1990 - THE ADVENTURES OF FORD FAIRLANE, possibly a comedy.

The comedian Andrew Dice Clay is the star of The Adventures of Ford Fairlane.  But before we get into the movie a few sentences regarding Andrew Dice Clay.  Clay was a comedian who was hot for a while in the late 80's and the 1990's.  The comedic character he portrayed on stage was a persona called The Diceman.  The Diceman was basically a character who offended people by telling dirty jokes and making up dirty nursery rhymes.  In essence Andew Dice Clay was a shock comedian.  He was extremely popular for a while but his jokes about "homosexuals" and women finally wore out their welcome as public tastes began to change.

While Clay was popular, the producer Joel Silver put him in a movie where he played his Diceman character called in this case Ford Fairlane. The Adventures of Ford Fairlane is about a rock and roll detective on the trail of the murderer of a heavy metal rock star.  Ford is Mr Cool,  a man who is quick with his fists and is good a bedding the babes.  Ford Fairlane spouts a series of one liners regarding the size of his penis, the size of women's breasts and lots of offensive material about "fags."  It's all supposed to be hilarious and maybe with a better approach could have been funny.

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Clearly the plan of the writers, the producer and the director Renny Harlin was to make a raunchy hip comedy.  But this kind of stuff takes a lot of skill to pull off.  You have to know the fine line between hipness and stupidity something the production team really couldn't get their minds around with their screenplay.  Andrew Dice Clay is kind of a "Johnny One Note," playing a lowlife New Jersey or Philadelphia "Guido."  After a while the sex jokes and the leering at women gets to be extremely tiresome.

 

Of note, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane has what could only be called a nightmare cast.  Wayne Newton, Priscilla Presley, Gilbert Gottfried, Morris Day and "Freddy Kruger" himself Robert Englund an amazing collection of oddballs gathered together in one unfunny movie. If anything The Adventures of Ford Fairlane is  a time capsule of a peculiar moment in popular culture in this country.

The film was written by David Arnott, James Cappe and Daniel Waters.  The running time is 102 minutes.