Synopsis
It brings all your fantasies to life.
Eighties teen romp involving Bill and his new apartment, Jim and his rebellious antics, Tom and his crazy self, and Anita with her older man David.
1984 Directed by Art Linson
Eighties teen romp involving Bill and his new apartment, Jim and his rebellious antics, Tom and his crazy self, and Anita with her older man David.
Chris Penn Lea Thompson Eric Stoltz Jenny Wright Ilan Mitchell-Smith Rick Moranis Hart Bochner Randy Quaid Robert Ridgely Jack Kehoe Ángel Salazar Michael Bowen Brin Berliner Susan Rinell Hildy Brooks Dean Devlin Sherilyn Fenn Dick Rude Lee Ving Nancy Wilson Cari Anne Warder Simone White Beth McKinley Robert Chestnut Reginald Farmer Leo Penn William Bramley Leigh Lombardi Rande Worcester Show All…
Vida Selvagem, Jóvenes alocados, Jovenes alocados, Attention délires !, Без тормозов, Odjazdowe wakacje, 疯狂野生活, 와일드 라이프
“It’s casual”
More often than not (like literally 90% of the time) the 80s comedies that Kino Lorber puts out hit, and hit me hard. This just became an all-timer for me. Excellent ensemble cast and my goodness, CHRIS PENN. One of my favorite performances ever, ALREADY, and I don’t think I’m overreacting after just watching this. I laughed, out loud, more than a couple of times and, he is so endearing, it almost moved me to tears at times.
I have such a soft spot for hangout movies and this is great one. The only thing I can really compare this to is Dazed and Confused, though it’s obviously not that (nothing is or can be). But the weaving in…
No points for The Wild Life as budding screenwriter Cameron Crowe's seriously disappointing follow-up to Fast Times at Ridgemont High - right down to the fact that it stars bleach blonde Chris Penn as a more aggressive and unlikeable Spicoli-type loser who perpetually fails upward - but I guess I don't have a leg to stand on since I only watched the film for Rick Moranis, who plays a horny nerd with extreme New Wave hair and some great Marilyn Vance-designed costumes, like this half stripe/half checkerboard vest. He didn't have enough scenes, and so of course I feel slighted.
Meanwhile, who would have guessed that Hart Bochner would go from playing a sexy policeman (sorry, don't judge me) in this film to the spineless yuppie co-worker in Die Hard in just a few years? Ah, Hollywood.
The Wild Life is not an ‘80s teen movie we talk a lot about. Cameron Crowe did write both, but we mostly talk about Fast Times. Is The Wild Life as good as Fast Times? That is a no in my opinion, but I do enjoy both.
The Wild Life does feature a strip club brawl, exploding giant donuts, bowling alley shenanigans and sleazy cops. Chris Penn, Eric Stoltz, Lea Thompson and Ilan Mitch-Smith are all on target.
The Wild Life is a good time and very watchable, but some movies from the same genre are more memorable.
It took me a good five minutes to accept that Chris Penn was not Alex Winter! This is a slice of 80’s American pie with an all-star cast and an identity crisis. Scenes that were set up to be funny ended up being a tragic bummer and visa versa. Rick Moranis’ hair was the real star of the show and the brick wall bustin’ party scene has essential party mix tape material. This is the sequel to Fast Times at Ridgemont High and does a good job being different but my attention waned and it isn’t a coming of age movie unless the characters, well, come of age. And, they really don’t. They just have one wild week.
Episode 103 of Movie Melt Podcast.
In my teens, I adored the Bananarama Wild Life video featuring a good dose of the film's footage. Did I say adored? God, I loved that video! Still do. But I never got around to seeing the actual film. Now, sadly, I have. As Cameron Crowe's "follow up" to Fast Times at Ridgemont High, it has great pedigree. And it features lots of great casting choices. How can you go wrong with a film that features Lea Thompson, Randy Quaid, and Rick Moranis?. Hell, it stars Lee Ving, Dick Rude, and Nancy Wilson! OK, we're talking serious downgrade from Sean to Chris (no offense to the sadly departed Chris, but there's no comparison). Outside of that, however, the players are…
Cameron Crowe’s pseudo-sequel to Fast Times is far less concerned with the more tumultuous (or melodramatic) aspects of being a teenager than just having a good time; Amy Heckerling’s deft, and feminine, touch is sorely missed here as Crowe’s cast of chauvinists leave just about every female character in their wake but that errant misogyny may also be what makes it feel, unfortunately, sincere - then again, maybe what every other teen movie of the 80s was missing was a gratuitous redneck brawl in a strip club
“It’s casual.”
Cameron Crowe regales us with more teen high school hijinx à la Fast Times at Ridgemont High. No earth shattering moment like Phoebe Cates’ bit, but lots of fun to be had, this time via the other Penn, Chris. Great cast - Stolz, Lea Thompson, Jenny Wright, Rick Moranis. Also includes sightings of Fear’s Lee Ving, Heart’s Nancy Wilson and the Stones’ Ronnie Wood (raiding a refrigerator). As expected, the soundtrack is great and that includes a fiery score by guitar god Eddie Van Halen! Smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em and crack a few brews, this is gonna be the best summer ever!!!!
Are you wondering how 80's this movie is? Allow this to be your barometer: Chris Penn with bleach blonde hair and a Hawaiian shirt throws a raucous party in which beach bums, a Michael Jackson lookalike, a Boy George lookalike, and some punk rockers (including Lee Ving) crash through the wall into an adjacent apartment, wherein they all proceed to dance to heavy metal music.
"You know what you've done? You made the transition from average guy to the Bill Man."
"It's casual."
Mega producer Art Linson adds a second (and final) directorial credit to his resume that feels more like a DAZED & CONFUSED precursor than it does a FAST TIMES follow up. Allegedly rising out of the ashes of Cameron Crowe attempting to write a Jim Morrison movie (note: thank God we never got that), this is simply more sex, booze and rock n’ roll happening right down the block from Ridgemont High, complete with a score by none other than Eddie Van Halen (though the new Kino disc is sadly the alternate video cut the studio released after the film flopped and they didn’t feel like dumping a ton of cash into retaining the now near-impossible-to-see theatrical edit’s Prince and Madonna…
A great ensemble cast of young actors including Jenny Wright, Eric Stoltz, Lea Thompson and Chris Penn play young high school and college students living “The Wild Life”. We are treated to a sweet Eddie Van Halen soundtrack that sometimes takes center stage over what’s happening onscreen. And when Eddie isn’t jamming, the soundtrack treats us to great classic rock and new wave.
The problem for me is that this all plays out like a few ordinary days in the lives of several ordinary young people. None of them have any important story arc, they don’t seem to have any particularly interesting goals... so who am I supposed to get behind here? It’s sure not going to be Chris Penn,…
I grew up in the 80's and there was a certain mystique of young adulthood that captivated me. I grew up around a lot of kids that were in their teens when I was 6-10 years old. I was never included because I was too little. Their world was almost always closed off to me, and I was only able to catch little pieces of it. I'd hear muffled music behind locked doors and vague references about what high school was like. The feeling of that always stuck with me, even when I got to high school. But it wasn't the same. It was a different time and there was different style and music and nobody acted the same way…