August 6, 2017
Okay, folks. I am back on the job with 365 Degrees!! I will
spare you the details of my absence, but, long story short, it don’t pay to
have two computers go Crap City on you at the same time…
That being said, my computer guy got me back on track, and
it’s time to catch up. When last we talked, we had reveled in A Nightmare on
Elm Street. Our first movie today is a complete shift of gears, one that could
give you whiplash, so hold on tight. We go from one of the ultimate scares to
one of the most irreverent, crude, sexist, but terribly funny movies you will ever
see. It stars one of the most controversial comedians of the past 30 years. So,
from ultimate horror, we go to the rock and roll detective stories known as The
Adventures of Ford Fairlane.
Andrew Dice Clay stars as Ford Fairlaine, the detective
whose clientele is exclusively targeted to the music industry in L.A. He is a
successful detective, but his clients
tend to pay him in almost every way other than cash. He gets gold records,
watches, even koala bears. His long-suffering assistant, Jazz (the incredibly lovely
Lauren Holly), puts up with his ridiculous attitude because she has a lingering
crush on him, but Ford is more interested in almost everything else in a skirt.
On the day after rock star Bobby Black (Vince Neil) dies of
a suspicious overdose, Ford starts getting phone calls. His old pal, DJ Johnny
Crunch (Gilbert Gottfried) wants to hire him to find his estranged daughter, a
band groupie named Zuzu Petals. Not ten minutes after their meeting, Johnny is electrocuted
in his DJ booth, and the plot thickens. The LAPD detective assigned to the
case, Lt. Amos (Ed O’Neill) hates Ford because Ford wrecked his career as a
disco singer back in Ford’s days as a publicist. Rich socialite Colleen Sutton
(Priscilla Presley) also wants to hire him to find "her sister," who supposedly is also Zuzu Petals. 
When Ford finds Zuzu Petals at Bobby Black’s funeral, she
gets snatched by a maniacal madman with a freaky smile (Robert Englund, with no
Freddy Krueger makeup!!), he and the maniac have a car chase through Hollywood Cemetery in hearses. During the chase (yes, DURING the chase), Ford finds out
Colleen Sutton’s money comes from her alimony checks from another of Ford’s many
enemies, record company owner Julian Grendel (Wayne Newton!) . When someone
blows up Ford’s beachfront home, a temple to rock and roll, and his custom 1957
Ford Fairlane (yeah, I know, but it is a car. Ford took his name from the car…),
all bets are off. He has Zuzu, who is as stupid as a person can be, but he has
no idea who she is or what part she plays in this mystery, but, as he says, “Time
to do the detective thing.”
Look, I’m not gonna sit here and tell you this is a great
detective movie. It definitely ain’t The Maltese Falcon. Hell, it ain’t even a
Maltese dog. It’s basically a star vehicle for Clay, who was at the crest of
his career as a foul-mouthed, crude, rude comedian. Daniel Waters and James
Cappe wrote the screenplay knowing this, and they made the most of it. Renny
Harlin, who loves to make things blow up almost as much as Michael Bay,
directed the movie, and he makes good action movies. Combine all these elements
and you get a jackpot of humor, action, and attitude that makes a really good
movie.
Special focus time – the supporting cast here is
surprisingly good. Englund plays a great maniac, but we all knew that. But
watching people like Wayne Newton and Priscilla Presley be nasty bad guys is rather
fun. Morris Day, who I will always swear was the saving grace of Purple Rain,
plays Ford’s good friend, record producer Don Cleveland. Maddie Corman is hysterical as the utterly
brainless Zuzu Petals. But let’s give a huge shoutout to Lauren Holly. As the
brains behind her boss, Holly really shows her talent for comedy as well as
action. This was only her second feature film, Band of the Hand being the
first. From Band, to Ford Fairlane, she went stellar with her roles in Dumb and
Dumber and Down Periscope, then a long run on the great TV show Picket Fences,
and on to her Emmy-nominated role as the ultra-tough head of Mark Harmon's investigative team on
NCIS, a show I don’t think you could kill with a stick and a silver
bullet.
But, for all that, this movie revolves around Andrew Dice
Clay. And, hey, I will be the first to say he can be revolting sometimes with
his comedy. He’s boorish, he’s sleazy, yadda yadda yadda. In this movie,
though, he shines. His Ford Fairlane is basically a slightly-shined up version
of his own stage personality. He even takes advantage of this several times in
his voiceover narration, making references to having been close to being a
rock star until he was banned from MTV, and in one very funny exchange, with a
girl in a club, he gives her his phone number, starting with 555. She stops
him, complaining that “that’s not a real phone number, that’s the one they use
in the movies.” His reply? “No shit, honey, what do you think this is, real
life?” Ford is completely aware he’s in a movie about himself, and he loves
that fact. It’s the Diceman being the Diceman, playing Ford Fairlane being Ford
Fairlaine. He even sings a nice little number at one point, trying to show a very lame new singing prospect how to really sing "rockin'-rapin'-roll," and it's not a bad song at all. Everything Ford/Dice does just works!
If you need a no-brainer of a movie, something to sit back
with after work with a beer or two and a bag of fried green tomato-flavored Lay’s
chips (thanks Tammy!), grab The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and sit back on the
couch. You will laugh, you will grimace, and you will have fun. And, really, in
Ford’s universe, it’s all about that – just sitting back and having fun.
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