8 Million Ways to Die (1986) review

Before I said I was only going write about movies I felt were worth watching and had something to offer the viewer - but I've changed my mind starting with this messy piece of 80's sleaziness. I have a thing for Rosanna Arquette and she looks spectacular in this movie, especially near the middle of the film where she and Bridges are emotionally connecting in his kitchen - she looks more natural in this scene and isn't completely dolled up 80's style. If you like her too or your just like gaudy, outdated 80's films then you won't completely be disappointed.

Here are some of the hilarious things you'll see in this movie: Andy Garcia with a rattail haircut playing a stereotypical hot-headed Cuban gangster who in one scene serves snow cones out of the back of his trunk and hides his cocaine in wooden cylinders that are labelled "Product of Columbia", Rosanna Arquette drunkenly trying to seduce Jeff Bridges and then puking on his crotch and a prostitute trying to beckon Jeff Bridges by saying, "the streetlight make my pussy hair glow in the dark".

The movie is Hal Ashby's final film and has nothing in common with his brilliant previous work. He was totally out of his element making an action film but oh well. It's comparable to an 2nd rate Miami Vice episode or the leftover scraps from the excellent 80's films "Scarface" and "To Live and Die in LA". Andy Garcia even uses dialog from "Scarface" when he says, "Want to play games? We'll play games".

The film opens strong with an impressive helicopter shot that feels lifted from "To Live and Die in LA" and awesome 80's credits in neon blue with Mistral font (the font used on the poster of the film "Drive). Jeff Bridges is Matt Scudder, an alcoholic cop (cliche alert) who shoots a criminal in front of the guys family which leads to him further descending into alcoholism, losing his job and losing his family. This whole set up is tedious and feels like a made-for-tv movie. Strangely, his family is never shown again - even at the end of the movie.

Things start to gain speed when Scudder is given an invitation to a private gambling/hooker club in Malibu. The house has this cool funicular (a type of hillside lift) and hideous ruby red carpet. One of the hookers pretends that he is her boyfriend - it's not clear but presumably she invited him. Most of this is inexplicable but it doesn't matter because most of the plot is threadbare and dubious. She wants to stop being a hooker, he looks after her and she's killed after being kidnapped in a van on their way to the airport. In typical 80's excess, some fake blood is splattered against the van window to indicate her murder. These scenes are like paint-by-numbers Miami Vice schlock. Scudder goes on another alcoholic bender. He flips through the dead hooker's little black back, which is basically the only detective work done in this pseudo-film noir, and discovers that Andy Garcia's character is some drug lord (big surprise!) using the gambling/hooker club to sell his shit.

Scudder ends up developing a relationship with the head hooker Sarah, played by Rosanna Arquette, saves her from being held hostage by Andy Garcia and then finally kills him Andy Garcia on the funicular and lives happily ever after with Sarah.

The film has many problems, some of which I've already mentioned. Andy Garcia is extremely annoying and his acting feels like a more lovable, geekier Tony Montana. He constantly touches, adjusts his tie and shrugs his shoulders. There's a inane scene where Scudder is in a car pushing another gangster against the car door with his back. It reminded me of something out of "The Room". The camera work is amateurish. In possibly my least favorite scene, where Garcia and Bridges are eating snowcones outside of an aerospace museum, the camera gets uncomfortably close to the actors faces. The whole scene feels improvised, sloppy and pointless.

In spite of this, the movie has some good qualities. The climactical scene where Sarah is held hostage and Scudder is threatening to burn Andy Garcia's cocaine is a great moment. It has real tension and Jeff Bridges acting is, as always, very good. He and Rosanna Arquette elevate this film from being a B-movie. They have good chemistry together and the movie would be atrocious without them. I love the scene where they are going down the funicular and she calls him a prick, he replies "fucking cunt" and she just says "fuck you". I also liked the weird, artistic Beverly Hills house that Andy Garcia lives in and the tackiness of the Malibu gambling/hooker club house. It was cool how they used the funicular in the final shoot out scene between Bridges and Garcia.