This is actually a fairly good film. It is hard to see how anything with the great Michael Caine could not be.
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Blame It on Rio
mail-2775 — 16 years ago(March 07, 2010 04:43 AM)
This is actually a fairly good film. It is hard to see how anything with the great Michael Caine could not be.
The main problem with this is that the casting is so horrible that, well, it isn't cast at all, it is as if they threw darts at headshots at the Hollywood post office and just put those people in it. The casting is so off that it lacks context.
First, it is almost impossible to imagine that the daughters were actually genetically related to the people that are supposedly their parents. Why have Michelle Johnson in the lead? Why not Connie Chung or Donna Summer? They are also not actresses and also don't look as if they could possibly be related to Joseph Bologna. The acting of Joseph Bologna is very poor in this film, too.
Second, the daughters themselves are bad choices. Does anyone buy Demi Moore as a teenager? She seems far too assertive and worldly. Michelle Johnson simply can not act. It isn't quite Mischa Barton not acting, but close enough. She readsand I do mean readsevery line at an 80% panic voice. She is a good fit with her looks and overall teenage obliviousness, but picking someone with zero acting experience to carry the lead in a feature film is ill-advised.
Third, there is no context for how ridiculously disparate the people are. Why are there two lifelong best friends, presumably from America, where one speaks with a very heavy still-living-in-England English accent, and the other speaks like a Brooklyn gangster who dropped out of school? Can anyone imagine Michael Caine and Valerie Harper as a 20+ year couple?
The music in this picture is just pathetic. Talk about dated. No, I am not talking about 1984, I am talking about going to garage sales and picking out 1960s LPs of easy listening/ethnic/Jazz music, and then just cueing various songs into the film at random places. The music is pure crap, and the part that isn't ethno-sounding sounds like Marilyn McCoo or Hair or something like that.
I almost had to bail on this picture in the first ten minutes because it is so poorly made. About 75% of the first half hour of this film has the dialog badly voiced-over. This is because the people who made this film did not know how to make a film and tried filming with live sound in a factory without shutting off the machines and in an airport without making everything quiet. This picture would get you a C in second year film school.
What redeems this film is a decent (well, indecent) story that has a shocking twist ending.
I recommend it, but only slightly, and only if you can see it for free. -
Defenseman13 — 16 years ago(March 07, 2010 12:13 PM)
I can't believe you got so busy over a mediocre 80's movie.
http://us.imdb.com/board/22339870/ -
summerishere77 — 14 years ago(July 17, 2011 02:23 PM)
Just saw this movie today, it was so bad but I couldn't help but finish it up so I could see how it would end.
Michelle Johnson's voice was so annoying though, I wanted to mute her every time she came on screen. -
lebellue — 13 years ago(September 03, 2012 04:15 AM)
Of course the film wasn't perfect and had flaws, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and thought it was HILARIOUSI laughed like crazy! I thought the casting was really good. EXCEPT, Valerie Harper,.next to an amazing actor like Michael Caine, she was terrible! Every line she delivered seemed very overacted and fake to me. I was just glad that she wasn't in the movie for very long. I have to check her out in other movies she has been in and give her a second chance.
As far as the difference in look between the kids and parents geneticallyHer Dad was a bit darker ..maybe Michele's hair was supposed to be bleached but,her eyes, at least, were brown like her dad's. We didn't see Michele Johnson's mom (maybe she looked like her)
Maybe Demi Moore was adopted or whatever. You can't assume that they are genetically related kids
Kids don't always look like their parents. Two different parents can make very different combinations in looksI've seen it!