2008 Woodie Awards
Point Break
Kyle Martinak
Issue date: 4/11/08 Section: Culture
Movie references are pure gold if you understand them. If a situation calls for a reference to a cheesy film, or possibly a laugh at Keanu Reeves, you can bet "Point Break" is going to be mentioned. But besides being the victim of many jokes, "Point Break" is also extremely entertaining and has influenced several other flicks along the way since it was first released in 1991.
The film stars Keanu "My Name is Neo" Reeves as former college athlete Johnny Utah, who has just become an FBI special agent in the Los Angeles bank robbery office. After being assigned to catch the infamous Ex-Presidents (bank robbers dressed as Nixon, Johnson, Carter and Reagan), Utah tries to infiltrate their adrenaline-addicted crowd by becoming a surfer. Along the way, Utah becomes friends with the spiritual surfing guru Bodhi, played by a scruffy Patrick Swayze.
To begin, I should say that the acting is not half bad in this movie, considering that it is a very unintentionally funny flick. Swayze is actually very good as the man called Bodhisattva, a modern savage who is looking for the ultimate rush. One brilliant performance comes from Gary Busey as Utah's burnt-out partner, Angelo Pappas. Pappas is not written well, as he is always sputtering that he has been in the FBI for twenty-two years and Vietnam stories come without prompt. Although, Busey, thankfully, has the ability to make people crumble in fear and laugh until they soil themselves at the same time, so he joines Swayze as the high point of the film.
All in all, the script is where the quality drops. The plot of a cop going undercover and then respecting and befriending his suspect is very tired and the very idea of an FBI agent surfing to catch the bad guys is ludicrous. That being said, it was a good enough formula for "Fast and the Furious," which borrowed a lot and exchanged surfing for street racing. The dialogue is kind of stilted, with Utah using cheap lines like "People trusted you, and now you've gotta go down!" and a terribly written 'learning-to-surf' montage. Even so, there is meaning behind Bodhi's life lessons, and the whole movie is funny, even when it isn't supposed to be.
The film stars Keanu "My Name is Neo" Reeves as former college athlete Johnny Utah, who has just become an FBI special agent in the Los Angeles bank robbery office. After being assigned to catch the infamous Ex-Presidents (bank robbers dressed as Nixon, Johnson, Carter and Reagan), Utah tries to infiltrate their adrenaline-addicted crowd by becoming a surfer. Along the way, Utah becomes friends with the spiritual surfing guru Bodhi, played by a scruffy Patrick Swayze.
To begin, I should say that the acting is not half bad in this movie, considering that it is a very unintentionally funny flick. Swayze is actually very good as the man called Bodhisattva, a modern savage who is looking for the ultimate rush. One brilliant performance comes from Gary Busey as Utah's burnt-out partner, Angelo Pappas. Pappas is not written well, as he is always sputtering that he has been in the FBI for twenty-two years and Vietnam stories come without prompt. Although, Busey, thankfully, has the ability to make people crumble in fear and laugh until they soil themselves at the same time, so he joines Swayze as the high point of the film.
All in all, the script is where the quality drops. The plot of a cop going undercover and then respecting and befriending his suspect is very tired and the very idea of an FBI agent surfing to catch the bad guys is ludicrous. That being said, it was a good enough formula for "Fast and the Furious," which borrowed a lot and exchanged surfing for street racing. The dialogue is kind of stilted, with Utah using cheap lines like "People trusted you, and now you've gotta go down!" and a terribly written 'learning-to-surf' montage. Even so, there is meaning behind Bodhi's life lessons, and the whole movie is funny, even when it isn't supposed to be.
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