Why is this movie so appealing?
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Streets of Fire
mill2542 — 16 years ago(June 18, 2009 07:39 PM)
This movie wasn't one of those award winners with a big cast. The plot was ok..nothing greatacting was okbut for some reason it's one of my favorites.
I was 19 when this movie came out and I wanted to look like Diane Lane so bad. She looked great in this movie. I just wanted to add my 2 cents. Whenever this movie comes on cable I make sure to Tivo it. I will never tire of this movie. -
sisterdebmac — 16 years ago(June 18, 2009 08:01 PM)
You just explained it. That's what it meant for you. For others it meant different things, but it reached a cult-sized audience. I think it's great because it has so many fun characters and set pieces and the music is just effin' fantastic. I was already a fan of TEN people in this cast. I've since become a fan of many more. I just adore it. I've seen it a ridiculous number of times, a lot of them on the big screen.
Once, at a midnight showing at the old Akers Mill theater in Atlanta, they slaughterhouse fived the damn thing! They ran it with the reels out of sequence. People complained, but it screened all mixed up anyway, and most people stayed. LOL!
Palin/Nugent 2012! Smell that? Mmmmm sarcasm.
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ozymandias312 — 16 years ago(September 14, 2009 06:41 AM)
I just bought the DVD. ;o)
I saw it twice on the big screen, once in a regular commercial theater when it first came out, then again sometime later (possibly as much as a year later) at a free screening in a nearby college theater. I was not a student then. I just went over to see the movie again, for free.
I was either 27 or 28 then. I'd spent about ten years trying to be something kind of like the archetype Tom Cody represented joined the Army just to shoot their guns and everything but it hadn't really worked, and I was still pretty much just another walkin'-down-the-sidewalk kind of guy. Yeah, I had a gun or two, but, so what? As Johnny Rocco said in Key Largo, "Thousands of guys got guns."
The projectioneer did a poor job, and, to my further annoyance, the mainly-student audience reaction was generally negative. I mean, to the movie itself, not just the botched screening. I never understood why some people disliked it so much.
I remember trying to discuss it with some other audience members later in the hallway, and I was trying to explain about symbolism and alternate realities and Jungian archetypes and so forth, and how all these different neighborhoods were like separate, squabbling city-states in ancient Greece or Renaissance Italy and all, but they just thought it was "dumb."
Well, I thought they were too dumb to get what it had to offer. They thought they were too smart for it, when in fact it was all going right over their heads.
Ozy
And I stood where I did be; for there was no more use to run; And again I lookt with my hope gone. -
ozymandias312 — 16 years ago(September 24, 2009 07:47 PM)
I have to say the "sledge hammer" (actually railroad spike-driving mauls, I think) duel was fairly unique. The only things I can think of that were really comparable were the climactic fight on the moving flatcar in Emperor of the North Pole(1973?), or maybe the chainsaw duel in Dark of the Sun(1968).
Ozy
And I stood where I did be; for there was no more use to run; And again I lookt with my hope gone. -
goblu78 — 14 years ago(February 02, 2012 10:59 AM)
I just downloaded the soundtrack. Amazing musical score. The coloring of the scenes with that nostalgic look, Diane Lane Deborah Von Walkenburg and Rick Moranis over the top. Had something for everyone in this movie.
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alison1963 — 16 years ago(September 25, 2009 07:53 PM)
I was 21 when I saw this (was released 1984, right?) and hormonal, a late developer, fell in love with Michael Pare, was at the height of all the wonderful stuff happening in the (much maligned 80's a decade of great change musically and otherwise) and I just remember being blown away big music, the production and just the pure outlandish romance of it all - Mills & Boon with extra great music and just right there, in your face.
For a rather naive 21 year old was pure gold!
"If you build it, he will come" -
Hewzy-LFC — 16 years ago(October 07, 2009 03:58 AM)
Diane Lane is the main reason i love it. The film itself is great too with an excellent soundtrack. find it really funny seeing Rick Moranis trying to act like the big man. Its just a all round quality movie that never gets boring. great song to finish the film too.
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Apollyon_Crash — 16 years ago(October 16, 2009 01:44 PM)
I like the film because it feels almost like a classic westernthe reluctant hero (almost an anti-hero), rolling into town and facing off against insurmountable odds to accomplish his goal, and basically kicking a$$. I'm a big fan of the short-lived FOX TV series "Firefly" for the same reason.
I also dug the atmosphere of SOFthe 1950s cars and lingo combined with the almost post-apocalyptic decay and breakdown of society was not only a cool combination, but even somewhat believable. Almost as if the film was set in an alternate 1980s, years after Russia dropped the bomb on the U.S. (and after maybe 20 years or so of world war), and society had barely evolved since. -
distant-skies — 16 years ago(December 06, 2009 11:02 PM)
It appeals to me because it inspired some of my favorite japanese anime at the time. Megazone 23, Bubblegum Crisis, and maybe others. Look at the intro to the first episode of Bubblegum Crisis and it almost looks like a replica of this movie.
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Ghost the Lost Soul — 14 years ago(December 31, 2011 09:50 PM)
I read that this film was highly popular in Japan at the time and was the influence of many anime series at the time. One of my favorite anime OVAs,
Red Photon Zillion: Burning Night
, was said to be inspired by this film.
People of the IMDB forums: Please learn how to type! -
daja_ace — 16 years ago(January 21, 2010 08:45 PM)
Funny thing is, I was too young to see this movie in theaters when it came out back in 1984 yet I love it.
For me I guess, I saw the movie on VHS many years ago and something about it really pulled me in. I think that the cast, the acting, the setting and atmosphere, the music, and the action was more than enough to get me to like this movie. The moonwalk being in it also helps out too.
Michael Pare really comes across like a true ass-kicker but managed to have great on-screen chemistry with Diane Lane. Willem Dafoe is a truly crazy and sadistic antagonist in this "rock and roll fable". Also, naturally since the same guy who directed
The Warriors
(a true classic imo) is responsible for this movie it makes sense that this would be a classic and a really good piece of cinema too.
I can't speak for anyone else but IMHO it seems that just about everything about this movie really clicks and it has plenty of memorable scenes. That's my take on it and why it's so appealing to me. -
sisterdebmac — 16 years ago(January 21, 2010 09:14 PM)
Totally agree. I also love The Warriors. Dave and I saw it at countless midnight movies and art houses over the years and I bought that Special Edition DVD when it came out. Though I think I prefer the original version of the film. What's your opinion on that Daj?
Let me tell you a little story. You're an idiot!