I'm continuing to read Arnold Schwarzenegger's autobiography and watch his films in order while doing so. No one needs my reviews for movies that we've all seen countless times, but it's an opportunity to share interesting facts from my reading. I ended my last batch with 1984's The Terminator, so this one starts with 1985's Commando.
Commando (1985) - 7/10 - Because it's a rather macho movie, I'm always a little surprised by just how funny this ends up being. According to Arnie, audiences loved the scene in The Terminator when room service knocks and the terminator, picking one of several available responses, tells the guy what to go do with himself. Because of that, he encouraged the writers of Commando to add a lot more humor like that, mostly in the form of one-liners, thus establishing one of his trademarks. Also, this was only the second film (after Class of 1984) for director Mark L. Lester, so a chance was taken with him and it paid off.
Raw Deal (1986) - 4/10 - The movie starts pretty well, with Arnie as a small town sheriff chasing down a bad guy, but quickly turns into a very unoriginal mobster movie. In order to be freed from doing any more Conan movies, Arnie agreed to eventually do one non-Conan movie for Dino De Laurentiis. This ended up being it and it shows. It feels like a straight-to-video movie that could've been given to any actor and is probably Arnie's most forgettable action movie. It could've been better if it had the humor of Commando, but it plays itself too seriously. If it hadn't been a flop, though, we likely wouldn't have gotten Total Recall. De Laurentiis owned the rights to that and didn't think that Arnie was right for the role, but Raw Deal's failure led to his bankruptcy and selling the rights to Carolco.
Predator (1987) - 9/10 - This might be the leanest action movie ever. The plot is so simple and, most of the time, nothing is happening, yet it feels tense for 100 straight minutes. Apparently, Arnie had watched a small horror film named Nomads and was so impressed with its tension despite its low budget that he lobbied for hiring its first-time director, John McTiernan. His intuition paid off with Predator and was re-affirmed the following year when McTiernan directed Die Hard. At one point, Arnie was covered in mud and insects in the Mexican jungle just 48 hours before he was due to get married in Massachusetts. He was willing to do Predator 2, but only if they got a better script (that didn't take place in the city) and a better director, but the studio cheaped out on both and he turned it down.
The Running Man (1987) - 7/10 - Shortly into filming, the original director was fired (for being behind schedule) and replaced with a TV director who had never made a movie. Arnie feels that that was mistake, since the new guy shot the movie like a TV show, losing much of the serious social satire of Stephen King's story. Even though it could've been better, it's still quite a fun and humorous movie. It's paced quite well and it has probably as many one liners as Commando, if not more. Like Commando, it's cheesy, but it's excellent cheese. Fun fact: the majority of the movie takes place in 2019.
Red Heat (1988) - 6/10 - This movie is somewhat enjoyable and disappointing at the same time. It has a good premise and some cool scenes, but could've been a lot better. I think that it suffers from some of the same things that Raw Deal did: it's too gritty and Arnie's character is too wooden (by design). Arnie seems at his best when his characters are strong and funny, but, here, he's only strong and all of the "funny" goes to Belushi, whom I've never cared for and don't really find funny here. Arnie thought that this would be a smash hit and doesn't know why it wasn't, but those are the reasons why I think that it wasn't. Interesting fact: this was the first American movie to be allowed to film in Moscow's Red Square.
Twins (1988) - 8/10 - I don't know why the RT ratings are so low for this because I've always loved this movie and thought that most people also loved it. It's funny and even a little touching. This time watching it, I was struck by how relatively good Arnie's acting was in this, compared to how it was just years earlier. Either he really improved in a short amount of time or comedy simply brings out the best in him. Supposedly, director Ivan Reitman was skeptical of Arnie's comedic chops until he got to talking with him and sensed the curiosity and gentleness in him that he could work with and that became the basis for his character. The most interesting fact about this movie is that Arnie, betting on himself and recognizing that the studio was taking a big risk giving him a comedy, decided to take no salary, only a percentage of the box office gross, and convinced De Vito and Reitman to do the same. He calls it his best business decision ever because Twins ended up being the 5th highest grossing film of 1988 and netting him $35M (more than he's made from any other movie) when he would've made "only" $5-10M if he'd taken salary.
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