Better Off Dead

John Cusack, Aaron Dozier, Amanda Wyss

Lane Myer (John Cusack) is stuck in a personal hell. A compulsive, adolescent Everyman growing up in Suburbia, USA, not only does he fail to make the prestigious high school ski team (again), but his ...( read more  read more... )beloved sweetheart, Beth, also leaves him for Roy, the team's popular, arrogant captain. If this isn't bad enough, he's stuck with a mother who frighteningly experiments--rather than cooks--with food, a brother who builds rockets out of models, and a best friend so desperate for drugs that he settles for snorting powdered snow. Faced with these prospects, Lane opts to end it all ... until he comes up with a ridiculous plan to gain acceptance and win Beth back. Director Savage Steve Holland warps this simple, clichéd premise, letting his wacky imagination twist it into a fairly original, slightly dark, and completely hilarious '80s teen comedy. Not as serious a "suicide-attempt" movie as, say, Harold and Maude but just as funny, the film's more a collection of screwball sketches than a narrative. Holland livens the high jinks with surrealistic fantasy touches, including Jell-O that crawls, a hamburger that sings Van Halen, drawings that mock its creator, Japanese race-car drivers who only speak Howard Cosell, and a psychotic paperboy seeking blood over a missing $2. Cusack puts the whole thing on his shoulders and carries the insanity with another one of his touching, obsessively romantic performances, which, along with Say Anything, The Sure Thing, and One Crazy Summer, made him the quintessential (and appealing) personification of lovestruck adolescence and suffering. --Dave McCoy

Flixster Users

87% liked it

Critics

81% liked it

PG, 1 hr. 37 min.

Directed by: Savage Steve Holland

Released: January 1, 1985

Invite friends to see

DVD Released: July 16, 2002

Recommend it Add to Favorites

Your Rating



clear rating

Top Flixster Reviews


  • June 17, 2009
    I thought this was going to be another predictable 80's romp (like a dude version of Sixteen Candles or something)...but it was SO much better.

    It was as if someone from 2005 went back 20 years into the past to film an 80's movie, and because they're totally aware of the cliches... ...( read more )
  • June 14, 2009
    I really really really enjoyed this.

    "I once built a bird house, but it was condemned by the fair housing committee
  • November 15, 2008
    This film is a non-stop laugh fest and the ultimate epitome of the 80's.
  • July 23, 2008
    two dollars?
  • May 19, 2008
    not the best teen comedy when compared to the likes of ferris bueller, still worth a look though

Critic Reviews


Comments


  • dreamless1986
    August 20, 2007
    I want my two dollars!!!!!!!!!!
  • dannyratcliff
    January 24, 2007
    One of the few teen comedies to stand shoulder to shoulder with John Hughes' back-catalogue, Better Off Dead is a weird hybrid of the teen genre, pulling in strange fantasy elements that were (unfortunately) reined in/diluted for the director's later movies.
    This is one of the truly original teen comedies in a decade awash with them - using darker, more adult themes than many of it's peers to paint a more rounded picture of the times than one would first imagine.
    Lane's suicide attempts (I've always thought to be an homage to Harold and Maude), although played for laughs, strike a serious chord for such a "zany" comedy, and the drug references of the uber-cool Charles De Mar kinda outstrip the weed in Johnson's shorts (although I am in NOOO way rating Better Off Dead above The Breakfast Club) make this movie the logical step between the candy floss teen movie and their grown up counter-parts (St.Elmo's Fire, Bright Lights Big City etc.) (MORE of this on my page, if you're interested)

Critic ratings and reviews powered by RottenTomatoes.com

Fresh (60% or more critics rated the movie positively)

Rotten (59% or fewer critics rated the movie positively)

Video Requires Latest Version of Adobe Flash:

Get Adobe Flash player

Official Trailer

More Like This


Click a thumb to vote on that suggestion, or add your own suggestions.

  • Ferris Bueller's Day Off
    Ferris Bueller's Day Off (61%)
  • Revenge of the Nerds
    Revenge of the Nerds (78%)
  • Nuga geunyeo-wa jasseulkka? (Sexy Teacher) (Who Slept With Her)
    Nuga geunyeo-wa jasseulkka? (Sexy Teacher) (W... (0%)
  • Grosse Pointe Blank
    Grosse Pointe Blank (71%)

Theater Showtimes & TV Listings


Recent News


No recent headlines. Got one?

Most Popular Skin


No skins yet. Interested in creating one?