Review of Gotcha! (1985) by Bass 9 — 25 Jan 2012

Gotcha! (Jeff Kanew, 1985).

Amusing trip into nostalgia-ville (I realized about 3/4 of the way through I'd seen it back in the eighties) that's soured at the end by one scene, but is still kind of fun for all that. Anthony Edwards, who would later go on to A-list status in ER, plays Jonathan, a college-aged nerd (not much of a stretch; remember, his first big break was in Revenge of the Nerds the year previous) involved in a TAG-like game called Gotcha!. All well and good until, on a spring break trip to Europe with his pal/roommate Manolo (A Nightmare on Elm Street's Jsu Garcia), he falls in love with enigmatic Czech beauty Sasha (The Last Seduction's Linda Fiorentino) and gets involved in real-life spy stuff. Now I grant you, Dan Gordon's script is not one of his best. In fact, it's pretty awful, directionless and full of plot holes, and he hadn't quite figured out how to do a thriller yet (he figured it out somewhere down the line, because he was also responsible for the much better Wesley Snipes vehicle Passenger 57 in 1992), but the comedy bits are actually funny and it's at least watchably-paced, while Edwards, Garcia, and Fiorentino are solid actors who are just plain fun to watch onscreen. I doubt any generation other than mine, who were teenagers when this came out, would find it nearly as amusing as I do, though. ***.