Viewed in
2012
Formats
HDTV
Premise
Rowdy Roddy Piper stars as a vagabond who stumbles upon sunglasses that show that we're controlled by skull-faced alien/monster/thingies.
Loved
Two lead actors, the cheesiness.
Disliked
Slow first 30 minutes.
Thoughts
I hoped for "so bad that it's good", and for the most part it succeeded.
I have no clue what convinced director John Carpenter to cast Piper as the lead, but turned out he was the perfect fit, since it required delivering ridiculously over-the-top dialog with gusto. I don't care how many times I've heard/seen that clip, but "I'm here to kick ass and chew bubble gum. And I'm all out of bubble gum." never gets old.
The other brilliant casting was Keith David as Piper's buddy. His voice and presence just made him such a BAMF who gave Hot Rod's bravado a run for his money. The centerpiece was their hilariously long brawl in an alley over Piper trying to convince David to wear the sunglasses. There were so many false endings and WWE moves that it got a standing O from me.
Other fantastically unintentionally funny things were the nonsensical attempt to show America's decadence in the plot (and through sunglasses), no explanation about who were these formaldehyde-faces, and horribly constricting masks that prevented actors from talking out of them properly. Yet none could touch the most powerful roundhouse bottle swing in history by a chick that sent Piper flying out a glass door and down a bajillion hills.
My complaints would be that the first act was too long and slow. I wanted Piper to run out of bubble gum sooner. Also, the score kept playing the same tune repetitively throughout.
They Live was a great bad 1980's flick. And it had some surprising charm thanks to Rowdy Rod and Goliath from Gargoyles.
