Mini-Review: Red Dawn

“Red Dawn” is the cinematic equivalent of your moronic best friend. It’s so dumb, you have to wonder how it keep from tripping over its own feets. It’s loud, oblivious, and more than a bit obnoxious. But it manages to project a kind of cheery stupidity that you can’t help but like.

Perhaps I misspoke when I said “cheery,” because “Red Dawn” is one of the grimmest movies I’ve seen in quite a while. The plot sounds like something hammered out by a hack writer with fifteen minutes to go til the deadline. Come to think of it, that’s probably exactly how it happened.

“Red Dawn” begins with the biggest bang imaginable—World War III. The Soviets, having grown tired of simply growling at us from across the pond, decide to settle the matter once and for all. The opening credits end, and five minutes later Soviet paratroopers begin dropping out of the sky into Dirtburg, Colorado. Note: the town probably isn’t named Dirtburg. However, we had some trouble with the volume while watching the movie, so we had to fill in most of the dialogue ourselves. I would like to think that our homemade script was an improvement.

Why are the Soviets so intent on holding Dirtburg? Why do they drop half an army into a town with a population of exactly three? And the tanks—where do the Soviet tanks come from? The movie never really explains. The only real exposition comes halfway through, when a grizzled American pilot (played, grizzledly, by Powers Boothe) tells our heroes about how America got caught with its pants down. “They used strategic nukes on cities like Omaha and Kansas City,” he says, proof that the Soviets probably drew up their battle plan using a map of America, some darts, and a good deal of vodka.

Our heroes are a group of plucky high school students (played, pluckily, by people I care nothing about) flee to hills and become anti-Soviet guerrillas. Each comes equipped with a rifle, a puffy jacket, and different 80s-style haircut, probably so the audience can tell them apart. I didn’t learn their names until the end credits, when I found that one of our heroes was called “Aardvark.” Aardvark! That’ll send a chill down the Soviet spines.

These clowns name themselves the “Wolverines,” in honor of their high school football team. Thank God they didn’t attend nearby St. Stephen High School, home of the somewhat less-intimidating Screamin’ Mimis. The Wolverines engage the Soviets in a series of escalatingly absurd battles. First, they’re killing off individual Soviets; then they move on to attacking tanks; by the end of the battle, two Wolverines manage to pin down an entire Soviet division. If the film had gone on for another fifteen minutes, the guerrillas probably would have stormed the Kremlin and punched out Gorbachev.

All of this is seasoned with an extra helping of Hollywood-style grit. It’s the kind of movie where no one simply dies; they ham it up like a dinner theater amateur, flinging their arms out and shrieking while little blots of red appear all over their chest. They look like they’re lactating cranberry juice. One noble Wolverine meets his fate by charging into the line of fire, machine gun blazing, while shrieking (and I quote) “Graaabbaaaah!” He gets cut down in seconds. The film is as much mystery as action—how the hell do the Wolverines survive as long as they do?

The MPAA once judged “Red Dawn” the goriest movie ever made, in terms of on-screen deaths. I wasn’t counting, but that seems accurate. Someone bites the bullet every four or five seconds. They all die in the most interesting ways. One Russian gets skewered in the back by a Wolverine arrow; as he goes down, he shouts out, “Help me comrades! I’m dying!” Well, then why should they help you, Yuri?

The director and screenwriter, God bless their hearts, take the whole film the utmost seriousness. They never wink at the camera, never even acknowledge the utter absurdity of the everything going on. They treat it like a mission from God. The commies are coming and, by God, they will warn us about it! I expected to see the closing credits thank “The nice people at the John Birch Society for their valuable input.” I have never seen a less ironic movie. Even the films that appeared on Mystery Science Theater 3000 had more self-awareness than “Red Dawn.”

Yet that’s what makes it so goofily enjoyable. When the Wolverines attacked the Russians while screaming their battle cry—“Wolverines!” in case you wondered—I chuckled. When young guerrilla love blossomed between Girl Wolverine and Boy Wolverine (Aardvark, maybe?) I guffawed. And when one character, imprisoned in a Soviet re-education camp, implored his children to “Avenge me!” I laughed harder than I have in weeks. You can’t help but be amused by total crap like that.

Don’t take “Red Dawn” seriously, and you’ll enjoy the heck out of it. The directors might have missed the irony. Rest assured, the viewer won’t.