Dead Heat (1988) New World/Comedy-Action-Horror RT: 84 minutes Rated R (language, violence, gruesome images) Director: Mark Goldblatt Screenplay: Terry Black Music: Ernest Troost Cinematography: Robert D. Yeoman Release date: May 6, 1988 (US) Cast: Treat Williams, Joe Piscopo, Lindsay Frost, Darren McGavin, Vincent Price, Clare Kirkconnell, Keye Luke, Robert Picardo, Mel Stewart, Professor Toru Tanaka, Martha Quinn. Box Office: $3.5M (US)
Rating: ***
Here’s a fun fact! In 1988, three cop movies with the word “heat” in the title were scheduled to hit theaters within months of each other. In June, it was Red Heat starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and James Belushi. In August, it was supposed to be Outer Heat, but it was retitled Alien Nation and bumped to October. The first one out of the gate, however, was Dead Heat, a goofy comedy-action-horror hybrid from New World Pictures. It didn’t go over well with critics or audiences, but this Movie Guy thought it was a blast.
I saw Dead Heat by myself (what else is new?) at a Wednesday matinee at one of my regular twin cinema haunts, the long-shuttered Lawrence Park Theater. A few things attracted me to it like a moth to a flame. First and foremost for me, it bore the New World Pictures logo. I always made a special effort to see their movies during their brief runs, usually one week but sometimes two. Second, I like both horror and action. This has both plus comedy. Third, it had an interesting cast. Treat Williams, at one time, seemed destined for greatness with lauded performances in movies like Hair, Prince of the City, Once Upon a Time in America and Smooth Talk. Now he’s starring in a zombie cop flick alongside a seriously buff Joe Piscopo (Johnny Dangerously).
The real star of note in Dead Heat is Vincent Price, a true horror thespian whose long list of credits includes House of Wax, The Fly, House on Haunted Hill and several of Roger Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe adaptations (e.g. House of Usher, The Pit and the Pendulum and The Raven). Here, he plays Arthur P. Loudermilk, a wealthy industrialist who serves as the mad scientist character of the piece. He’s built a machine that can raise the recently deceased. He has an evil plan, but first he has to test it out. It still has a few bugs in it.
To give you an idea of the level of humor in Dead Heat, Williams’ character is named Roger Mortis. Take a moment to let that sink in. Roger Mortis, rigor mortis! Get it? LOL! I told you this movie is goofy. Detective Mortis and his partner Doug Bigelow (Piscopo), a reckless but effective pair with a penchant for pissing off their captain (Stewart, better known as George Jefferson’s brother Henry on the first three seasons of All in the Family), stumble onto something quite ghoulish while investigating a series of violent daytime robberies. The coroner Rebecca (Kirkconnell, TV’s The Paper Chase), Roger’s slightly bitter ex-girlfriend, calls them in to show them something rather peculiar. It seems that the two robbers they just shot and killed already had autopsies sometime before they committed the robbery. What gives? Her boss Dr. McNab (McGavin, Kolchak: The Night Stalker) dismisses it as a paperwork error on her part. Of course, that’s not what it is.
Rebecca’s findings lead the guys to Dante Pharmaceuticals where the attractive public relations rep Randi (Frost, The Ring) assures them all is normal and above board. That’s right before Doug has a run-in with a biker zombie. In the ensuing chaos, Roger gets locked in a decompression chamber where he’s asphyxiated by an unseen person. Rebecca and Doug aren’t the kind of people that allow a small detail like death get in the way of solving crime. They take Roger, put him on the resurrection table and successfully bring him back to life. Or maybe I should say semi-successfully. Like I said, the process hasn’t been perfected yet. Roger has about 12 hours to solve his own murder before the re-animation process fails and he dies again. As explained by Rebecca, his tissue will progressively decay until he dissolves into “a kind of organic stew”. Mmm, mmm, yummy! Does it come with garlic bread?
The director of Dead Heat is one Mark Goldblatt, the editor of such films as Humanoids from the Deep, The Howling, Halloween II, The Terminator, Rambo: First Blood Part II and Commando (to name but a few), making his debut as the caller of the shots. He does a decent job overall. He strikes the right balance of yuk-yuks and yucks. One of the movie’s biggest laughs is the movie playing on TV in one scene. It’s the 1949 film noir D.O.A., the one about the guy who tries to find out who fatally poisoned him before he dies. Coincidentally, the remake with Dennis Quaid came out about seven weeks earlier. I even saw it at the same theater. Is that nuts or what?
Goldblatt also knows how to stage a good action scene. The opening shoot-out between the living cops and zombie robbers is well done. Same goes for the finale when Roger shoots his way to the main bad guys trying to sell their unique services to rich potential clients. There’s plenty of violence and gross makeup effects courtesy of FX artist Steve Johnson who’s probably best known for his work on Ghostbusters (he created Slimer). There’s a neat scene where all the dead animals come to life in a butcher shop run by a shady Asian guy (Luke, Gremlins) who might have helpful information. Even cooler is the big, hulking guy cutting up chicken parts. It’s the mighty and awesome Professor Toru Tanaka, aka Subzero from The Running Man, another one I saw at the same theater. The practical effects might look cheesy, especially by today’s standards, but they look great for a movie with a $5M budget.
While they’re no Gibson and Glover, Williams and Piscopo have pretty good chemistry. Roger is the more straight-laced of the two while Doug provides the comic relief. He’s described at one point as a Neanderthal due to the crude way he puts things. In an encounter with an indifferent security guard, Doug snatches the porno mag he’s reading and says, “Sorry to interrupt your erection.” Even better is this exchange between Roger and Randi:
Randi: “Hey, you’re hurt.”
Roger: “Lady, I’m f***ing dead.”
Randi: “Well, it doesn’t give you the right to be rude.”
Frost is little more than eye candy. She’s cute, but that’s about it. There’s no evidence of actual talent. McGavin is always a welcome presence even if it is hard to see him as anyone other than Ralphie’s old man in A Christmas Story. As for Price, it’s always great to see him. He lends a note of class to the mostly classless proceedings.
Goldblatt, who really isn’t that bad a filmmaker, would direct only one other movie (The Punisher with Dolph Lundgren) before returning to his old job. Williams would rebound in the mid-90s with The Phantom, The Devil’s Own and Deep Rising. Sadly, he died earlier this year of injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident. Former SNL funny man Piscopo would go on to play the cartoonish evil sensei in 1993’s Sidekicks starring Chuck Norris and the late Jonathan Brandis.
Dead Heat is a great deal of fun. It got a bum rap at the time of its release. It didn’t deserve it. Sure, not all of the jokes land and it’s surprisingly (NOT!) easy to pick out the mystery bad guy who killed Roger. Such is the imperfect nature of B-movies. Movie fans like me know this. We still love watching them. I’ll take Dead Heat over the latest Marvel mess any day.
