Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the eighth dimension
A friend who watched “Buckaroo Banzai” with me in the theater the week of its release in the Summer of 1984 described it as "the most sublimely ridiculous movie ever made." Many years later and after this movie has gained a cult following and we still hear it mentioned in interviews and see it included in various "best of…" lists, I still cannot find anything else said or written about it that can improve upon my friend's one-sentence summary/description. They set out to make a hilariously silly and ridiculous movie, and, wow, did they ever succeed.
The production company hired some of the best comic actors of the 1980s: John Lithgow (the patriarch from the TV show Third Rock from the Sun), Christopher Lloyd (The time-traveling scientist from Back to the Future) and Jeff Goldblum (Jurassic Park and a frequent supporting character in Wes Anderson movies). In the title role, they cast an up to then little-known but very highly skilled actor named Peter Weller (a few years before he starred in RoboCop). It also stars Ellen Barkin and a stable of wonderful character actors -- the sort of actors you've seen a million times without knowing their names.
A polymath -- Inventor, brain surgeon, and rock musician—named Buckaroo Banzai and his crime-fighting team, the Hong Kong Cavaliers, save Earth from evil alien invaders from the eighth dimension. Almost everything in the story happens for no apparent reason, so don't try to find one. The same goes for the various personal attributes of the characters. John Lithgow's performance as the alien invasion leader includes an inexplicably bad pseudo-Mussolini Italian accent. Why? Who cares? Why do they call one of the Hong Kong Cavaliers "Perfect Tommy?" Because he's perfect. Why do the "good guy" aliens look like Rastafarians when disguised as humans? Again, don't worry about it; just sit back and let the sublime ridiculousness wash over you like an absurdist, dadaist, farcical, sci-fi bath.
(Remember to look for this DVD in the stacks under "A" for "Adventures." I first looked under "B" for "Buckaroo" and briefly thought it was lost).
