{"id":7035,"date":"2024-10-25T12:02:55","date_gmt":"2024-10-25T16:02:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=7035"},"modified":"2024-10-25T12:02:55","modified_gmt":"2024-10-25T16:02:55","slug":"rad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/10\/25\/rad\/","title":{"rendered":"Rad"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Rad <\/strong>(1986)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 TriStar\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 93 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Hal Needham\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Geoffrey Edwards and Sam Bernard\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: James Di Pasquale\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Richard Leiterman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: March 21, 1986 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Bill Allen, Lori Loughlin, Talia Shire, Ray Walston, Bart Conner, Jack Weston, Alfie Wise, Marta Kober, Jamie Clarke, Laura Jacoby, H.B. Haggerty, Chad Hayes, Carey Hayes, Kellie McQuiggin, Beverly Hendry.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $2M (US)<\/p>\n

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

\u00a0I successfully avoided the sports drama Rad<\/strong> for more than three decades. I didn\u2019t see the point in watching it. To me, it looked like a movie for 10YOs not yet familiar with the conventions of the genre. You know, the tried-and-true underdog story popularized by Rocky and copied by every sports-themed drama that followed. It focuses on BMX racing, a sport I have no interest in. Actually, I\u2019m not especially interested in ANY sport, but BMX racing is near the bottom of the list. I figured I\u2019d bypass it at theaters and wait until it showed on HBO. Long story short, I\u2019m just now seeing Rad<\/strong> for the first time. I have to admit, it\u2019s pretty good. Hey, I\u2019m as shocked as you are.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The story centers on Cru Jones (Allen, Streamers), a small town teen who dreams of being a professional BMX racer. He gets his chance when Helltrack, the Superbowl of BMX racing, comes to his hometown courtesy of shady bicycle company owner Duke Best (Weston, Dirty Dancing). A natural talent, Cru wants to try out, but it\u2019s on the same day as the SATs. His mother (Shire, Rocky I, II, III, IV and V) refuses to even discuss it; he simply cannot throw away his future on a dream. He tries out anyway and qualifies. Duke approaches him with an offer of sponsorship and fame if he throws the race in favor of reigning champ Bart Taylor (Olympic gymnast Conner). When Cru turns him down flat, Duke resorts to dirty tricks to keep him out of the race. Yeah, everybody knows that\u2019s NOT going to happen. Cru and Bart WILL face off in the big race.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Is there romance in Rad<\/strong>? Of course there is. It\u2019s in the form of Christian (Loughlin, The New Kids), a female BMX racer who helps Cru master a particularly challenging move. That\u2019s after they hit the floor on their bikes at the big dance while \u201cSend Me an Angel\u201d (by Real Life) plays on the soundtrack. It\u2019s a sweet little teen romance. They hang out, play Follow the Leader on their bikes and go \u201cass-sliding\u201d- i.e. going down a slide into the lake. She\u2019s the one who offers words of encouragement when Cru is at his lowest. I know what people think of Loughlin now, but she is mad cute in this movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0For those born too late, the term \u201crad\u201d is short for \u201cradical\u201d, a slang word indicating approval- e.g. \u201cDude, that\u2019s radical!\u201d In Rad<\/strong>, it also refers to the name of the team that Cru forms as a response to Duke\u2019s attempts to shut him out. He is the real villain in this movie. In a deviation from form, Bart isn\u2019t an antagonist on the level of Johnny Lawrence from The Karate Kid. He\u2019s cocky and full of himself, but he\u2019s not a sadistic jerk who constantly bullies Cru. It\u2019s the movie\u2019s sole note of originality; the rest of it is as standard as they come.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I\u2019m not going to waste time commenting too much on the acting and writing. It\u2019s exactly what you\u2019d expect. Shire pretty much plays a slight variation on Adrian Balboa while Ray Walston (Fast Times at Ridgemont High) has fun as a crotchety oldster who proves to be the team\u2019s greatest ally. The script is one clich\u00e9 after another. What I\u2019d like to train focus on is Hal Needham\u2019s (The Cannonball Run) direction. Being a former stunt man, he\u2019s the ideal choice to lens Rad<\/strong>, a movie filled to the rim with cool, gravity-defying stunts on BMX bikes. I can\u2019t believe some of the things these kids do. And they get many, many opportunities to show off their skills. One of my favorite bits is an early scene where Cru leads a local motorcycle cop on a chase through a lumber yard. The school dance scene is pretty neat too. Then there\u2019s the climactic race. I must say it\u2019s pretty exciting even if the outcome is a foregone conclusion. Needham may not be a great filmmaker, but he knows his way around stunt scenes, the raison d\u2019etre<\/em> for Rad<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I\u2019m almost ashamed to say that I got into Rad<\/strong>. Yes, it\u2019s a movie for children and fans of the sport, but I found plenty to enjoy. The riding is impressive even if the plot isn\u2019t. The soundtrack contains exactly the kind of rock music you\u2019d expect in a teen sports movie. One song is called \u201cThunder in Your Heart\u201d (by John Farnham). It\u2019s played at least three times. It\u2019s obviously the one the producers hoped would be a Top 10 hit. The fact is Rad<\/strong> bombed at the box office. It wasn\u2019t until it came out on video that it gained a following. Even with that, I had no desire to see it until I started doing First-Time Friday Features. I thought \u201cwhy not\u201d. Let\u2019s just say I\u2019m not unhappy I chose to finally watch it.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rad (1986)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 TriStar\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 93 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Hal Needham\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Geoffrey Edwards and Sam Bernard\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: James Di Pasquale\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Richard Leiterman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: March 21, 1986 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Bill Allen, Lori Loughlin, Talia Shire, Ray Walston, Bart Conner, Jack Weston, Alfie Wise, Marta Kober, Jamie Clarke, Laura Jacoby, H.B. Haggerty, Chad […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7396,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dramas","category-guilty-pleasures"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Rad-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\/7035","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=7035"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7035\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7398,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7035\/revisions\/7398"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}