Stupid movies of my youth; I thought that once I made it to high school, joined a Frat, or got my License to Drive, that I'd be set, and it'd be non-stop partying for the years to come. Of course I quickly realized that wasn't how my teenage years would be; instead it turned into years of bashful awkwardness. But still when I watch those care-free 80's movies, I'm taken back and get a glimmer of that feeling, which is wonderful, even if it's very brief. It had been a long time since I'd seen License to Drive, probably before I got my drivers license, I wasn't sure how it was going to hold up.

The opening scene (see below) where Les, played by Corey Haim at the height of his charisma, is asleep in his drivers-ed class and dreaming about a demonic school bus driver (shades of A Nightmare on Elm St. part 2), a Magnum P.I. Ferrari, and a very young Heather Graham, is most excellently done; with just the right amount of charm and cheesiness, and put together very nicely, with great photography and editing. It reminded me of John Hughes at his peak and gave me hopes that I could enjoy License to Drive on more than a nostalgic level. The rest of the film isn't quite up to par, it'd be tough to keep up that pace, but it is still very entertaining and well done.

Corey Haim and Corey Feldman did a quite a few films together in the 80's and early 90's, I'd say without a doubt that this is their best pairing. (Lost Boys is a better film, but they have a different dynamic.) They were great friends in real life, and that friendship shines through in this film, they play wonderfully off each other making it enjoyable to watch. Maybe I'm biased as a child of the 80's, but it seems there really hasn't been a great teenage actor that could easily carry a film, since that decade. Show me a young actor of the 90's or 00's that can hang with the likes of Corey Haim, Feldman, John Cusack or Anthony Michael Hall. (Maybe Shia LaBeouf?)

Les is determined to get his drivers license, it's the biggest goal of young his life. He believes that once he has it, he can do anything he wants; which includes dating the school's hottie, Mercedes Lane. There's another pretty great driving scene, where Les takes his driver's test with a psychotic DMV employee, who will only pass him if he doesn't spill his piping hot coffee, and proceeds to take him through a series of the toughest driving conditions, and does notably well. Afterwards it comes out that he didn't pass his previous computer quiz, and the brief hold on his license is taken away.

Thinking he'd pass no problem, he's already promised to take his best friends and Mercedes out for a night on the town, so he sneaks the keys to his Grandfather's beloved Cadillac and proceeds to have the kind of night that can happen in movie-land. He and his friends are taken through a chaotic series of events; each one more perilous than the last, with the poor car getting more trashed by the minute. Then through the magic of screen-writing, he's able to redeem himself with another crazy driving scenario, showing his parents all the tricks he learned from the previous night, and they quickly forgive him despite his demolishing their trust. Of course he lands the girl as well.

The film is so very obviously influenced by his style, most directly Ferris Bueller, that I'd say this was the best John Hughes film that he didn't direct. The hair and clothes are very 80's, but I think that the drivers license right-of-passage is such a universal American teen story, and the film is so genuinely funny and well made, that even today's kids would enjoy it. As a look back, it took me to a more innocent time, where a drivers license meant freedom, not going to work or driving the kids somewhere. License to Drive is a classic 80's teenage flick. - Grade: B+

Gremlins is one of the seminal films of my youth. I still remember my mom talking to another mom about how horrible it was, and that the kids should definitely not see it. That was it, I had to see it. I don't remember exactly when I got to see it, it was probably on HBO. I saw everything on HBO those days, before video rentals were the norm.

I don't remember it scaring me. I think that even at a young age, I got that it was a comedy. Maybe a few of the scenes scared me, I briefly remember being tense during the final showdown between Zach and Stripe in the department store, but that's it. Since then, I've seen the film around 20 times. But it's been almost 10 since my last viewing. I decided since my cousin was probably old enough to view it, I'd bring it down to watch with him as one of our Christmas movies.

We've all seen the film, (If you haven't what are you doing here? Watch it now!) I don't need to recycle the plot of cute little Gizmo being bought as a pet, and him hatching a whole gaggle of horrible Gremlins that take over a small town during Christmas. I'm surprised by how well the film holds up. I think it has to do with the use of puppets for the Gremlins. They look very realistic, their movements are very well done, and acting with those creepy looking things probably helped the actors believe the situation. They're not winking at the camera, they play it very straight, so one minute it's a little creepy, the next you're laughing. A tough mix to pull off.

This was advertised as a Spielberg family film when it came out in 1984. But the violence, probably the kitchen scene where the mom dispatches of a few Gremlins in nasty ways in particular, this and another Spielberg creation, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, lead to the creation of the PG-13 rating. Spielberg produced a lot of these edgy kids flicks in the 80's, he's gone on to say that he wouldn't do so now that he has kids, I guess he didn't realize how scary some of them were. But I loved those films, I hate how white-washed most kids films are these days, most kids love being scared and they don't like being talked down to.

However, my 12-year-old cousin didn't seem to impressed with it; so maybe it doesn't hold up as well as I thought. But I still really enjoyed it. It's darkly hilarious, really well directed by Joe Dante, and full of great 80's actors, like Phoebe Cates, Zach Galligan, Corey Feldman, and Judge Reinhold. It'll remain a Christmas staple in my life and in a few years, I'll probably introduce it to my son.

When I was growing up, the neighbor's kid, who was a couple years older than me, was a huge horror film fan. He had posters on the wall for a couple of the Friday the 13th films, and I was completely fascinated by them. From those images and what he told me about the films, I was able to terrify myself. I became a fan of Jason, years before I was able to see the films for myself. Even now the Friday the 13th series remains my favorite horror film series, over Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween and anything more recent like the Saw films.

Every so often I'll watch through them again. I watched parts 1-4 again before Halloween, and was finally getting around to part 5. I don't know if I'll bother with part 6-9, they start to get pretty intolerable after this one, though I may check out Freddy vs. Jason again, I haven't seen it since it was in the theaters.

I think Part V: A New Beginning is probably the third best in the series, after the original, and The Final Chapter. The film opens with Tommy, played by Corey Feldman, who killed Jason in part IV, seeing him reborn, thanks to a couple of yokels who've decide to dig him up. Smash-cut to a grown-up Tommy on the way to a half-way house for loony-kids. He's become a bit messed-up, since Jason chopped up his mommy and sister, before he himself cut off Jason's head.


The characters here are pretty stock; there's the couple who can't get enough sex, the nerdy guy who wants to get with the slightly less nerdy, but cute girl, the sass-talking-black-kid, an 80's punk-chick, the doctor, the sexy-nurse, the rage-filled-psycho and the clueless-fat-guy. The psycho kills the fat guy with an ax, within about 10 minutes of the Tommy showing up, so he gets to witness another brutal slaying.

Soon the kids are getting bumped off one by one, for most of the film we don't get to see who is doing it, but Tommy keeps seeing Jason everywhere. Leading to the questions; is he just crazy, is he killing these kids, or is Jason really back from the grave? And I think that bit of mystery makes A New Beginning a little more interesting than some of the other films, where Jason magically comes back again and again. In this film, there's an actual real-world explanation for all the murders.

The death scenes in this film are pretty stock for the series, nothing really stands out, but they're not bad. I think fans miss seeing Jason himself do it, so that's why this film may not be held as high. But on the plus side, it contains the best nudity of all the films. If you watch Part 1 through 5, skipping the crappy part 3, you're getting the best of the series, and the bulk of the "important" storyline.