Howard the Duck (1986)

Slight change to the schedule this week as I'm away with work for 3 days after today and I already had to take a week off last week as I was away on holiday (YES, AGAIN) and couldn't fit a movie into the schedule, but whilst I was away, my little humble movie blog turned 2 years old which felt like cause for a celebration. So this week's movie is something I have wanted to watch for a very long time. Predating this blog even. 1986's Howard the Duck. Potentially one of the lesser known, and redheaded step children of Marvel movies it was Marvel Comic's first foray into Theatrical productions, and was executive produced by Cinematic cornerstone: George Lucas. And it absolutely stunk. It was lambasted by critics and only just broke even of it's budget at the box office and although it has since developed a cult status it regularly crops up on worst movies ever made lists. Although I'm jumping ahead chronologically in my run down, I am really excited about finally getting to watch this.

Howard T. Duck (Ed Gale / Jordan Prentice Voice: Chip Zien) is just minding his own business checking out this months edition of Playduck, when he gets sucked out into space by a wormhole before landing in Cleveland on Earth and immediately getting... ducknapped? kidnapped? by some punks who hustle him into a club. After immediately getting thrown out and proceeding to get bounced around the block, Howard jumps to the rescue of a young rock singer, Beverly Switzler (Lea Thompson), saving her from 2 young punks, and she takes pity on him inviting him back to her place where their relationship develops. The following morning Beverly takes Howard to see her Scientist friend Phil Blumbertt (Tim Robbins), but when all Phil does is insult his intelligence, Howard storms off and he and Beverly fall out. Deciding to go his separate way, Howard takes a job at... what I think is a hot tub sex parlour... but doesn't last very long before quitting and after freaking out at an advert about duck hunting on TV, Howard finds himself back at the same club he met Beverly where she is singing with her band, Cherry Bomb. Eavesdropping on the Manager offering to sell Beverly's "services," Howard takes offense, and after beating him in a fight he convinces their Manager to release the band from their contract. Reconciling with Beverly, Howard tells her and the rest of the band that they are now free from their manager, as Phil, who just so happens to be dating a member of the band, begins his quest to untangle how Howard arrived on Earth. Stealing one of Howard's feathers for the process. Later that evening, Beverly and Howard grow closer and when Beverly doesn't reject Howard's advances and instead plays up to them, Howard suddenly gets cold feet and tries to talk his way out it. Duckily, err sorry I mean... luckily he is saved when Phil just waltzes into the apartment with Dr Walter Jenning (Jeffrey Jones), and his friend Carter (Miles Chapin) and interrupts the pair. Dr. Jenning and Carter explain that Howard was pulled to Earth when a test they were carrying out went wrong and that they think they can send him back. Despite feeling sad about leaving Beverly and despite Beverly being disappointed but agreeing it's for the best, Howard goes along with the plan to send him home, but when they get to the lab they discover something has gone terribly wrong with an experiment and the Spectroscope, the equipment used to bring Howard to Earth, is damaged beyond repair. As the Police swarm the scene, initially arresting Howard but he manages to escape, Beverly and Howard escape, picking up Dr. Jenning along the way who survived the accident but appears to be suffering with... something as a result... As they escape through the city, Dr. Jenning begins to suffer even further complaining of something alien being inside his body, and as he struggles to maintain control of the car the trio nearly crash before coming to a stop outside a 50's diner where Dr. Jenning, or whatever used to be Dr. Jenning announces that the "conversion" is complete. Inside the Diner, Jenning reveals that he is now a Dark Overlord from a dimension beyond space, brought to the planet in much the same way as Howard and has assumed Jenning's body to take on a disguise, and that it's arrival means the eggstinction (sorry) of all life in the universe. Revealing that he intends to bring more Dark Overlords to Earth by using the code-key to activate the spectroscope again, Howard snatches the key and makes a run for it but it's accosted by a gang of Truckers on the way out leading to slapstick fight in the diner. Eventually overcome by the rest of the diners, Howard is just on the verge of becoming tomorrows menu special when Jenning finally develops his full strength and proceeds to completely trash the diner and zap anybody out of the way who tries to stop him. Manipulating Howard into giving him the code-key, and abducting Beverly in the process, Jenning leaves to proceed with his plan to bring more Dark Overlords to Earth. Hooking up with Phil after he rescues him from the back of a Police Car, Howard and Phil commandeer a... flying tri-cycle thing and use to fly to the lab with the Police in hot pursuit. Meanwhile Jenning takes a de-tour to nearby Nuclear Power Plant and absorbs the power from the reactor to complete his transformation before continuing to the lab, intending to use Beverly as a host for another Dark Overlord. Despite the best efforts of the Police, Howard and Phil manage to make it to the lab, albeit with not much of the flying tri-cycle left. Inside they find Jenning using the Spectroscope to target the Nexus of Sominus and bring another Dark Overlord to Earth.  Using an experimental weapon, the Neutron Disintergrater, Howard faces off against Jenning and after a brief stare down, fires the weapon causing a huge explosion, emerging from the debris, Dr Jenning is back and reveals that the Dark Overlord has left his body but is still in the lab. As Phil sets Beverly free, the Dark Overlord reveals itself in it's true form: a really ugly looking scorpion thing, and after paralysing Phil and Beverly, it activates the Spectroscope again to open the rift. Taking control of the Neutron Disintergrater once again, Howard blasts the Dark Overload blowing it to chunks but then, faced with the difficult decision to destroy the machine and his only chance of getting back home or prevent more Dark Overlords arriving, Howard blows the machine to pieces nearly killing himself in the process! In the closing scene, under the management of Howard, Cherry Bomb are now huge rock stars on tour and Howard joins them on stage for an impromptu guitar solo!

Wow. I don't really know where to start with this one, but like in a good way. I mean, let's just get something out the way here, like Super Mario Bros, there is absolutely no way this movie deserves to be talked about as one of the worst movies ever. Absolutely no way. You can reserve your own opinions I guess, but there are far and away much, much worse movies than this one. I should know. I cover them. This was very 80's and very of it's time yes, and there are things I can, and will, criticize it for, but it was enjoyable, it was interesting and dare I say it, it was... different! Like fresh? 

I usually struggle slightly with origin stories, especially like Batman or Spiderman, because they usually spend far too much time building on the back story and not enough time exploring actual things going on in the storyline, and most of the time you don't need all that detail. You know how Batman becomes Batman. You know how Spiderman becomes Spiderman, you don't need to go into intricate detail with it, and I feel like they got the balance just right here, there is enough detail to establish how Howard came to Earth and what happened from there without going overkill on the detail and the back story.

I can tell you now that if I watched this 15-20 odd years ago, teenage me would have had a pretty big crush on Beverly Switzler. Lea Thompson is really great in this movie as Howards on/off Girlfriend and is also great in the supporting role. She's tough when she has to be, sweet when she has to be, is kind of the damsel in distress role, but it didn't feel cliché and cheesy here like it sometimes does in other movies. She played a big role in making this movie enjoyable and I genuinely felt like she had chemistry with Howard, despite it being, y'know, a puppet and a man in a costume!

Speaking of Howard, Chip Zien did a good job being the voice and allowing for the fair old number of moments where it became pretty obvious it was a puppet, broadbrushly speaking I thought Howard was portrayed pretty well. It's a mid-80's movie so not on par with the special effects of today obviously, but in retrospect it was mostly believable as an anthropomorphic duck and for the most part the balance between being a bumbling slapstick character to a neer-do-well hero was struck pretty decently. I feel like Howard could have gotten a bit more development as a character but for the most part he was fleshed out and portrayed well.

This movie does seem to struggle to find it's tone though, and it's there in that we find the films biggest problem. The movie is rated a 12+, likely due to some of the sexual references, but I feel like trying to keep the rating low by dialing back on the language, on the nature of the movie and on the violence was this movies biggest weakness. Maybe it was the prevailing sense of direction at the time, but I honestly feel like it held the movie back and if they had taken off the safety wheels and let the movie be a full on adult language, adult content based movie it would have brushed off the goofiness and gave the movie a bit more of a sharper edge. There's no escaping that by trying to colour inside the lines of a 12+ amped up the corniness in certain areas and it instead chose to focus more on the slapstick comedy and comedic action scenes rather than get a little bit more gritty and darker in tone.

Aside from that though, and that the special effects were a little bit dated by todays standard (see above), the movie was shot and produced superbly. It was interesting to watch, the camera work was all spot on, and the soundtrack - although very much a product of the 80's - added nicely to the movie aesthetic. No criticisms in the acting department either, as aforementioned it was very easy to fall in love with Lea Thompson, but everybody else did a pretty decent job. Tim Robbins got a little bit irritating but I genuinely feel like his character was supposed to be irritating.

I will fully admit to being completely biased going into this. I wanted to enjoy it because I've been intrigued and interested in it for so long but have put off watching it. Until now. And I am so glad I finally watched it because I really enjoyed it and I can see me adding this to my film collection. It's sort of everything I expected: it's cheesy, it's goofy, it's corny. I wish it was just that little bit more smutty, more gritty, more violent, which was closer to what the Howard the Duck comics were like, but that didn't spoil my enjoyment of it and I live in hope yet that one day we will get that 18+ / Rated R Howard the Duck movie from Kevin Feige et al with Seth Green as the voice. Make it happen Kevin. 4 out of 5.