Bad Boys (1983)

Bad Boys (1983)
1983’s Bad Boys is one of the grittiest, most brutal prison films ever made. It’s not the best prison/reform school film-that honor goes to The Shawshank Redemption. However, this is a powerful must-see film that features exemplary acting from all the young leads. The imagery shown is some incredibly brutal at times-even by today’s standards. As director Rick Rosenthal points out, he wanted to add realism to his story. Without any film depicting this violence, then there is no point trying to be realistic.



The film came to fruition a few years prior when producer Richard Solo mentioned to writer Richard Di Lello that he wanted a “James Cagney version of a reform school film.” Di Lello wrote the script within ten days. What is truly remarkable is how the script came across as realistic with no research. Di Lello decided to do some research after he wrote the script and to his surprise, the events that he racked from his brain turned out to be as realistic as one would expect. With the script out of the way, Rick Rosenthal was hired to direct. He previously directed the maligned Halloween 2 in 1980. This one film would be the best film he would ever go on to direct.



Mick O’Brien (Sean Penn) is a gang member from Chicago. During a drug trade that goes completely south, O’Brien is arrested and sent to a maximum-security juvenile facility for vehicular manslaughter. The person he killed happens to be the younger brother of his rival, Paco Moreno (Esai Morales). As a vow of revenge, Moreno rapes O’Brien’s girlfriend J.C (Ally Sheedy). He is eventually caught and sent to the same facility where O’Brien currently resides. With these two bitter enemies under the same roof, danger lurks just around the corner.



The performances are, for the most part, very good. After watching Sean Penn as a high school student doped up on a weed in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, he delivers a completely different performance here. I was impressed at the range he shown. His character is a bad guy, but Penn was able to make the character sympathetic. Esai Morales does a solid job, although I felt this character was a little cliched. Ally Sheedy made her film debut with this movie and does a great job. Some of the people we meet in the prison are worth mentioning- Reni Santoni who plays one of the helpful reform school guards, Ramon Herrera, Clancy Brown as Viking who claims to be the leader of the prisoners, and Eric Gurry as Horowitz, the explosives-loving cellmate of Mick’s.



Bad Boys does a very good job on showing how brutal life living in these reform schools can be. There are many disturbing images throughout and I really liked how the filmmakers were not afraid to show us these images. The first hour was the best part of the movie as we are introduced to Mick and his life at prison. When Moreno re-enters the movie, the film does fall into a predictable mode, but the brutality still exists. The ending fight scene, although moves a bit long, is a very climatic and unforgettable sequence. As for prison films go, this ranks in the upper echelon in terms of personal taste. I seemed to like this movie better than most, and I am fine with that. If you are looking for a prison film that features young stars at their best with disturbing imagery, maybe give Bad Boys a look.



My Grade: A-

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