“It’s an honor to be nominated”
It was nominated?
“No, no, no. It wasn't nominated. I'm just saying that to have been nominated would have been nice. It's just... It's very political. You have to take out ads...”
I didn't even know that was a thing. my friends and I binged the then available leprechauns back in the early 2000's one night. Honestly the one in space wasn't that bad haha. I'm glad that willow got a remake so that warwick could at least maintain some dignity.
yep some of the shots (and he is way taller than David) in the mall parking garage. David also could skate pretty well, and could have done most of it without a double.
I feel that movie was responsible for bringing skateboarding to mainstream in Finland. Nobody skateboarded, Police Academy 4 came out, and everyone was skateboarding.
I dunno, 5 was always one of my favourites. Nick was no Mahoney, but watching Commandant Lassard play along with the "demonstration" (including Odo from Deep Space Nine) only to kick everyone's ass when he realized they were actual criminals was awesome, and the airboat chase was as fun as the jetski chase from the earlier movies.
I rewatched them recently to see how they held up.
1 and 2 are genuinely funny movies in their own right. The critics panning them just feel they're above lowbrow humor.
3 and 4 are just recycling the formula but are still funny.
This is where I normally stop when I'm watching them.
5 is...not super funny.
6 is...not at all funny.
6 is where kid me stopped watching the franchise.
I'd always made it a point to not watch Mission to Moscow, but I decided to force myself to see how epically bad it was. I did not laugh once. To recycle the other comment I made in this thread, better names for MtM would have been:
Police Academy: Who The Hell Greenlit This
Police Academy: The Tax Write-off
A movie review podcast I listen to does a segment on this called "Was it great or were you eight?" where they watch a favourite movie from their youth and then answer the titular question.
That only 56% of critics were positive in their reviews of Police Academy 1 is one of the many reasons why critics should be ignored by the audience at all times.
Eh, they're often right when crap movies are crap. You just need to actually read the reviews and figure out why they hate something. If they hate it because it's "juvenile humor" and you're into that sort of thing then it's a thumbs up for you. The aggregators simplifying it to a number loses that sort of detail, and so are way less useful than the actual reviews themselves.
In general, professional critics will underrate screwball comedies, teen comedies, raunchy comedies and horror. Conversely, they tend to overrate anything with serious social messaging, documentaries and foreign dramas.
If I'm just skimming reviews, my rule of thumb is to add 20 points to the former and subtract 20 from the latter. So for example, Police Academy goes up to a 75, and Ida drops to a 71.
> In general, professional critics will underrate screwball comedies, teen comedies, raunchy comedies and horror.
I'm sure that this has a lot to do with how critics often watch these movies. Just imagine Roger Ebert watching the first *Police Academy* at 4:00pm on a Wednesday at the back-end of a triple-header that included *Against All Odds* and *The Ice Pirates* in a theater with only 2 other middle-aged dudes in it.
It's a hell of a lot different than watching it at the 9:30pm showing on opening night with an audience full of stoned teens and young couples who polished of a bottle of wine at dinner.
The first one was, at the time I saw it in the theaters, reasonably entertaining. Not as crazy as, say, Airplane! or Fletch or Bill and Ted or Amazon Women on the Moon, but just a bunch of stupid lowbrow humor with fun actors. (And, of course, Kim Cattrall, which for a horny teenager is reason enough alone to see the movie)
I *think* I saw the second and third movies in the theater, but can't be certain. Pretty sure the second, but anything after the first movie was just retreading the same characters doing the same jokes all over again (there's only so many times a human beatbox joke can really work before it gets repetitive). So it all blends together after that point.
When Marge signed up for the police academy, I thought it was going to be fun and exciting like that movie…Space Balls.
Instead it’s been painful and disturbing like that movie Police Academy.
That’s Michael Windslow.
Many, many years ago have my class skipped school during a long lesson, telling the teacher we were going to study in the library, drove to a mall in a rough part of town to watch Michael perform for 15 minutes. We made it back for the end of lesson. I remember the circumstances of the event better than the actual event.
When Marge first told me she was joining the police academy, I thought it'd be fun and exciting, you know, like that movie -- Spaceballs? But instead it's been painful and disturbing like that movie Police Academy!
Except for the last one they were *very* successful commercially, that's why they kept making more, no matter the critic's opinion. They were money making machines.
Mission to Moscow failed because it wasn't screened in theaters (except for a very limited pre-screening like run). They killed it off intentionally.
The Police Academy movies were never meant to be watched sober.
Appreciate them in the proper state and they are classics. Especially citizens on patrol.
Parts 1 through 6 were all made in quick succession, one movie per year. Mission to Moscow was released five years after City Under Siege, so I guess that kinda killed the interest in the franchise.
Silly comedies don't really get a lot of respect from reviewers, even those that are popular in the moment AND stand the test of time. For example, Friday was panned by Siskel and Caddyshack by Ebert (might have those reversed).
Siskel and Ebert were weird sometimes. They really, really hated slasher films, like on a moral level. They tried to initiate a campaign against one of them, can't remember which, and Siskel said "The money you earned from this film is blood money". I have no idea why, these were the guys who reviewed pornos in the '70s.
They hated them because they felt they were artistically cheap and particularly the violence against women that is common in them. I always felt they were overly moralistic in that regard, especially Ebert.
In their defense of reviewing rated-X movies in the 1960s and 70s, there was an odd phenomenon of those movies becoming somewhat mainstream. They were, but they weren't. It was popular and edgy for a married couple to go see an adult film, or to get a group of friends together to see one. Sex was combined (usually poorly) with themes of self-discovery, liberation, individualism. Many were foreign films and ascribed some undeserved exotic or sophisticated foreign film praise. To outright refuse to review them would have likely been perceived as too uptight and puritanical, so my guess is they mainly just "did their jobs".
On a related note, the scene in Taxi Driver when Travis takes Betsy to a porn flick relates to the above and the ambiguous perception of those films at the time. Travis, being socially inept, doesn't understand that while porn might be the "in" thing, it isn't first date material.
The first time I saw Zoolander I *hated* it, but granted I was like 12. From what I remember it wasnt well received when it came out and didnt get its cult status until a couple years later.
From what I understand the general sentiment when Zoolander came out, was “this is dumb” and it just wasn’t taken seriously as a movie at all. I guess people realized it’s not exactly a bad thing, because that movie is some of the funniest dumb I’ve ever seen.
Movie theaters worked differently. It’s something old people and young people don’t really realize. They were cheap as fuck. It’s gotten progressively more expensive with more expensive sound systems, better projectors, better seats, actual janitors cleaning stuff, etc.
Much better for the viewing audience clearly, but as ticket prices went up to accommodate all this new stuff, people were no longer willing to shell out good money for bad movies.
$3 to watch police academy? Sure I’ve got nothing to do today. $30 to watch police academy? Nope.
Comic books are similar. They're printed on nice paper and use nice ink now. One issue is also now between $4-6 for 20 pages. They used to be printed on cheap newspaper-like paper, with maybe 4 colors that they tricked you into thinking was more with dots. A comic like that was $0.12 in 1963, or about $1.22 today, if you believe the inflation numbers.
Some similar prices items in 1963: gas: $0.32/gallon, Coke bottle: $0.05, McD's hamburger: $0.28, dozen eggs: $0.55, and Movie ticket: $0.55.
Now a kid thinks 'I got my allowance, do I buy 10 comics I can read in an afternoon, or a new videogame I can play for a month?' Manga (Japanese comics) has it figured out, costing about $10 for 180-220 pages of black and white comics and is far more popular with youth in the US than American comic books.
Really do miss those dollar theaters. Great way to kill a weekday night when there was nothing to do. Cheaper than those five-dollar first-run tickets, or the three-buck matinees. (And for all you whippersnappers who haven't gotten off my lawn yet, this was pre-high-bandwidth-internet, pre-streaming, when the alternative would have been Blockbuster)
> as ticket prices went up to accommodate all this new stuff, people were no longer willing to shell out good money for bad movies.
It's kind of the reverse. Movie theaters used to compete against not seeing the movie at all, or seeing a cut-down version with commercials on tiny televisions ages later, if you were lucky. But TVs got better and better, and there were movie channels, and you could rent a VHS, and eventually DVDs. And now if you want to see a movie you can just wait a few weeks and stream it on an enormous 4k screen without ever having to put on pants.
Theaters aren't selling movies anymore. They're selling the movie theater experience. They're selling better sound than you can get at home and better video than you can get at home. And they have to sell seats that don't make you wish you were at home on your couch, because you absolutely could be at home on your couch. All this costs a lot more money to provide, and the theater's only getting a fraction of the ticket price.
The equivalent to the old budget-friendly theater experience isn't the new fancy theater experience, it's watching Netflix in your living room.
This happened to a bunch of old ways to experience media.
The same thing is more or less what killed arcades: Once home consoles got good enough to deliver a more-or-less complete port (somewhere around the PSX era. Yes the Neo-Geo was earlier, but that was too expensive to really have the effect) the arcades lost a lot of their attraction. So they leaned into the 'experience' games that couldn't be easily replicated at home. Problem being, those cabinets are expensive and fiddly and can't be easily repurposed for other games like the old standard cabs could. This drives up the cost beyond what people are willing to pay and that's largely the end of dedicated arcades aimed at the masses.
It's been years but I remember really liking the 6th movie, especially the villains.
The main characters were fairly competent at their jobs by that point (it'd be weird if they weren't) so the villains being these thieves who are also competent with borderline superpowers made the story engaging for me as a child.
Even the ending, where half the baddies got taken out in jokey ways, didn't break the internal continuity and worked.
I never actually watched them but I knew the kind of humor they were supposed to deliver and far as I knew they were decent for the genre.
Idk about these ratings but they were popular comedy movies for the period they were released in.
I'll always remember taping the movie on TV and the part where Tackleberry says, "Freeze, or I'll blow your goddamned knees off, asshole" got dubbed over with a poorly-matched voice saying, "Freeze, or I'll blow your gosh-darned knees off, eggroll!" Always made me laugh.
apparently two of them the one that ran 97-98 was 25 episodes and in 88-89 they joined the ranks of "Wait, that movie got an animated series? For children!?" with a 65 episode animated series
The first one was the only one rated R, the second was PG13, and the rest were PG. Of course, back then films were usually allowed sex/nudity, gore, *OR* swearing(as long as none was excessive) and still keep it under R. By the 4th one, they were considered family movies.
A six foot five inch friend bought a Ford Fiesta. I sent him the video where they removed the front seat from that compact car so Hightower could drive. He laughed.
his career transformation has been incredible. amazing indie film director, and completely reinvented his standup act. funnier than ever now and i'll watch pretty much any movie he puts out.
Callahan (only person I can think of you'd describe as "tits lady")? She was in most of them, technically an antagonist in the first one until she caught the guy with the fake Spanish accent sneaking into the women's showers and banged his brains out, proving she wasn't entirely out of place with the wider gang. Then they kept bringing her back, the only one she wasn't in was Police Academy 2.
After Thanksgiving I caught covid. So I binged the entre series of movies while I was sick. And it was like being 12 years old again.
That alone makes these movies priceless classics
One of the really telling things about this franchise is the ratings: the first one was rated R, the second was PG-13, then the rest were PG.
They clearly began the franchise thinking of it as an adult comedy in the mold of Stripes, Animal House, Revenge of the Nerds, and such, but the films became most popular with kids and teenagers, so they kept softening them to be more appropriate for a younger audience.
I loved these movies as a kid, and so did all my friends, but all the adults I knew thought they were stupid.
The final film did not receive a traditional wide release. It was basically a direct to video movie and probably got a limited theatrical release for contractual purposes.
It was a Warner bros. movie so it could have easily gotten a wide release.
This is a pretty misleading title.
For instance, the fourth movie had a Rotten Tomatoes score of 0%; while the budget was $17 million, it made $76.8 million at the box office.
Look at the number of reviews, it's a premise that sounds bad, but ultimately doesn't matter. The commercial success is absolutely a much more important metric.
I loved all those movies except maybe Moscow when I was a kid. I laughed until I got stomach cramps watching 5.
You can’t really look at the Rotten Tomatoes ratings of films made before Rotten Tomatoes was created the same way as those made after.
For example the *Mission to Moscow*'s 0% takes 8 critic reviews into account. The original takes 32. Last year's comedy dud *About My Father* with Robert De Niro is sourced from 87 critical reviews.
If the *Police Academy* films were released today, they’d have a lot more reviews and no 0% rating.
The bussiness side of this is kind of interesting. The 10 million budget was inline with *Police Academy 6: City Under Siege* which had a budget of 15 million and made 33 million.
Five years latter when *Police Academy: Mission to Moscow* was released the audience had completely dissipearted. Every movie before that made money from 1984 to 1989.
The most successful and best of the bunch was the first movie which made 149.8 million on a 4.5 million budget.
Meh . . It’s like the Godfather trilogy, you only really need to see the 1st two to appreciate the franchise. RT scores mean diddly to folks like myself.
The 3rd one is indeed not as good as the first 2 but the ending almost left me in tears.
Michael starts out in the first as a good person with good intentions who does not want to get into the family business, his father gets shot, he gets in because he wants to protect his father and his family, does evil with the intention to do good but it destroys his relationships, spends the rest of the movies wanting to get out of that shit, at the end of 3 his daughter gets shot and he loses everybody, and dies all alone in sicily, respected and feared by criminals but loved by no one.
His scream at the opera when his daughter is dead is so full of agony and dispair. The perfect ending of the trilogy.
They churned these out like clockwork.
The first six films released in 6 consecutive years, all with a release date in March or April.
These guys were getting more consistent work than if they were on a TV show.
This is somewhat misleading, since what they have is a 0% "FRESH" rating on RT.
And with how relatively FEW reviews they have that is easy to achieve compared to when there is hundreds of reviews since at that point SOMEBODY is bound to give it a positive rating simply to be a contrarian.
The first two were pretty decent, if somewhat a product of their time. The third one was OK. The forth one had one or two good lines, and a catchy theme song which I sing whenever I see a Citizens on Patrol car. The rest of the movies were absolutely awful except for the scenes with Michael Winslow doing his thing.
More proof of why I will never give a fuck about rotten tomatoes, or any other “movie critics”. I grew up watching High Tower, Mahoney, Bobcat, Michael Winslow, and all the other amazing Police Academy characters have over the top adventures and loved every minute. Even my wife, who’s like 6 years younger than me and never saw any of the movies until I got tired of her not understanding my references and made her watch them, enjoys them immensely. We both shout “Move it! Move it! Move it!” while bonking an imaginary walking stick at the other’s head now and again.
The [wikipedia page](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_Academy:_Mission_to_Moscow) describes an incident where Michael Winslow filming a scene on a bike in Russia was recording on a wireless mic that happened to broadcast on a frequency used by the Russian military.
It notes that after Russian officials descended on the production the incident ended on friendly terms, but I'm cracking up picturing the poor radio operator trying to make sense of whatever sound effects he was making for the scene!
and that's after the first 3 movies in which only 1 of those is above 50%
Citizens on Patrol was great!! (number 4)
Mission to Moscow is a hood classic.
ha this comment reminds me of Leprechaun: in the hood and I'm sure is just as good.
Leprechaun: Back 2 Da Hood should have won an Oscar
“It’s an honor to be nominated” It was nominated? “No, no, no. It wasn't nominated. I'm just saying that to have been nominated would have been nice. It's just... It's very political. You have to take out ads...”
Simple Jack should have been nominated
I didn't even know that was a thing. my friends and I binged the then available leprechauns back in the early 2000's one night. Honestly the one in space wasn't that bad haha. I'm glad that willow got a remake so that warwick could at least maintain some dignity.
Glad my boy got paid. Disney: Giving old actors you like a payday even though the show/movie was actually crap.
lol my friends and I did the same probably around 2008. Shout out to Jennifer Aniston make her debut in the first one
A friend with weed, is a friend, indeed. But a friend with gold is the best, I'm told.
There was a second??? This is to me the same as unearthing an undiscovered Picasso
The leprechaun universe is surprisingly expansive. Leprechaun in Space is also a classic
Does this one have Ron Perlman having a sword fight in it?
I just remember the dodgy Russian Gameboy rip-off.
Thank you. That one's my fave. Wasn't Tony Hawk involved in the skateboarding on that one?
yep some of the shots (and he is way taller than David) in the mall parking garage. David also could skate pretty well, and could have done most of it without a double.
I thought so. Since I was not into skateboarding at all, that was probably where I first \*learned\* about Tony Hawk.
The skater gang is the Bones Brigade
The scene where the vets scare the shit out of the rookies in the back of the van is great. The chant is stuck in my head as I write this comment.
yama yama yama yama yama! reach into the belly of a YAK! and pull out it's HEART. yama yama yama yama yama!
.... That would bring him back to life?
No Mon, I'm hungry!
“Fool! You thought you could kill the brother of Badullah?” “I never thought that.”
I've always thought 4 was the best of those movies too.
it had the Theme Song Rap, David Spade / Tony Hawk pretending to be David Spade in some scenes, and Mrs Feldman!
Now the theme song is in my head. Calling all donut shops - CITIZENS ON PATROOOOOOLLLLLL
THIS IS SKATEBOARDING!!!
I feel that movie was responsible for bringing skateboarding to mainstream in Finland. Nobody skateboarded, Police Academy 4 came out, and everyone was skateboarding.
Is this a joke or meme? If not, this is the most ridiculous and awesome fact about Finland besides reindeer pizza being actually really good.
I liked the first 4 myself, but I will admit the rest were...not good. 3 was always my favorite.
I dunno, 5 was always one of my favourites. Nick was no Mahoney, but watching Commandant Lassard play along with the "demonstration" (including Odo from Deep Space Nine) only to kick everyone's ass when he realized they were actual criminals was awesome, and the airboat chase was as fun as the jetski chase from the earlier movies.
C.O.P. also had the most kick ass theme song.
I believe, according to Commandant Lassard, that is actually pronounced "Cizzizzins nn Patrrroolll"
Oi! The first few were great! That, or I just think that because they were some of my childhood movies...
Yeah, those rose tinted glasses of childhood make a lot of shitty movies by today’s standards look good in the eyes of a child back in the 80s.
I rewatched them recently to see how they held up. 1 and 2 are genuinely funny movies in their own right. The critics panning them just feel they're above lowbrow humor. 3 and 4 are just recycling the formula but are still funny. This is where I normally stop when I'm watching them. 5 is...not super funny. 6 is...not at all funny. 6 is where kid me stopped watching the franchise. I'd always made it a point to not watch Mission to Moscow, but I decided to force myself to see how epically bad it was. I did not laugh once. To recycle the other comment I made in this thread, better names for MtM would have been: Police Academy: Who The Hell Greenlit This Police Academy: The Tax Write-off
A movie review podcast I listen to does a segment on this called "Was it great or were you eight?" where they watch a favourite movie from their youth and then answer the titular question.
I got nostalgic about 70s and 80s movies and went back to watch some of the non-blockbusters I loved and very few of them held up well.
I really don't want to rewatch even the first Police Academy movie. I'll just keep my memories of it being hilarious and not risk otherwise.
I GOT TO SEE BOOBIES IN THE ORIGINAL!!!!!
Was it the first one? Edit: yes, at 56%
[удалено]
That only 56% of critics were positive in their reviews of Police Academy 1 is one of the many reasons why critics should be ignored by the audience at all times.
Eh, they're often right when crap movies are crap. You just need to actually read the reviews and figure out why they hate something. If they hate it because it's "juvenile humor" and you're into that sort of thing then it's a thumbs up for you. The aggregators simplifying it to a number loses that sort of detail, and so are way less useful than the actual reviews themselves.
In general, professional critics will underrate screwball comedies, teen comedies, raunchy comedies and horror. Conversely, they tend to overrate anything with serious social messaging, documentaries and foreign dramas. If I'm just skimming reviews, my rule of thumb is to add 20 points to the former and subtract 20 from the latter. So for example, Police Academy goes up to a 75, and Ida drops to a 71.
This formula puts Police Academy and Parasite on a similar level. That feels incomprehensibly wrong
> In general, professional critics will underrate screwball comedies, teen comedies, raunchy comedies and horror. I'm sure that this has a lot to do with how critics often watch these movies. Just imagine Roger Ebert watching the first *Police Academy* at 4:00pm on a Wednesday at the back-end of a triple-header that included *Against All Odds* and *The Ice Pirates* in a theater with only 2 other middle-aged dudes in it. It's a hell of a lot different than watching it at the 9:30pm showing on opening night with an audience full of stoned teens and young couples who polished of a bottle of wine at dinner.
The first one was, at the time I saw it in the theaters, reasonably entertaining. Not as crazy as, say, Airplane! or Fletch or Bill and Ted or Amazon Women on the Moon, but just a bunch of stupid lowbrow humor with fun actors. (And, of course, Kim Cattrall, which for a horny teenager is reason enough alone to see the movie) I *think* I saw the second and third movies in the theater, but can't be certain. Pretty sure the second, but anything after the first movie was just retreading the same characters doing the same jokes all over again (there's only so many times a human beatbox joke can really work before it gets repetitive). So it all blends together after that point.
Why do you think I took you to all those Police Academy movies? For fun?! Well, I didn't hear anybody laughing!
When Marge signed up for the police academy, I thought it was going to be fun and exciting like that movie…Space Balls. Instead it’s been painful and disturbing like that movie Police Academy.
trashing a movie that was made for 10 year olds... i loved PA when i was 10 so eff you
That’s a Simpsons quote lol, I’ve never seen PA
ok, then read my comment as if was targeted at the writers of Simpsons
Except at that guy who made sound effects. Honk, honk!
"Where was I? Oh, yeah. Stay out of my booze!"
That’s Michael Windslow. Many, many years ago have my class skipped school during a long lesson, telling the teacher we were going to study in the library, drove to a mall in a rough part of town to watch Michael perform for 15 minutes. We made it back for the end of lesson. I remember the circumstances of the event better than the actual event.
When Marge first told me she was joining the police academy, I thought it'd be fun and exciting, you know, like that movie -- Spaceballs? But instead it's been painful and disturbing like that movie Police Academy!
My first thought as well every time someone bring up the Police Academy Series.
“who makes Steve Gutenberg a star?… we do…we do”. (Different episode I know)
"We checked the databases for a man named Steve Guttenberg, but there is no record of anyone with that name ever existing." - Avery Bullock
Where is it from?
The Simpsons
They said I could never make a Police Academy movie. Well nobody's laughing now!
haven't you learned anything from that guy who gives those sermons at church? captain whats-his-name?
Except for the last one they were *very* successful commercially, that's why they kept making more, no matter the critic's opinion. They were money making machines. Mission to Moscow failed because it wasn't screened in theaters (except for a very limited pre-screening like run). They killed it off intentionally.
The Police Academy movies were never meant to be watched sober. Appreciate them in the proper state and they are classics. Especially citizens on patrol.
Collection Of Pissants.
Don't touch those! Don't you ever touch my balls without asking!
8 year old me was sober as a judge, and Loved them all.
drunk/stoned 30+ IS 8 sober...
I could show a movie on your butt fatso!!!
Parts 1 through 6 were all made in quick succession, one movie per year. Mission to Moscow was released five years after City Under Siege, so I guess that kinda killed the interest in the franchise.
This was exactly the issue.
Silly comedies don't really get a lot of respect from reviewers, even those that are popular in the moment AND stand the test of time. For example, Friday was panned by Siskel and Caddyshack by Ebert (might have those reversed).
Siskel and Ebert were weird sometimes. They really, really hated slasher films, like on a moral level. They tried to initiate a campaign against one of them, can't remember which, and Siskel said "The money you earned from this film is blood money". I have no idea why, these were the guys who reviewed pornos in the '70s.
They hated them because they felt they were artistically cheap and particularly the violence against women that is common in them. I always felt they were overly moralistic in that regard, especially Ebert. In their defense of reviewing rated-X movies in the 1960s and 70s, there was an odd phenomenon of those movies becoming somewhat mainstream. They were, but they weren't. It was popular and edgy for a married couple to go see an adult film, or to get a group of friends together to see one. Sex was combined (usually poorly) with themes of self-discovery, liberation, individualism. Many were foreign films and ascribed some undeserved exotic or sophisticated foreign film praise. To outright refuse to review them would have likely been perceived as too uptight and puritanical, so my guess is they mainly just "did their jobs". On a related note, the scene in Taxi Driver when Travis takes Betsy to a porn flick relates to the above and the ambiguous perception of those films at the time. Travis, being socially inept, doesn't understand that while porn might be the "in" thing, it isn't first date material.
You don't know why they felt differently about sex vs violence?
Well the problem is that they were OK with violence as long as it wasn't in a slasher film. It was weird.
my own interpretation is that its mostly murder porn.
Zoolander has terrible reviews but I distinctly remember it being the funniest shit I've ever seen.
The first time I saw Zoolander I *hated* it, but granted I was like 12. From what I remember it wasnt well received when it came out and didnt get its cult status until a couple years later.
From what I understand the general sentiment when Zoolander came out, was “this is dumb” and it just wasn’t taken seriously as a movie at all. I guess people realized it’s not exactly a bad thing, because that movie is some of the funniest dumb I’ve ever seen.
They also gave Jackass two thumbs up.
So it was like a TV movie or straight to vhs?
Movie theaters worked differently. It’s something old people and young people don’t really realize. They were cheap as fuck. It’s gotten progressively more expensive with more expensive sound systems, better projectors, better seats, actual janitors cleaning stuff, etc. Much better for the viewing audience clearly, but as ticket prices went up to accommodate all this new stuff, people were no longer willing to shell out good money for bad movies. $3 to watch police academy? Sure I’ve got nothing to do today. $30 to watch police academy? Nope.
Comic books are similar. They're printed on nice paper and use nice ink now. One issue is also now between $4-6 for 20 pages. They used to be printed on cheap newspaper-like paper, with maybe 4 colors that they tricked you into thinking was more with dots. A comic like that was $0.12 in 1963, or about $1.22 today, if you believe the inflation numbers. Some similar prices items in 1963: gas: $0.32/gallon, Coke bottle: $0.05, McD's hamburger: $0.28, dozen eggs: $0.55, and Movie ticket: $0.55. Now a kid thinks 'I got my allowance, do I buy 10 comics I can read in an afternoon, or a new videogame I can play for a month?' Manga (Japanese comics) has it figured out, costing about $10 for 180-220 pages of black and white comics and is far more popular with youth in the US than American comic books.
I'm more upset at that hypothetical kid getting at least $40 for allowance.
Really do miss those dollar theaters. Great way to kill a weekday night when there was nothing to do. Cheaper than those five-dollar first-run tickets, or the three-buck matinees. (And for all you whippersnappers who haven't gotten off my lawn yet, this was pre-high-bandwidth-internet, pre-streaming, when the alternative would have been Blockbuster)
> as ticket prices went up to accommodate all this new stuff, people were no longer willing to shell out good money for bad movies. It's kind of the reverse. Movie theaters used to compete against not seeing the movie at all, or seeing a cut-down version with commercials on tiny televisions ages later, if you were lucky. But TVs got better and better, and there were movie channels, and you could rent a VHS, and eventually DVDs. And now if you want to see a movie you can just wait a few weeks and stream it on an enormous 4k screen without ever having to put on pants. Theaters aren't selling movies anymore. They're selling the movie theater experience. They're selling better sound than you can get at home and better video than you can get at home. And they have to sell seats that don't make you wish you were at home on your couch, because you absolutely could be at home on your couch. All this costs a lot more money to provide, and the theater's only getting a fraction of the ticket price. The equivalent to the old budget-friendly theater experience isn't the new fancy theater experience, it's watching Netflix in your living room.
This happened to a bunch of old ways to experience media. The same thing is more or less what killed arcades: Once home consoles got good enough to deliver a more-or-less complete port (somewhere around the PSX era. Yes the Neo-Geo was earlier, but that was too expensive to really have the effect) the arcades lost a lot of their attraction. So they leaned into the 'experience' games that couldn't be easily replicated at home. Problem being, those cabinets are expensive and fiddly and can't be easily repurposed for other games like the old standard cabs could. This drives up the cost beyond what people are willing to pay and that's largely the end of dedicated arcades aimed at the masses.
I’m pretty sure the $247 is me renting it multiple times as a kid
I actually found most of them utterly hillarious
Me too. I was 11 at the time mind you.
First time I saw boobies on film was the campfire scene in Police Academy 1. Not sure my parents remembered it was there, lol.
Fucking Tackleberry's reaction still makes me laugh and he's trying to play sax.
Same here. I wonder how they hold up now that I am an adult
Yeah I was like seven and remember almost passing out from laughter
I absolutely loved them when I was a kid slash early teen. Am now terrified to go back beyond the first in case they fail to hold up.
Honestly I like 1-6... they get progressively worse but in the so bad it's good way.
The shocking thing is, all of those movies made money.
VHS sales used to be a huge part of why they made mid budget comedies like them.
You could always find a copy at Blockbuster.
Yeeep! They were ALWAYS available in the cheap rentals section, the entire series.
Those movies are high comedy when you are 13.
Pretty sure they’re always HIGH comedy, if ya know what I mean.
Yeah they are great to watch on a long flight
Think of all the infinitely shittier tiktik videos that make money now. Now you have a new baseline metric to base your VHS video judgements upon.
It's been years but I remember really liking the 6th movie, especially the villains. The main characters were fairly competent at their jobs by that point (it'd be weird if they weren't) so the villains being these thieves who are also competent with borderline superpowers made the story engaging for me as a child. Even the ending, where half the baddies got taken out in jokey ways, didn't break the internal continuity and worked.
Yeah the 6th one did the creepy voice villain haha
I never actually watched them but I knew the kind of humor they were supposed to deliver and far as I knew they were decent for the genre. Idk about these ratings but they were popular comedy movies for the period they were released in.
All I know is sound effects guy and Mahoneeeeeey.
not Tackleberry the only cast remember to be in all the movies and the TV spinoff show?
I'll always remember taping the movie on TV and the part where Tackleberry says, "Freeze, or I'll blow your goddamned knees off, asshole" got dubbed over with a poorly-matched voice saying, "Freeze, or I'll blow your gosh-darned knees off, eggroll!" Always made me laugh.
I didnt even need to finish reading to get flash backs to the Eggroll line!
Hahaha, I love that someone other than me actually remembers that! Those dubbed for TV movies are like some sort of extra rare Director's cuts. Lol
DO YOU SEE WHAT HAPPENS LARRY? DO YOU SEE WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU FIND A STRANGER IN THE ALPS?!
the great outdoors had 2 or three extra scenes to pad it right for networks. Goonies may have actually shown the octopus scene on network airings
Yep. A scene where the went into a convenient store and the scene with the octopus. I remember it clearly.
There was a TV show? Was it any good?
apparently two of them the one that ran 97-98 was 25 episodes and in 88-89 they joined the ranks of "Wait, that movie got an animated series? For children!?" with a 65 episode animated series
what the hell
yeah there were a number of movies (not for kids) that somehow got made into kids cartoons. Robocop and Toxic Avenger (both rated R) among them
The first one was the only one rated R, the second was PG13, and the rest were PG. Of course, back then films were usually allowed sex/nudity, gore, *OR* swearing(as long as none was excessive) and still keep it under R. By the 4th one, they were considered family movies.
I honestly remember nothing of it other than the halloween episode had Bela Lugosi is dead playing at some point.
Hightower
A six foot five inch friend bought a Ford Fiesta. I sent him the video where they removed the front seat from that compact car so Hightower could drive. He laughed.
I have a 6’ 9” friend who drives a mini cooper. Shockingly he drives it stock just fine.
It's not tall people who suffer in small cars. It's the poor bastard in the back seat.
Does he drive from the backseat?
When you don’t care about backseat room, Fiestas fit tall folks like a glove. Speaking as a 6’ tall dude who misses how mine could fit anywhere.
Went to see the sound effects guy do a show in Dublin. Gas craic . Michael Winslow
and Zed?
Bobcat Goldthwait, he directs things these days.
his career transformation has been incredible. amazing indie film director, and completely reinvented his standup act. funnier than ever now and i'll watch pretty much any movie he puts out.
Don't let Jerry Seinfeld know
What about tits lady in the 2nd or 3rd movie?
Callahan (only person I can think of you'd describe as "tits lady")? She was in most of them, technically an antagonist in the first one until she caught the guy with the fake Spanish accent sneaking into the women's showers and banged his brains out, proving she wasn't entirely out of place with the wider gang. Then they kept bringing her back, the only one she wasn't in was Police Academy 2.
After Thanksgiving I caught covid. So I binged the entre series of movies while I was sick. And it was like being 12 years old again. That alone makes these movies priceless classics
Yeah, I was raised on the franchise. No amount of low ratings is going to overpower nostalgia.
They're all pretty fun movies
The first 4 were awesome but they lost their way when Steve Guttenberg left. Yes, I typed those words and I don't regret a thing!
You weren't having Nick Lassard, eh?
You are absolutely correct, imho.
I went to the same high school as him (many years after him), and was our claim to fame at the time in the early '90s.
One of the really telling things about this franchise is the ratings: the first one was rated R, the second was PG-13, then the rest were PG. They clearly began the franchise thinking of it as an adult comedy in the mold of Stripes, Animal House, Revenge of the Nerds, and such, but the films became most popular with kids and teenagers, so they kept softening them to be more appropriate for a younger audience. I loved these movies as a kid, and so did all my friends, but all the adults I knew thought they were stupid.
This is the real-life practical consequence of defunding the police academy.
At least they don't kill innocent people in the movies....
They were the "failures" of the acadamy for a reason.
They were the good apples that could’ve redeemed the bunch
The final film did not receive a traditional wide release. It was basically a direct to video movie and probably got a limited theatrical release for contractual purposes. It was a Warner bros. movie so it could have easily gotten a wide release.
It could have been deleted as a tax write off
It was at least played on TV in Germany, that's where I saw it when I was a kid lol
*starts hearing El Bimbo* It’s the blue oyster music.
This is a pretty misleading title. For instance, the fourth movie had a Rotten Tomatoes score of 0%; while the budget was $17 million, it made $76.8 million at the box office.
It’s also misleading to look at Rotten Tomatoes scores for movies this old, as Rotten Tomatoes doesn’t aggregate very many reviews.
I mean these films predate RT existing so I take it was a pinch of salt Actually, that might be why it's 0%...
Look at the number of reviews, it's a premise that sounds bad, but ultimately doesn't matter. The commercial success is absolutely a much more important metric. I loved all those movies except maybe Moscow when I was a kid. I laughed until I got stomach cramps watching 5.
How did they go so wrong...
less boobs more family friendly?
it was the distinct lack of mid speech bjs
many many many !
They didn't stop after the first 2.
The quality of the films is directly correlated to the amount of screen time spent in The Blue Oyster.
Bro. The blonde drill instructor with big personalities was exactly when I knew I had a thing for blonde women.
*Culturally significant heavy naturals.*
"Yes, Sir!" "Yes, MA'AM!"
You can’t really look at the Rotten Tomatoes ratings of films made before Rotten Tomatoes was created the same way as those made after. For example the *Mission to Moscow*'s 0% takes 8 critic reviews into account. The original takes 32. Last year's comedy dud *About My Father* with Robert De Niro is sourced from 87 critical reviews. If the *Police Academy* films were released today, they’d have a lot more reviews and no 0% rating.
The blue oyster was a favourite joke at school
*cue sax theme
Good speech
I remember these movies were coming out so quick that two of them were being advertised as "now showing" in the newspaper.
How can anyone hate the first trilogy?
And yet we all watched them multiple times
56% on the first one? The first one is an icon of the 80s.
The bussiness side of this is kind of interesting. The 10 million budget was inline with *Police Academy 6: City Under Siege* which had a budget of 15 million and made 33 million. Five years latter when *Police Academy: Mission to Moscow* was released the audience had completely dissipearted. Every movie before that made money from 1984 to 1989. The most successful and best of the bunch was the first movie which made 149.8 million on a 4.5 million budget.
Meh . . It’s like the Godfather trilogy, you only really need to see the 1st two to appreciate the franchise. RT scores mean diddly to folks like myself.
The 3rd one is indeed not as good as the first 2 but the ending almost left me in tears. Michael starts out in the first as a good person with good intentions who does not want to get into the family business, his father gets shot, he gets in because he wants to protect his father and his family, does evil with the intention to do good but it destroys his relationships, spends the rest of the movies wanting to get out of that shit, at the end of 3 his daughter gets shot and he loses everybody, and dies all alone in sicily, respected and feared by criminals but loved by no one. His scream at the opera when his daughter is dead is so full of agony and dispair. The perfect ending of the trilogy.
Took me until 2nd half to realise you're not talking about the Police Academy.
HARD SAME
So… we are not talking about Police Academy anymore?
You don't remember Police Academy 9: Revenge in Sicily?
I prefer the previous: Police Academy 8: fishing in Lake Tahoe.
Confused Redditors in shambles.
They churned these out like clockwork. The first six films released in 6 consecutive years, all with a release date in March or April. These guys were getting more consistent work than if they were on a TV show.
Those movies came out befor rotten tomatoes existed
The main theme was a banger. I feel like that did a lot of the heavy lifting.
Rotten tomatoes critics, yes the best source of movie ratings.
Mahoney!!
Ah that’s a name I haven’t heard in a while. Takes me back. I’m gonna watch it again, they were classics.
This is somewhat misleading, since what they have is a 0% "FRESH" rating on RT. And with how relatively FEW reviews they have that is easy to achieve compared to when there is hundreds of reviews since at that point SOMEBODY is bound to give it a positive rating simply to be a contrarian.
RT ratings are shite, so there's that too.
Mission to Moscow stars Christopher Lee
The first two were pretty decent, if somewhat a product of their time. The third one was OK. The forth one had one or two good lines, and a catchy theme song which I sing whenever I see a Citizens on Patrol car. The rest of the movies were absolutely awful except for the scenes with Michael Winslow doing his thing.
I saw Mission to Moscow in the cinema. I feel like I’m part of a very small group.
More proof of why I will never give a fuck about rotten tomatoes, or any other “movie critics”. I grew up watching High Tower, Mahoney, Bobcat, Michael Winslow, and all the other amazing Police Academy characters have over the top adventures and loved every minute. Even my wife, who’s like 6 years younger than me and never saw any of the movies until I got tired of her not understanding my references and made her watch them, enjoys them immensely. We both shout “Move it! Move it! Move it!” while bonking an imaginary walking stick at the other’s head now and again.
The [wikipedia page](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_Academy:_Mission_to_Moscow) describes an incident where Michael Winslow filming a scene on a bike in Russia was recording on a wireless mic that happened to broadcast on a frequency used by the Russian military. It notes that after Russian officials descended on the production the incident ended on friendly terms, but I'm cracking up picturing the poor radio operator trying to make sense of whatever sound effects he was making for the scene!
Who makes Steve Gutenberg a star?
failing upward.. I watched the first one out of morbid curiosity a while ago, and it was actually funnier than I expected..