Phil Collins, Madonna, That Perfect 80’s Sound and Drama

I have been listening to a lot of Phil Collins “In The Air Tonight” lately.

This is mostly to get myself pumped up for the Celtics (who play it before tip off at the Garden). But whenever I think of Phil Collins, I remember all his other classics.

“Against All Odds”is one such classic. And I was thinking about it on the train on the way into work today and I remembered seeing a music video for “Against All Odds” that contains cut scenes from a movie of the same name.

Now obviously, music television and VH1 being what they are, there is no way i saw this video more recently than 10-15 years ago. But it popped into my head. So I IMDB’ed it.

You know a movie is a classic when the “Plot Keywords” are Beautiful Woman | Female Nudity | Neo Noir | Remake | American Football.

This movie clearly needs to arrive in my mailbox via Netflix ASAP.

When I was thinking about “Against All Odds” though, I also started thinking about a movie I vaguely remember (same time period) that starred Sean Penn, where, if I remember it correctly, he stole cars and it featured the phenomenal Madonna song “Live To Tell”. Man is that a great song.

So I checked that one out too. And it looks like my Netflix queue is filling up by the second. plot Keywords are Rape | Pennsylvania | Murder | Sociopath | Disturbing.

“At Close Range” also features the tag line “Like father. Like son. Like hell.” Brilliant. And it has Crispin Glover!

Mainly though, the thing that got me started on this movie tangent is 80’s music. I don’t know what it is, but there is just a certain style to 80’s songwriting that seems right to me. Maybe it was growing up in the shopping mall as a kid and hearing these types of songs.

I wish madonna still did songs like “Live To Tell”. She was so adorable back then. Now she just kind of scares me.

The 80’s synth is undeniable. They just don’t seem to have tones like that anymore. Listen to “Young Turks” by Rod Stewart or “Live To Tell” by Madonna or even that song by Patrick Swazye in “Dirty Dancing”. Its just a certain quality of sound that isn’t common these days.

Maybe that is why I love Tegan & Sara’s “The Con” so much. The brilliant 80’s sound. Ditto for the band The Static Age. The song “Vertigo” by The Static Age is like an anthem from the 1980’s that was written 14 years too late. Even The Knife have some of that perfect 80’s sound and I doubt I would care for them if they didn’t.

In other movie related news, my two week theory has held strong, as I still have yet to see “Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull of Subparness”.

 

 

 

 

 

~ by yorkroberts on June 6, 2008.