John Candy Movie Review: ***^ Delirious (1991)

 This is a parody of day time television.  Jack Gable (John Candy) is a writer for a daytime drama.  He bonks his head and then finds he in the daytime drama he is writing.  He further discovers that he can manipulate the characters by what he writes.  He has always had a crush on Laura Claybourne/ Rachel (Emma Samms) and writes them together, while another writer is writing different things.  Gable is falling in love with Louise/Janet Dubois (Mariel Hemingway).  At one point Gable is frustrated and breaks his typewriter.  So he has to perform surgery on the typewriter so as to save Janet.  

This show actually has some humor.  And some very shallow soap box characters.  And in the end one love story.

Robert Wagner has a cameo as the business man Jack Gates.  Raymond Burr plays the father of the ruthless Hedison family.  

Tom Hanks Movie Review: ****Splash (1984)

 This is the movie that launched the career of Tom Hanks.  Hanks portrays Allen Bauer and John Candy portrays his older brother, Freddy Bauer.  Together they run a vegetable distributor in New York.  The movie presents us this first, and Allen's messed up love life.  He decides to take a break to Cape Cod, where his family had a happy vacation.  But through a series of bad luck, he ends up capsized, and the boat hits him in the head.

He is rescued by a mermaid (Bo Derek) who puts him ashore and waits until he wakes so Allen sees her.  She finds his wallet in the ocean, and decides to visit him in New York.  She arrives on Liberty Island naked.  But she has Allen's wallet, and he is contacted and comes to collect her; which starts a lorid love affair.  She has a seven day vacation as a human, but after that she can only stay if she becomes human forever.  Allen is unaware of her mermaid qualities, just that she is different.  She decides to accept his proposal of marriage, meaning she will give up being a mermaid.

However enters Walter Kornbluth (Eugene Levy) who is determined to expose her, and prove to the world that his theories on mermaids are real--they do exist.  After a couple failures where he sprays water on innocent women trying to turn them to mermaids, he finally does expose her.  She is taken away for scientific experiments.  He is also taken due to their interaction.  However when he proves to have no abilities he is let go.  Allen is lost, but his brother reminds him that love is love and is very rare.  Allen needs to save her.  They recruit Kornbluth for the attempt, and pretending to be Swedish scientists they make the attempt.

The ending is different than you might think.  This show is very cute and introduces Tom Hanks to the world.  Ron Howard directed.  Even with Candy's character being a bit loud, and even Tom Hanks giving Allen the same quality at times, I enjoyed this show.  Bo Derek, being a model, does well in an acting roll.  

Movie Review: ****^Cool Runnings (1993)

This is a 1993 movie of the first Jamaican bob sled team at the 1988 Winter Olympics.  I actual remember this story from the Calgary Olympics.  Four sprinters, who were hoping to run track and field, but a fall ends this dream, but still wanting to be Olympians, take up bob sledding.  Irv Blitzer (John Candy) becomes their coach.  This movie is not only motivational, but funny.  A lines that sticks, "You dead man?"  This line is in my vocabulary.  The Jamaicans find their style, with a lucky egg, and their own song, "We got a Jamaican Bob Sled Team."  It is amazing how sometimes dreams hang by a thread, and theew is always opposition.  Sometimes opposition comes from those you love; sometimes from those you don't know; and sometimes from others who disrespect you.  Whatever the case you have to stand and fight.

Movie Review: ***Spaceballs

This is one of Mel Brooks' best movies.  Spaceballs is a parody of Star Wars, and all movies in the science fiction genre, as it gets a bit at most of them, Planet of the Apes (the statue of liberty in the sand), Alien (a baby being born from a man's stomach), and Star Trek (Lone Star using the Vulcan shoulder squeeze).  It hits most of the time, and a couple places misses.  The Schwartz idea is funny, but goes over board when they hold their life savers in front of their crotches.  The spaceship turning into a maid with a vacuum is totally classic.  This movie has tons of, Mel Brooks plays Yogurt, as well as as President Skroob, our villain.  Rick Moranis is Dark Helmet, a miniature Vader.  John Candy plays Barf, a half man half dog character.  Bill Pullman is Lone Star, Daphne Zuniga the princess (who has to marry a prince, and luckily Lone Star discovers he is one).  Dick Van Patton is the king, and George Wyner is Colonel Sandurz.  Quote classics:
Yogurt: Use the Schwartz, Lone Starr! Use the Schwartz!
Lone Starr: I can't - I lost the ring!
Yogurt: Forget the ring! The ring is bubkis! I found it in a Cracker Jack box!

Self-Destruct Voice: This ship will self-destruct in twenty seconds. This is your last chance to push the cancellation button.
President Skroob: Cancellation button? HURRY!

Colonel Sandurz: Sir hadn't you better buckle up?
Dark Helmet: Ah, buckle this! LUDICROUS SPEED! *GO!*

Barf: I'm a mog: half man, half dog. I'm my own best friend!

Dark Helmet: Before you die there is something you should know about us, Lone Star.
Lone Starr: What?
Dark Helmet: I am your father's brother's nephew's cousin's former roommate.
Lone Starr: What's that make us?
Dark Helmet: Absolutely nothing! Which is what you are about to become.

Dark Helmet: What's the matter, Colonel Sandurz? CHICKEN? 

This movie has its moments, but a pit crude for my taste.

Movie Review: *****Home Alone

The Home Alone movies were made to entertain.  But in the first two, with the witticisms of John Hughes, we get some very powerful Christmas messages.  The first of the series is the best.  *****Home Alone was produced in 1990 with Macaulay Culkin in the leading role of Kevin McCallister.  Kevin is left home from a family trip to France, after he wished his family gone the night before.  He then spends the first day doing everything he is not suppose to, waiting for someone to discipline him.  This includes sleigh riding down the stairs, watching a violent movie, and jumping on his parent's bed.  He then takes over as the man of the house, and when a couple burglars threaten the home, he defends his home from intruders.  His efforts, and plans for home defense, and the bungling burglars are what make this show so fun to watch.  Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern are very good in their roles and take the brunt of Kevin's defenses.  This includes a bee-bee gun, slippery stairs, nail and ornaments left out for bare feet, flame thrower for the head, paint cans flying through the air.  However the movie becomes classic when it adds the neighbor, who saves Kevin in the end.  He is supposedly a murderer as rumored around town and related by Kevin's older brother.  The neighbor is also estranged from his son.  Kevin, after overcoming his fears, befriends the old man.  Kevin points out that he should at least reach out to his son, that way he won't have to be afraid of what his son might say, he will know one way or the other.  This results in a healing of family relationships and we see the man with his son and granddaughter at the end of the movie.   Kevin's parents are played by David Heard and Catherine O'Hara.  The concern of mother to reach her son is part of the thrill of this movie.  This also leads to a cameo by John Candy, the Polka player.