Review of Road House (1989) by David L — 11 Mar 2008

To begin,. I grabbed a dvd of Roadhouse for a friend of mine this past weekend. It made me feel a wave of nostalgia for the film along with the recent news of Swayze's battle with pancreatic cancer( I hope he beats this and recovers very soon)Road House is a movie about tough guys (and a few tough gals) hitting each other along with some philosophy, a couple of steamy sex scenes and some gratutious nude scenes( even a butt shot from" the Swayz" just for the ladies). For nearly two hours we are asked to sit back and enjoy folks getting stabbed, shot, head-butted, struck with bottles, struck with pool cues, throats torn out, eyes blackened, heads smashed against tables, and so on and so on.What can I say but it's a movie thats alot of fun and I enjoy it more each time I watch it.

For the few who haven't seen the film, Dalton (Patrick Swayze) is a super-tough bouncer ? known in the trade as a "cooler" ? who specialises in turning violent, lawless bars into sophisticated night-spots. He is offered a phenomenal wage if he can transform a run-down Kansas hell-hole, named the "Double Deuce", into a more civilised, respectable kind of place. Dalton visits the "Double Deuce" to find out what he's letting himself in for, and finds it every bit as rough and tough as anywhere he's ever worked. Within a few weeks, though, he starts to get the joint's reputation sorted out ? firing the incompetents, coaching those that show potential, and maintaining strict discipline amongst the drinkers who frequent the place. He even gets a girlfriend in the shape of local nurse Elizabeth Clay (Kelly Lynch). It's not all smooth sailing, however, as the town's resident crime lord Brad Wesley (Ben Gazzara) starts to get irritated by Dalton's successful attempts to clean up the town and the "Double Deuce". Seems Wesley preferred it as it was. Various thugs and hired hands try to drive Dalton away, and their campaign against him slowly starts to wear him down. Dalton calls his friend Wade Garrett (Sam Elliott) ? the ultimate bouncer, and the guy who taught Dalton every trick in the book ? and together they stand up against Wesley's reign of fear.

There's really very little to say about Road House. It has mindless action for those of us who crave such things; some of the dialogue is curiously quotable; and its choreographed fist-fights are every bit as brutal as they're supposed to be. Director Rowdy Herrington (an apt name, if ever there was one) knows exactly which target audience he's trying to satisfy, and he gives them what they want. The film is photographed efficiently, and Michael Kamen underscores the proceedings with simple but suitable music. Performance-wise, well no Oscar winning performances here but in this kinda film its not needed. Swayze does some good work here, just to bad he didn't do more action films( I guess Roadhouse can fall into being the 1st film in the Swayze action trilogy with Next Of Kin And Point Break rounding things out), Gazzara smiles jovially even when being threatened just as any evil villian in a action film is suppose to do , Elliot delivers juicy lines with snarling relish, and Lynch basically stands around looking sexy. This is one film where it's unlikely that anyone will be glancing at their watch every five minutes wishing that the movie will hurry up and finish. At the very least, one can appreciate it on the level of entertaining trash. In the end is this as I've heard it called "Macbeth With Mullets", a Friday night no-brainer or a film of lasting significance and high art, you decide.