{"id":11207,"date":"2025-02-22T18:32:20","date_gmt":"2025-02-22T23:32:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=11207"},"modified":"2025-02-22T18:32:20","modified_gmt":"2025-02-22T23:32:20","slug":"best-defense","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2025\/02\/22\/best-defense\/","title":{"rendered":"Best Defense"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Best Defense<\/strong> (1984)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Paramount\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 94 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, violence, nudity, sexual content, alcohol use)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Willard Huyck\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Patrick Williams\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Donald Peterman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 20, 1984 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Starring: Dudley Moore, Eddie Murphy, Kate Capshaw, David Rasche, George Dzundza, Helen Shaver, Mark Arnott, Peter Michael Gotez, Tom Noonan, Matthew Laurance, Christopher Maher.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $19.2M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: * \u00bd<\/p>\n

\u00a0The key to understanding Best Defense<\/strong> is to note that Eddie Murphy is billed as a \u201cStrategic Guest Star\u201d on the poster. Even though he receives second billing behind Dudley Moore, he\u2019s only on screen for about 12 minutes. Not only that, he NEVER appears in a single scene with Moore or any other member of the lead cast. Why? The advance screening for this movie went so poorly that Paramount quickly shot and edited in Murphy\u2019s scenes. They figured that people would show up if they thought Best Defense<\/strong> was an Eddie Murphy movie. Talk about the old bait and switch.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Murphy was a hot property at the time with hits like 48 Hrs. and Trading Places under his belt. Audiences went into Best Defense <\/strong>expecting a hilarious Eddie Murphy comedy; instead, they got an excruciatingly bad Dudley Moore movie. It\u2019s not that Moore himself isn\u2019t funny; he turned in great performances in 10, Arthur and Unfaithfully Yours (I also liked Lovesick). The problem is that Moore isn\u2019t funny in this movie. In fact, he made a lot of bad movie choices throughout his career like Wholly Moses, Romantic Comedy, Micki & Maude, Like Father, Like Son and Blame It on the Bellboy. Best Defense<\/strong> ranks just one step away from the very bottom of the list (Wholly Moses is the worst!).<\/p>\n

\u00a0In 1982, inept engineer Wylie Cooper (Moore) is attempting to develop a surface-to-air missile guidance system for a brand new super-tank. The problem is that a part called the \u201cdip-gyro\u201d doesn\u2019t work; it causes something called the WAM to overheat. His failure to make this part work properly is pushing the company (Dynatechnics, Inc.) to the brink of bankruptcy. Everybody hates him, especially his shrewish but hot supervisor Clair (Shaver, The Color of Money). He gets no respect at home either. His bitchy wife Laura (Capshaw, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom) doesn\u2019t even want to have sex with him.<\/p>\n

\u00a0One night, Wylie encounters a very strange man (Noonan, Manhunter) at a bar who\u2019s going on about all sorts of wild conspiracy theories. When he isn\u2019t looking, the man slips a computer disc in his briefcase. The disc contains schematics for a working dip-gyro. One of his colleagues sees it and assumes that Wylie finally fixed the problem with the part. He reluctantly takes credit for the other guy\u2019s work and becomes everybody\u2019s hero.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Of course, this leads to a whole bunch of new problems like the psychotic international spy (Rasche, Sledge Hammer) who wants to get his hands on the dip-gyro in the worst way. Also, it turns out that the part might not work as well as everybody thought it did. If Wylie doesn\u2019t correct the problem in time, it could have dire consequences for whoever is operating the super-tank. That\u2019s where Murphy comes into the picture. His character, Lt. Landry, is the tank commander taking the vehicle for its first test run in Kuwait in 1984. The test is not going well at all; the tank is literally falling apart. Then, Landry and his two-man crew find themselves in a real battle situation as they must rescue some American soldiers. Will the missile guidance system work or not? That\u2019s the big question.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I have conflicting feelings about Best Defense<\/strong>. Overall, it\u2019s a really bad movie, but it\u2019s not completely without laughs. It\u2019s funny when Murphy is on screen; the rest of it sucks big time. It breaks down like this, Murphy\u2019s scenes are scattered throughout the beginning and the end of the picture. He\u2019s absent for a long stretch of the movie and that\u2019s when it\u2019s at its worst. It\u2019s the cinematic equivalent of Waiting for Godot (Waiting for Eddie? Hmmm\u2026.). It\u2019s solid proof that Murphy used to be funny. If he can keep this dreadful movie from earning a deserved \u201cNO STARS!!!\u201d rating from Movie Guy 24\/7, then he must have some talent. Thankfully, he redeemed himself with Beverly Hills Cop the following December.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Let me make something perfectly clear. Murphy is funny, the movie is NOT! Huyck\u2019s attempts at comedy come off as heavy-handed and clumsy. He\u2019s the same guy who directed the infamous 1986 bomb Howard the Duck (one of my top guilty pleasures!). Between these two titles, it\u2019s easy to understand why he\u2019s never directed another movie. It would be box office suicide on the part of the producers. Thankfully, Huyck had the good sense to just sit back and let Murphy do what he does best. He did one thing right.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Unfortunately, the rest of the cast does a very poor job. Rasche turns in an extremely embarrassing performance as the whacked-out and violent spy. There are also an alarming number of offensive stereotypes in Best Defense<\/strong>; the Arabs get the worst of it. There\u2019s also a trio of Latin Americans that nearly destroy an FBI sting operation and get Wylie killed.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I didn\u2019t see Best Defense<\/strong> at the movies. It looks like I made a wise choice there. I split the cost of the video rental with my younger brother in January \u201985 and still felt robbed. I think Eddie and everybody else involved in the making of this fiasco would prefer to forget it ever happened. I\u2019m certain that anybody who has ever watched it feels the exact same way.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Best Defense (1984)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Paramount\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 94 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, violence, nudity, sexual content, alcohol use)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Willard Huyck\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Patrick Williams\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Donald Peterman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 20, 1984 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Starring: Dudley Moore, Eddie Murphy, Kate Capshaw, David Rasche, George Dzundza, Helen Shaver, Mark Arnott, Peter Michael Gotez, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11223,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies","category-this-sucks-so-bad"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/Best-Defense-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11207"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11225,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11207\/revisions\/11225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}