage to lick his wounds, we see Robert Loggia is in the tournament crowd. He sends his burly henchman to fetch Sly and take him up to his Presidential Suite. With thirty minutes free before his next bout when he receives the invitation, Stallone agrees.

The meeting itself is rather short and sweet. After all, you don’t want to cut away from this pulse-pounding, nail-biting action for long, or the audience will end up remembering that this movie has no real story. As soon as he walks into the suite, Robert Loggia takes Stallone out onto the balcony where he points down at the parking lot, showing him the purpose of their rendezvous. Much like the deal that he already signed in prison (and hadn’t broken up to this point, which makes this whole thing all the more confusing), Loggia offers to give Sly a brand new rig and five hundred grand if he’ll just leave. And even though that’s more than the tournament’s grand prize, Sly declines, saying that once he wins, he’ll be coming for Michael. Not satisfied with the answer, Loggia turns to his brutish thug, motioning for him to stop Sly from leaving. But just to really up to unnecessary violence quotient of the movie, Stallone puts the man through the glass patio door when he attempts to restrain him. That a boy, Sly. There’s no better way to make sure that you’re in top form for the competition than some hand to hand combat. We can only hope that Sylvester tries unsuccessfully to karate chop a marble statue in half with his wrestling arm, just to prove no point whatsoever.

As the competition is about to start again, the announcer reminds us AGAIN that this is a double elimination contest. Fuck, WE GET IT. But if that wasn’t stupid enough, the dude that Sly’s about to face off against drinks a quart of motor oil right before the match is about to start, just to prove how badass he is. Fuck, I’m pretty sure that can kill you. So showing all the brains that I’d expect from these competitors, this genius has decided that even if he wins, he’s still going to die regardless. And for that, I salute you. Once their match actually begins, Sly wins almost instantaneously. Fuck, it might have been that motor oil poisoning you, douche bag. Once that’s out of the way, it’s time for more fighting montages. Dudes arm wrestle other dudes to bring the size of the final pack down, and we can’t really describe much of it to you, because it’s goddamn arm wrestling. All the matches look the goddamn same, as do all the sweaty, burly men involved in them.

I applaud this movie for not having even one of them think to stop this idiot from basically committing suicide.

Mikey finally enters the arena where the tournament is being held just before it moves into the final four, a group which they call, go figure, OVER THE TOP. I’ve got a better name: THE FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE SNORE-POCALYPSE. They take a moment to introduce the four men with short interview clips again, why I’ll never know. Sly is there of course, as is his massive arch-rival, Bull, along with two dudes that I don’t give a shit about, even though I’ve been introduced to them twice now. Fuck, this whole is proving to be about as dramatic as trimming your toenails. Sly and Bull both beat their opponents, go figure, setting the stage for the ultimate final. And just as he’s resting for that final match, Mikey shows up and tells Sly that he wants to be with him. Stallone finds this news so inspiring that he starts talking about how Bull is real good, that he might lose to him. Naturally, this causes Mikey to give him the same speech that he’s heard several times himself by this point, about how the world meets no man half way, that he’s got to do if for himself. And, of course, this powerful soliloquy works as well on him as it did on his son.

Exhibit D: Two Men, One Dream, Zero High School Diplomas

Now that Stallone has wiped his eyes and made sure his training bra is in place, the final match between Bull and the little girl that Sly has turned out to be is set. As the athletes approach the platform, the announcer takes a moment to once again remind us of the grand prize. And since we’re already exploring the land of time wasting redundancy, how about they cut to more fucking interviews? In these filmed moments of glory, Bull says that Stallone has no business being in the ring with him, while Stallone talks about how he turns his hat backwards just before he arm wrestles because it feels like a switch that turns him into an arm wrestling machine. And while he’s explaining this, it shows Stallone getting ready at the final table, turning his hate backwards. Fuck, I’m glad they explained that because I never would have figured that out on my own. Here I was thinking that he did it in case there was the chance that his opponent might want to lean in and make out. So I guess I’m the asshole. But now that we’ve stretched out the running time of this movie as much as possible, the final match actually begins. As they lock fists and begin their grunting pleasure, the match starts and it immediately looks as though Bull is about to win. But just before it once again looks as though that suicide ending where Stallone chokes himself to death with his own panties comes to pass, Sly’s hand slips and they break apart. Goddamn this is dramatic! But to ensure that they don’t let go of each other again, the refs of the match joins the two combatants hands together using…THE STRAP. They’re introduction of the device sounds rather menacing, but it’s just a simple leather strap.

Hey Hawk...I just peed a little.

Once they’re tied together and Mikey starts to begs Stallone to win from the audience, Bull uses the distraction to punch Stallone in the nose with their collective, strapped together fists. Hey Chubs, there are refs right there. You might want to be a little more subtle. But for those of you wondering if he should have been given a strong warning about that, if not disqualified altogether, I would advise you to go back to your rocket science research and keep your big brains to yourself. They start the match again seconds later, and after creating tension by looking like he’s going to lose for about ten minutes, Stallone goes “over the top” on Bull and, even though he’s about a hundred pounds lighter than this guy, comes back to win! Hurray! He’s declared the champion and official winner of the tournament. Taking the loss surprisingly well, Bull holds up Stallone’s hand to recognize his victory. And as Stallone carries his son around the stage in victory, Robert Loggia looks on from the crowd and nods in begrudging respect, as if to concede that he’ll let Stallone keep his kid. But while the film gets carried away in jubilation, I’d like to remind them that this is a double elimination tournament. After all, they only reminded us of that fact about a dozen times. So since we didn’t see Bull lose a match before the final, shouldn’t they have to do that again? But as we’re left asking the obvious once again, the scene fades to black.

It's never explained, but Stallone actually manages to win because Bull has a flashback to that time his puppy got hit by a car.

I guess now we see why the qualifications for the tournament were a thousand dollar entry fee and a Class 1 license.

To finish this clusterfuck properly with one last money shot, we see Stallone and his son getting their new truck ready by screwing his signature hawk hood ornament onto the rig while they chat about opening their new trucking company. I’d like to suggest that they call it Two Men In The Closet. But seeing as my shouting can’t travel through the TV back to 1987 where they can hear this movie, they ignore my suggestion and get into their new ride, fire the best up, and roll off into the sunset giving one another high fives and still having no plan whatsoever about how he’s going to take care of his son. That’s so sweet that I think I just got diabetes.

The Verdict:

Donkey: I’m not a psychic, but I’m supremely confident that I can tell you the exact conversation that went down between the writers and the studio when they were pitching the concept of this shit taco: “Let’s put you in a movie, Stallone, only instead of Russians or the seedy criminal underbelly of a major metropolis, we’ll have you fighting for…the love of your son. You abandoned him years ago for reasons we’ll never actually give, but trust us, they’re totally legit. And now his mother wants you to get to know him because she is dying of an illness that we’ll never actually give, but trust us, it’s totally lethal. The problem is that her father doesn’t want you back in the picture and he’s a pretty powerful and scary guy for reasons that we’ll never actually give, but trust us, he’ll be totally badass. So to prove your worth to the boy, we’ve got to have you doing something that’s totally macho and yet makes no sense. Arm wrestling? Done. You’re about to compete in the World Championships of Arm Wrestling…they have those, don’t they?….so that you can win a fabulous cash prize and….um….a brand new rig! Yeah! Because all arm wrestlers are truck drivers! Right? Whoa, hey, pass that coke before it’s all gone…” The only way that pumping out garbage that half baked doesn’t deserve a slap in the head is if I give someone a Lite-Brite and ten minutes to write a screenplay on it. But the fact that someone thought to actually release this into theaters is what makes it infinitely hilarious and a classic film for generations to ponder over for years to come. I give it five estranged sons out of five completely inappropriate grand prizes.

What We Learned:

Donkey: It might be hard to see from where you’re sitting and eating your barely edible food, but if you wander to the back corner of a truck stop diner and look around, you’ll find an official, regulation arm wrestling table. That’s a fact.

Don’t forget to check back every Sunday for a new fresh review! Next week shittymovienight.com presents: a film that’s every bit as great as its name, when we turn around to discover…EVIL BEHIND YOU.

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