“Road House” Review
Patrick Swayze is the epitome of cool in “Road House”, the cult classic action comedy film that has become the subject of a remake on Amazon Prime Video.
There are plenty of films that have been labeled as “so bad they’re good” and I have enjoyed a great many of them. However, many of those films are enjoyed ironically because of how colossal their failures are. But what about films that are intentionally made to be ridiculous, over-the-top and massively dumb? This is the case with the 1989 cult classic “Road House” which, despite being only a modest success at the box office, quickly gained a massive following and has become a beloved exercise of excessive action, humor and excitement. While the 2024 reimagining of the film starring Jake Gyllenhal appears to have a similar overblown style, I can’t fathom any remake topping this masterpiece that is so dumb that it’s brilliant.
In a world of 1980s camp where the average bar has at least five massive fights per night, the true heroes of this “wild west” of honky-tonks, beer halls and dance clubs are “coolers”. Treated with the same respect and fear as gunslingers, these bouncers not only put a stop to trouble but also upend places that have become too rowdy. One such cooler is James Dalton (Patrick Swayze) who has been hired to shake up a joint in Jasper, Missouri called The Double Duece. Upon arrival, Dalton quickly upscales the bar, makes strong friendships with the townsfolk and even starts a romance with local doctor Elizabeth “Doc” Clay (Kelly Lynch). But when Dalton’s actions make him an enemy of Brad Wesley (Ben Gazzara), the richest man in town who runs a racket on every business in the county, Dalton must take the fight to him with his mentor, aging cooler Wade Garrett (Sam Elliott), by his side.
As you can tell by the many references in the plot summary, “Road House” essentially takes the plot of a western and makes a literal translation to the late 80s. In fact, I have found the best way to describe what this film is like. Imagine taking the western stories and massive amounts of violence in a Sam Peckinpah film (“The Wild Bunch”, “Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid”), combine that with the fun mania of a Roger Corman motorcycle movie (“The Wild Angels”) and add in the 80s cheese and borderline homoerotic undertones of “Top Gun” and you get “Road House”. I especially see a lot of Roger Corman’s iconoclastic indie charm throughout the whole film because everything about “Road House” feels like a B-Movie that was made with a modest A-Movie budget.
Don’t be mistaken, this film is insanely goofy but so much of this film also took a lot of thought, especially with the film’s script. While the basic plot is pretty standard, the characterization and dialogue are quite excellent since writers R. Lance Hill and Hilary Henkin knew what to take seriously and what to have fun with. Dalton’s iconic pep talk to the bar staff is full of this and includes such zingers like when he lays out his rules and says “I want you to be nice until it’s time not to be nice” and provides an apt description of the bar’s clientele as “too many 40-year-old adolescents, felons, power drinkers and trustees of modern chemistry.” Some of these lines are so well-written, in the script’s over-the-top manner, that it’s a lot easier to believe that Hilary Henkin would go on to be nominated for an Oscar for writing “Wag the Dog” with David Mamet.
Subtlety is not the forte of “Road House” since all four of its main contenders are named after famous legends from the American West with Dalton sharing a surname with Emmett Dalton, his love’s nickname being similar to “Doc” Holiday, the villain Brad Wesley having ties to John Wesley Hardin and Wade Garrett to Pat Garrett. With the protagonist, Dalton is exceptionally written and really manages to stand out in a decade that was chock full of iconic leading men in action. Swayze doesn’t have the massive figure of Stallone or Schwarzzenegger but he also doesn’t have the everyman feel of Bruce Willis. He sort of fits in the middle with a mullet that would terrify Billy Ray Cyrus and this natural charisma that very few leading men in Hollywood can muster. The character of Dalton is this bizarre enigma. You can tell that the writers were aware of what kind of film they were making so they decided to give him this comical yet suave multifaceted persona. Dalton may be a bar cooler but he also reads poetry, practices Tai Chi and even has a degree in philosophy from NYU. He’s perfectly capable of ripping a person’s throat out and has even killed a man (an event that haunts him and gives his backstory an edge) but he also believes in ending a fight before it begins. He’s like Kwai Chang Caine on steroids.
Swayze is so macho and so cool that “Road House” could only get one man to show his own masculine superiority with Sam Elliott. Despite arriving to help Swayze with just 45 minutes left in the film, Elliott makes the most of his time and seeing the two of them together is about as awesome as it sounds. Even without his trademark mustache (instead rocking a beard and mullet), Elliott still has his mellow yet dangerous nature ever present.
The only thing cooler than Patrick Swayze? Patrick Swayze and Sam Elliott with both men engaged in an epic battle of whose hair looks like God’s?
I also find that having one of the writers be a woman really lent its way to “Road House” having its female characters be more dynamic than one would expect for the time period. Don’t get me wrong, I would not call this a feminist film by any stretch of the imagination. “Road House” is a very hyper-masculine film and completely relishes in that with so much violence, swearing and nudity. Upon reviewing the film, I decided to look past all the male-pandering that I love about this film (Self-interest, am I right?) and really pay attention to the women in this film and I think there’s a bit more autonomy than this film has been given credit for. For starters, Doc is an insanely likable presence and I love how she’s not a damsel in distress. While she does appear in the climax that sees Dalton take on Wesley and his goons, she’s not relegated to a plot device by getting kidnapped or something else that has been done to death.
The film’s women don’t really take part in the action side of things, especially compared to today’s slew of action heroines, but I’d like to mention that one of my favorite quick fights in the film comes from Carrie Ann (Kathleen Wilhoite), a waitress at the Double Deuce. During a massive bar fight, she beats a man over the head with her serving tray, then punches him in the face and then immediately hits him over the head with a beer bottle that was handed to her by another woman. It’s only a few seconds but it’s so perfectly timed and executed that it not only impresses me with how ingenious it is but also how hard it makes me laugh.
I’d also like to mention that, while there is a lot of female nudity in the film (something that I’m pretty sure the audience for “Road House” has enjoyed), it’s not as one-sided as one might think. I guess the filmmakers guessed plenty of men would drag their girlfriends to see this film so they might as well throw in shots of Swayze’s ass. Since this film came out a couple of years after “Dirty Dancing”, I don’t think any of those women that were forced to see the film minded the two hours spent watching the film. While these factors related to female representation aren’t the biggest reasons why “Road House” has endured as a cult classic, I think it was worth mentioning.
When it comes to men beating the absolute shit out of each other, “Road House” more than delivers because this action is truly impressive. While none of these fights are game-changers in the world of stunts, they are all executed brilliantly and keep up the film’s strong balance of legitimate thrills with a goofy edge. Director Rowdy Herrington (yes that’s his name) said that he wanted every fight to stand out and that’s exactly what happened. So many of these stunts are well executed and look painful mainly because they were. A lot of great stuntmen worked hard on this film and all of the main actors (including Swayze and Elliott) did their own work with special instruction from martial artist Benny Urquidez.
During the famous fight where Dalton fights Brad Wesley’s top goon Jimmy Reno (Marshall Teague) which ends with Swayze ripping out his throat after Jimmy says “I used to fuck guys like you in prison” (a line that brings up way too many questions that I don’t want answers to), these two basically tore each other to pieces for the sake of getting the best takes with Swayze hurting his knee and breaking some ribs. Swayze was so beat up from the shoot that he turned down other action roles after “Road House” wrapped and did “Ghost” instead. He then returned to action with “Point Break”. I wouldn’t say that the set was unsafe or negligent but it does show you the risks and punishments that stunt performers and actors who are comfortable doing their own stunts take in order to get the job done.
One factor of “Road House” that has left a huge impact with fans of action movies is the excellent stonework that pushed the actors to the limit.
Along with the actors being completely committed to the project and Herrington’s crazed knack for directing well-polished campy fun, the talent behind the camera really elevates this rough and rowdy tale. If you ever wondered why these fights were shot so well and why the explosions that permeate the film look that good, it’s probably because the film’s cinematography was done by Dean Cundey. As in the Dean Cundey who shot some of your favorite movies like the “Back to the Future” trilogy, “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”, “Jurassic Park”, “Apollo 13” and a shit-ton of John Carpenter films. On top of that, the film was edited by John F. Link and Frank J. Urioste who both had just been nominated for an Oscar for editing “Die Hard”. All of these guys were hot shit and they used their incredible talents to make a film that looks impressive and flows incredibly well. I had forgotten that this film was almost two hours because it feels so tight that I could have sworn it was a lean 90 minutes.
“Road House” may be this hokey, insane thrill ride but it knows that and has this remarkable sense of self-possession. It really doesn’t care if you’re laughing at the film or with it as long as you're having a good time. One thing you can’t deny is that nothing in the film is half-assed. When something happens, it’s always big whether it involves an explosion, a monster truck or a car doing a massive flip while on fire. Even the soundtrack is a collection of colossal bangers, many of which are provided by Jeff Healey who has a role in the film as Cody, the resident bandleader and guitarist at the Double Deuce. The fact that this guy lost his sight at 18 months old and still learned to play the guitar (resting on his lap like a lap-steel guitar) with such skill and personality is another powerful drop of water in the tsunami of awesomeness that is “Road House”. Even Swayze gets to sing. Not in the movie but he did contribute songs to the soundtrack so there’s that. There’s so many wickedly cool elements to the film that I don’t even have time to detail how one of the characters named Red is played by Red West, a member of Elvis Presley’s Memphis Mafia who served as the king’s bodyguard.
With all of the film’s fun and cheesiness that only this decade could provide, I did find one flaw with the story. While Ben Gazzara is a guy that you love to hate as Brad Wesley (he treats objects like women, man) and his goons are all ridiculously fun country bumpkins with massive amounts of firearms, his plan makes no logical sense. In the film, he is depicted as this corrupt rich man who has taken the town hostage economically and has brought many big brands to the town (7/11, JC Penney, etc.) while he pockets much of the profits. However, once Dalton cleans up the Double Deuce and even fires Wesley’s idiotic nephew, Wesley decides to not only take on Dalton and escalate a conflict but starts destroying several town businesses that he has a stake in because the owners are friends with Dalton. It makes no sense why he would have one of his men drive a monster truck through the Ford dealership that gives him a cut every month. I guess he’s afraid that the town’s citizens will turn against him if Dalton stays but I think destroying their businesses, blowing up their homes and trying to kill their friends would also do that. But he does die in a way that’s both incredibly silly and incredibly awesome so I guess we shouldn’t dwell on such things. I mean, I’ve been writing about “Road House” for a while now and I’m starting to forget which planet I’m even on.
In many respects (pretty much all of them), “Road House” is most definitely a product of its time. Many films now feature women as action stars, the male stars are generally more physically vulnerable and there is a massive conflict between practical stunts and what computer effects can accomplish. Perhaps that’s why a film like “Road House” is so fun. It’s a completely foreign film at this point in time, a capsule of what 80s action films valued stretched almost past the point of believability. I can’t act like this is one of the greatest action films of all time or even of that time or even that it’s objectively a good movie. But if a film is intended to be ridiculous and over-the-top and succeeds in such a spectacular manner that it not only has a rabid fanbase but also a remake, does that mean it’s bad? I don’t think so. Whether it’s enjoyed for the reasons the filmmakers intended or for other reasons, “Road House” has left an impact and I think that that impact is worth taking a look at, giving it a few X-rays and stitches and then sending it on its way until it inevitably winds up back in our arms so that we can inspect it again.
