StreetsOfFire Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Erik Davis ordered me to come up with a new approach to summer movies, and he demanded that the concept be intelligent, engaging, and jam-packed with vowels and consonants. (One out of three isn't bad.) And since I'm a childish movie nerd who had a deep affection for all things nostalgic, my first idea was "Hey, let's have the writers pick their favorite 'movie summer' and write a piece about it." And since my next eleven ideas stunk, he said "Ugh, fine. Do your Favorite Summers thing. But don't forget the vowels."

Nearly all of the Cinematicaleers will be penning their own pieces, but since I like to lead by example (when I'm not leading by guilt), I figured I'd get the ball rolling first. (Special thanks to Box Office Mojo for displaying OLD release dates in very handy fashion.) Also, for the sake of this series, let's say "summer" counts as "May through August," even though May is technically spring and part of September is definitely summer.

5/4 -- The Bounty // Breakin' // Hardbodies // Sixteen Candles -- So which one of these would be the big "Iron Man" release? We got Gibson and Hopkins in a nautical remake; a whole lot of pop-lockin' looneys; a leering sex comedy that helped to kill the sub-genre of mid-'80s sex comedies; and the directorial debut of one John Hughes.

5/11 -- Firestarter // The Natural -- Robert Redford knocking the cover off a baseball and Drew Barrymore immolating George C. Scott. Now THAT's summer!

5/18 -- Finders Keepers // Making the Grade -- A pair of justifiably forgotten farces, yes, both of which I saw theatrically.

5/23 -- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom -- Even back in 1984 Indiana Jones demanded his very own weekend ... one that starts on a Wednesday, no less! I distinctly remember seeing this on the afternoon of opening day, and while I was waiting for Mom to come pick us up, there was a woman BERATING the box office girl. Honest! Something about the heart-tearing scene had upset her small child. And just like that, the PG-13 was born.

Well, what do you know? Here I was thinking I was one of the few people out there who actually had fond memories of Walter Hill's musical flop Streets of Fire, but you can now add Albert Pyun to the list of the film's dedicated fans. Reports have surfaced over at AICN that the B-movie director extraordinaire is planning a sequel of sorts to the 1984 cult classic. According to AICN, the title is The Road to Hell, and will bring back Streets' original star, Michael Paré, to star alongside Clare Kramer (Buffy) and Courtney Peldon (Boston Public).

If you haven't seen the original, then you are missing out on some prime '80s cheese. What other decade would feature a rock and roll musical set in an urban fantasy land with Willem Dafoe sporting vinyl overalls in a sledgehammer fight to the death? According to AICN, the film will not be a direct sequel to Hill's original flick, but instead a tribute film that will take "STREETS' mood and energy, infusing 50s styled "hardboiled" dialog and characters possessing "dark" shades of gray."

Now that we finally have confirmation from Pyun on that The Sword and the Sorcerer sequel, I guess we'll just have to wait and see which project Pyun makes first. So even though I'm not all that thrilled about a sequel to one of my youth's guilty pleasures, I can't say no to a plot description like this: "Consider it Moulin Rouge meets torture porn. A heavily torqued romantic fantasy where dreams still live but they carry very big knives. "

I'm sold. How about you?