Risky Business
| Year: | 1983 |
| Production Co: | The Geffen Company |
| Director: | Paul Brickman |
| Producer: | Jon Avnet/Steve Tisch |
| Writer: | Paul Brickman |
| Cast: | Tom Cruise, Rebecca De Mornay, Curtis Hanson, Bronson Pinchot, Joe Pantoliano |
Would Bob Seger's Old Time Rock and Roll be nearly as immortal without one of the most famous entrances in movie history?
It's hard nowadays to equate sometime-Oscar baiting show pony Tom Cruise with a teen comedy where he's finally free of parents and responsibilities, but even Risky Business was a step up from the usual teen fare even of the early 80s, let alone today when all movies - not just teen comedies - are targeted at teenagers.
So there's a lot more than dick jokes and a prostitute main character in this fable about one boy's struggle to have fun and become a man, all under the nose of various authority figures who threaten to bust him at every turn while his wealthy parents are away on holiday.
Straight arrow Joel (Cruise) and his friends don't want to do much more than enjoy themselves in his Chicago mansion - turning the equaliser up full force, using his house for a sex hotel and driving his Dad's wicked 928S Porsche.
When Joel gets the chance to pop his cherry with a beautiful hooker (De Mornay), things start to get out of hand. She disappears with a priceless household heirloom after giving him an exorbitant bill for services, and after Joel crashes his father's precious, uninsured car into the lake, the lady of the night's potentially fearsome pimp shows up, intent on taking Joel for everything he can.
Joel throws the party to end all to raise the money to get his dad's car fixed, eventually getting by on a serious of lucky chances, close shaves and previously unimagined wit and entrepreneurship.
Some soulful sequences - like the train-bound love scene backed by 80s synth-poppers Tangerine Dream - give it an edge over other movies of the genre (everything from Porkys to Superbad), but it was the first serious entry by a leading man who'd become Hollywood's most enduring megastar. Anyone born in the 70s or 80s will know exactly what you mean if you say 'the dream is always the same.'
It's hard nowadays to equate sometime-Oscar baiting show pony Tom Cruise with a teen comedy where he's finally free of parents and responsibilities, but even Risky Business was a step up from the usual teen fare even of the early 80s, let alone today when all movies - not just teen comedies - are targeted at teenagers.
So there's a lot more than dick jokes and a prostitute main character in this fable about one boy's struggle to have fun and become a man, all under the nose of various authority figures who threaten to bust him at every turn while his wealthy parents are away on holiday.
Straight arrow Joel (Cruise) and his friends don't want to do much more than enjoy themselves in his Chicago mansion - turning the equaliser up full force, using his house for a sex hotel and driving his Dad's wicked 928S Porsche.
When Joel gets the chance to pop his cherry with a beautiful hooker (De Mornay), things start to get out of hand. She disappears with a priceless household heirloom after giving him an exorbitant bill for services, and after Joel crashes his father's precious, uninsured car into the lake, the lady of the night's potentially fearsome pimp shows up, intent on taking Joel for everything he can.
Joel throws the party to end all to raise the money to get his dad's car fixed, eventually getting by on a serious of lucky chances, close shaves and previously unimagined wit and entrepreneurship.
Some soulful sequences - like the train-bound love scene backed by 80s synth-poppers Tangerine Dream - give it an edge over other movies of the genre (everything from Porkys to Superbad), but it was the first serious entry by a leading man who'd become Hollywood's most enduring megastar. Anyone born in the 70s or 80s will know exactly what you mean if you say 'the dream is always the same.'