“The police can’t help me—I’m one of the bad guys.”
I really didn’t mean to use this space for so much Jeff Goldblum Revisited, but I’ve been watching a lot of semi-obscure ’80s/early ’90s movies lately and Into the Night fits right in.
The Premise: Nerdy engineer Ed (played by you-know-who) has insomnia, a cheating wife, and a general case of suburban malaise.
On a late-night drive, Ed inadvertently rescues Diana (Michelle Pfeiffer) from a bunch of Iranian mobsters and is plunged into seedy intrigue in Los Angeles—seems Diana (see the quote above) is a jewel smuggler. Can the two of them make a deal that will get them out of this mess alive? Will Ed ever sleep? How did Dan Aykroyd get in this production, and how would we ever play Four Degrees of Jeff Goldblum without him?
This is a weird little movie, and since I didn’t recognize all the director cameos when I was younger (the movie’s director, John Landis, plays a bad guy; David “The Fly” Cronenberg plays Ed’s boss, and there are other brief appearances by Lawrence Kasdan and Roger Vadim), I am only now starting to appreciate how weird. Jim Henson has a cameo, for pete’s sake. And yet I kept wondering what kind of movie David Lynch could’ve made from this same material, since it seems to touch on a lot of his neo-noir motifs.
On the other hand, could anyone really improve on Jeff Goldblum in an Elvis car?
The Verdict: On the whole, I probably like this movie as much now as I did when I saw it in the ’80s, but for completely different reasons. Except for the B.B. King soundtrack, of course: that’s always good.
Keep an eye out for David Bowie in the trailer, too.
Might go well with: Bacon, other diner food.
Next time: We spend more time with Jonny Quest and friends.
