1985
D: Savage Steve Holland
C: John Cusack, David Ogden Stiers, Kim Darby, Demian Slade, Scooter Stevens, Diane Franklin, Laura Waterbury, Dan Schneider, Yuji Okumoto, Brian Imada, Chuck Mitchell, Amanda Wyss, Curtis Armstrong, Aaron Dozier, Frank Burt Avalon, J. Warren David, Peter Ellenstein, Vincent Schiavelli, Edward Mehler, Taylor Negron, Rich Little
W: Savage Steve Holland
Original Music: Rupert Hine
Cinematography: Isidore Mankofsky
Runtime: 97 min
Country: USA
Language: English
Color: Color
Aspect Ratio: 1.85 : 1
Sound Mix: Stereo / Dolby Digital
Certification: PG
Lane Meyer’s girlfriend just dumped him in no uncertain terms for the captain of the high school ski team. His mother is off her rocker (she gives him TV dinners as Christmas presents). His dad is a clueless dork, always trying to “relate.” His kid brother is a perv. There’s a psychotic paperboy who really wants his two dollars. He’s so messed up he doesn’t even realize that his French foreign exchange student neighbor Monique has the hots for him. To make matters worse his one escape plan from this hellish existence fails miserably after botching several suicide attempts. But hope springs eternal and Lane, with the help of his best friend Charles De Mar, hatches a plan to get his girl back. But when the trophy’s in his hands will he still want her?
Hilarious performances all around, especially Dan Schneider as Ricky the glue sniffing neighbor and 80’s teen flick staple Curtis Armstrong as Charles De Mar (”I’ve been going to this high school for seven and a half years. I’m no dummy!”). Demian Slade is also great as the paperboy. He got a starring part a couple years after this as the wise-ass son of Annette Funicello and Frankie Avalon in the hit-and-miss throwaway comedy Back To The Beach.
Interestingly, John Cusack actually hates this film, as well as his other Savage Steve Holland collaboration One Crazy Summer. He refuses to talk about them in interviews. Holland has said that during the first days of shooting One Crazy Summer he screened Better Off Dead for the cast and crew and Cusack walked out after 20 minutes, later approaching him and saying “You know, you tricked me. Better Off Dead was the worst thing I have ever seen. I will never trust you as a director ever again, so don’t speak to me.” What is weird about this is that they are both uncommonly clever comedies, and Cusack is as good in them as he’s ever been in anything.
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