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Holistic Guidance - Better Off Dead
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List Price: $9.98
Our Price: $3.15
Your Save: $ 6.83 ( 68% )
Availability: N/A
Manufacturer: 20th Century Fox
Starring: John Cusack, David Ogden Stiers, Kim Darby, Demian Slade, Scooter Stevens
Directed By: Savage Steve Holland
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9786301802321
Format: Closed-captioned
ISBN: 6301802322
Label: 20th Century Fox
Manufacturer: 20th Century Fox
Publisher: 20th Century Fox
Release Date: 2000-05-23
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Theatrical Release Date: 1985-10-11
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Editorial Reviews:
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Lane Myer (John Cusack) is stuck in a personal hell. A compulsive, adolescent Everyman growing up in Suburbia, USA, not only does he fail to make the prestigious high school ski team (again), but his beloved sweetheart, Beth, also leaves him for Roy, the team's popular, arrogant captain. If this isn't bad enough, he's stuck with a mother who frighteningly experiments--rather than cooks--with food, a brother who builds rockets out of models, and a best friend so desperate for drugs that he settles for snorting powdered snow. Faced with these prospects, Lane opts to end it all ... until he comes up with a ridiculous plan to gain acceptance and win Beth back. Director Savage Steve Holland warps this simple, clichéd premise, letting his wacky imagination twist it into a fairly original, slightly dark, and completely hilarious '80s teen comedy. Not as serious a "suicide-attempt" movie as, say, Harold and Maude but just as funny, the film's more a collection of screwball sketches than a narrative. Holland livens the high jinks with surrealistic fantasy touches, including Jell-O that crawls, a hamburger that sings Van Halen, drawings that mock its creator, Japanese race-car drivers who only speak Howard Cosell, and a psychotic paperboy seeking blood over a missing $2. Cusack puts the whole thing on his shoulders and carries the insanity with another one of his touching, obsessively romantic performances, which, along with Say Anything, The Sure Thing, and One Crazy Summer, made him the quintessential (and appealing) personification of lovestruck adolescence and suffering. --Dave McCoy
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Sorry your mom blew up Ricky
Comment: One of the best movies ever... just classic. "He's skiing on 1 SKI! umm.. And something is following them."
Buy it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Better off alive so I can watch tis movie
Comment: This is on my list of great funny movies.It's really funny and has a great ending.Better Off Dead - I Love the 80's Edition
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Better Off Dead
Comment: John Cusack has had a marvelous career and continues to improve his talent, more in dramatic roles like "1408" these days. As a young man he played in a number of comedies and this is certainly a good one. When his girlfriend breaks up with him he thinks it's the end of the world. The fact that just about everything in his room has her picture on it let's us in on the fact he may be slightly over the edge. To say he was slightly obsessed with her is putting it mildly. Eventually he meets a foreign exchange student and she helps him through his crisis. Her reason for seeking out John is twofold. She thinks he's funny and the family she is living with is mental. The mother wants her to be her sons girlfriend and he still plays with dolls and would give Porky Pig a run for his money at the food trough. When it looks like John will get his old girlfriend back we see the age old question of the two "H's", hormones or honesty. Fun movie especially for fans of 80's movies. Good quality DVD, but no extras. Good replayability. If you enjoyed this catch "Say Anything" and "National Lampoon's Van Wilder".
CA Luster
Customer Rating:
Summary: Flash Back to the 80's!!!
Comment: WOW!!! What a classic Cusack film! He was SO young... SO cute... SO Cusack! This hilarious tale follows the hopeless romantic on his quest for a revengeful death... or lack thereof. With timeless characters, colorful cartoons and questionable food, your eyes won't be bored with all the visual delights. Not to mention the outlandish comments and situations everyone finds themselves in. Definite knee slapper!!! ;)
"Two dollars!" - CLASSIC!!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Hilarious and charming 80s feast
Comment: Take a lovelorn teen, a crazy fast food boss, kind but goofy parents, a kid brother with a science interest, a snotty skiing champ, a rotten newsboy out for his money, lots and lots and lots of cheesy, 80s synth music, a French exchange student, leg warmers, big hair, Pat Benatar lookalikes.... put them all together and you get Better Off Dead. This is one of the better 1980s comedies featuring teens in various conflicts. Virtually no violence or swearing here, and you'd have to laugh just at the fashions. This also features a very young John Cusack, who is quite likeable in his role as the lead.
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