by Justin Crockett
The 1980’s were a time of blatant suspension of disbelief for moviegoers. It just seemed that we could accept anything as a premise in regard to films. A robot that came to life from a lightning strike and wanted to hang out with Ally Sheedy? Alright. A group of kids that sit in detention for a FULL DAY WITH NO SUPERVISION? And end up hanging out with Ally Sheedy? Yeah, ok.
But upon further analysis, it seems that the reason a lot of 80’s movie plots move forward is due to gross negligence on the parts of very specific character groups.
Front Lobby Security Guards
“There are men with semiautomatics approaching the door sir.”
“Probably nothing”.
Think of every single action movie, there’s almost always a fringe terror group that has to enter a building. But wouldn’t you know it, there’s a crack staff of 2 security guards manning the front desk, and they are dispensed of with record speed. Forget any of their “training”, I’m not even sure they ever get a chance to unholster their guns.
Movie Police Chiefs/Police Staff Psychologists
The chief is always the loudmouth, bellowing out “Get Riggs/Nolte/Foley” into my office NOW! And yet, they never get their rogue arrogant cops in line, and usually they take them off the investigation, even though the cop always knows what he’s doing, and has been proven right in multiple sequels.
The psychologists might have a mention in that they are clearly, especially with Riggs, dealing with a not-completely-there-mentally cop, and let him go about his job blindly. Martin Riggs has suicidal thoughts and a gun, the entire department knows he lost his wife and that he’s unstable. Can we get this man in a class or therapy session before he polices the 2nd largest city in America?
Villain Henchmen
Think about The Joker’s crew in Burton’s Batman, The Foot Clan in Ninja Turtles, Bennett’s men in Commando, Lo Pan’s men in Big Trouble in Little China(including the 2 Raiden motherfuckers); huge hordes of bad guys whose sole purpose is to protect one guy. They have all sorts of cool weapons at their disposal, and there are generally dozens of them.
And they all fail. Usually against one guy.
School Administrators
“I had a 14 year old boy pose nude for me!!!!”
Mark Harmon in Summer School let a guy go to the bathroom and then completely forgot him. Principal Vernon in the Breakfast Club let all sorts of unsupervised shenanigans go on. Principal Rooney has an unnatural bitter hatred for one single high school student. The Heathers high school allows a culture of murder and suicide.
How are our 80’s high school students possibly making it to 90’s college movies?
Real Estate Planners
In Poltergeist, Coach is a realtor that finds out from his boss that his development is built knowingly on a sacred burial ground. In Pet Semetary, the family moves into a house that is directly next to a narrow ass road that is perfect for, what else, high-speed truckers. That’s bad enough, but they also live next to ancient Indian burial grounds as well.
Business Handshakes 