On Aug. 23, 1985, the Warner Bros. teen comedy Better Off Dead, starring John Cusack, hit limited release. The film, written and directed by Savage Steve Holland, grossed $10 million domestically in theaters. The Hollywood Reporter’s original review is below:
As a title, Better Off Dead doesn’t give one much of a clue as to what the movie’s about. It does, however, reflect a likely audience reaction to this crude, cartoonish comedy. Not surprisingly, Warner Bros. has been doing a lot of research — sneaking Dead in places like Denver — to figure out what to do with this one, other than to stamp D.O.A. on its opening.
John Cusack stars as a myopic high schooler smitten with a perky blonde (Amanda Wyss) who leaves him for the school’s obnoxious ski team captain (Aaron Dozier). While plot structure may seem like just an other faded away August release, the romantic triangle in this film written and directed by Savage Steve Holland has an unusual kink — the Cusak character, instead of being a winning underdog, is really just “a no-show” in life, as Wyss accurately describes. Indicative of Cusack’s level of dynamism is his predilection to stand in front of the bathroom mirror sticking Q-tips into his oral cavities. Such is the film’s level of wit.
Although relentlessly puerile, Better Off Dead does reflect a strong and fractured wit on Savage Steve Holland’s part. Inarguably, he has a sense of humor. Yet evidently, he has no comic touch: Dead‘s off-the-wall look at high school romance and middle class family life is so exaggerated, so pitched with cynicism and so Katzenjammer crude, that Better Off Dead comes off as a crass comic strip. All of the characters are grotesque. In addition to the phlegmatic Cusack, the Nazi-ish skier Dozier and the fickle Wyss, they include: a maniacal paperboy who’d kill for overdue bills (Demian Slade), an Asian race car driver who talks like Howard Cosell, a buffoonish boss of the local Pig Burger drive-in (Chuck Mitchell), a jello-snorting sidekick who carries around a Mason jar filled with what looks like a pig fetus (Curtis Armstrong), and others too derivative to waste space on with description.
Structurally, the film plows along in the low-budget high school romance mold, with myriad repetitions of sight gags and familiar funnies. Borrowings from other movies, including Hitchcock — Cusack’s mother concocts the most gruesome meals this side of Frenzy — and silent comedy are tossed into this story and then put on high-speed blend.
Technical credits are highlighted by film’s off-center look at Middle America, a credit to Holland and his production designer Herman Zimmerman. Music also is often wittily interspersed; a rendition of “Mannish Boy” with Muddy Waters wailing away to counterpoint the wimpy Cusack character gives quirky texture.
In the end, as throughout the film, weirdness never transcends banality. — Duane Byrge, originally published on Oct. 7, 1985.
