Today's edition of Dave-El's Weekend Movie Post takes us to that long ago year of 1984 and a cult classic sci-fi movie that has delighted and confounded people for over 4 decades.
Today's post is about (take a deep breath!) The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension! (Whew!)
Or simply Buckaroo Banzai for short.
Who the heck is Buckaroo Banzai? He's a guy who is just good at everything.
He's a medical doctor. The movie opens with Buckaroo performing a complex surgery that only he is smart enough to do.
He's a physicist AND an engineer. Working with his mentor Dr. Tohichi Hikita Buckaroon has perfected the "oscillation overthruster" which can allow objects to pass throughj solid matter.
He's an adventurer, a daredevil. Buckaroo tests the overthruster by driving his specially designed JetCar through a mountain.
He's an artist, a musician. Buckaroo fronts a band called the Hong Kong Cavaliers as a singer and he plays a variety of instruments.
He's a poet and a romantic. Buckaroo stops a performance to talk to one sad woman in the audience. Her name is Penny and dang if she's isn't a dead ringer for Buckaroo's dead wife, Peggy.
Buckaroo Banzai is the answer to whatever question you might have.
How can we stop Earth from being invaded by the Red Lectroids of Planet 10?
Answer: Buckaroo Banzai!
But it's not an easy answer but neither is the question.
Dr. Emilio Lizardo escapes from the Trenton Home for the Criminally Insane. Lizardo had worked with Hikita on a prototype of the overthruster in 1938 but he tested it before the device was ready and Lizardo became monentarily stuck between dimensions where his brain was taken over by John Worfin, leader of the evil Red Lectroids.
Now that Buckaroo Banzai has successfully employed the overthruster, Lizardo/Worfin seek to continue their respective work that was interrupted in 1938.
The Black Lectroids make contact with Buckaroo Banzai to alert him to the danger posed by the Red Lectroids and they give him the ability to see past the Lectroid's human disguises.
Since Buckaroo perfected the overthruster which will enable the Red Lectroids to escape their other dimensional prison, the Black Lectroids hold Buckaroo Banzai responsible for stopping John Worfin from unleashing his army of Red Lectroids and conquering Planet 10.
To add incentive to Buckaroo Banzai's quest, the Black Lectroids threaten to attack Russia and trigger a nuclear war which will destroy the Earth and stop the Red Lectroids from leaving this planet.
Well, that's a fine how do you do!
Further complications ensue when Lizardo kidnaps Penny and straps to her a torture/slow death thingy.
Heads up, kids! This is where things get complicated.
It ain't easy being Buckaroo Banzai, adventurer.
Also, it ain't easy being Buckaroo Banzai, the movie.
This film challenges the viewer with several shifts in tone, mixing comedic absurdity with dark tragedy. People die and we get a very disturbing suicide attempt. (SPOILER: the suicide attempt is by Penny while Buckaroo is singing her a love song. Which is almost funny but it's not.)
The alien tech is very otherwordly and organic looking.
And the aliens are suitably weird. The Lectroids in human form all take names that begin with "John".
Peter Weller takes the near perfect Buckaroo Banzai and embued him with humanity and heartbreak. Yeah, Buckaroo is smart enough to figure out how to fly an alien spacecraft but he needs a minute or two first, OK?
The scene stealer in this film is John Lithgow as Emil Lizardo aka John Worfin who pronounces the word "over thruster" like an angry German version of Sylvester the Cat.
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| Buckaroo Bonai and the Hong Kong Cavaliers |
There is a lot of detailed world building in The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension!
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