Three O'Clock High (1987)

The Worst Film Ever

Powerful

Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

The teen movies of the 80's decade were dominated by the cheesy / romantic / well-intentioned cinema of John Hughes; the "Lemon Popsicle" sex teen movies clones such as Bob Clark's "Porky's" trilogy, "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" or "The Last American Virgin" and the Spielberg's executive produced adventure / fantasy teen flicks such as "Back to the Future" or "The Goonies".Phil Joanou's first venture as a director was an unconventional teen comedy for its time called "Three O'Clock High", set in an all american High School like the majority of Hughes' (and non-Hughes) flicks of this genre, inspired by the classic western "High Noon" starring Gary Cooper (in an Oscar winner role) and Grace Kelly and based in real life situations of the two screenwriters during their High School years.Joanou, a fan of Scorsese's "After Hours", released 2 years prior and also an unusual comedy, but set in the adult world, based its directing style and fancy cinematography straight for the teen movie genre with the help of the inovator cinematographer, Barry Sonnenfeld (an usual collaborator of the Coen brothers at that time) to acquire a 'cartoon-ish' / comic book style through stylized camera angles and proper lightning effects resulting in a visually nifty film which also benefited from a skillful editing giving the movie its congruous frantic pace.Besides the greatness of its technical aspects, the movie is also clever in its storytelling, the rivalry between the nerd, Jerry Mitchell and the "new kid on the block", the bad boy, Buddy Revell changes stereotypes through the course of the action with Mitchell being accused of theft, illegal weapon possession and even for cheating at the exam and Buddy, the long-haired' black leather jacket outsider being more smart & sensitive than people would give him credit for.Casey Siemaszko, after a string of good supporting roles in famous teen movies such as "Back to the Future", "Secret Admirer" and "Stand by Me" was given the lead role of Jerry Mitchell and he's perfectly cast giving life to his character, a nervous, unpopular & nerdy high schooler about to face his rite of passage to becoming a confident young man after his feud with the troubled misfit, played here by Richard Tyson, in his debut role, who delivered an interesting (and imposing) performance as Buddy Revell, even if his screentime is kind of short.The supporting players are filled with great character actors such as the always sinister, the late John P. Ryan ("Runaway Train", "Avenging Force", "Class of 1999"); Jeffrey Tambor and Mitch Pileggi (future Wes Craven's "Shocker" and better known as Skinner in the hit TV show, "The X-Files").Some may say, including the late Roger Ebert in his review, that this movie resembles a lot of an early teen movie starring Chris Makepeace, Adam Baldwin & Matt Dillon called "My Bodyguard", which is a great (and earlier) entry on the High School genre, but ultimately, "Three O'Clock High" is way more creative, memorable and well paced and much more worthy in the rewatchable factor.Steven Spielberg, who executive produced this movie, ordered to get his name removed from the credits after he watched a rough cut of this. Apparently, the big bearded wanted another "The Karate Kid" or a more conventional / cheesy High School teen flick and this kind of offbeat comedy startled him. He had already done the same two years before with "Fandango", the debut movie of director Kevin Reynolds which featured a young Kevin Costner in his first leading role. In my point of view, Spielberg made a big mistake of disowned both films, because they're way original and inventive and still hold up well today and maybe with the Spielberg name envolved, they could have had more chances at the box office, instead of being flops that ran into obscurity (only cinephiles know the existence).Also worthy of a mention is the memorable music score by Tangerine Dream and the additional music provided by Sylvester Levay.In short, "Three O'Clock High" deserves to be in the Top 10 of the best High School teen movies from the 80's, it's a great watch and one of the last breath of a genre that started the downfall in popularity at the same time as the end of the decade was approaching...On a side note, the hit TV Show for Fox Network that premiered in '90, "Parker Lewis Can't Lose" stole the concept, ideas, the cinematography and directing style of this one. Universal Pictures and Joanou should have sued Columbia Pictures Television for producing such a blatant rip-off.

Three O'Clock HighThe only way to really deal with a bully is to bully their younger sibling.Unfortunately, the bully in this comedy is an only child.High school geek Jerry (Casey Siemaszko) is tasked with writing a welcome article on his school's newest transfer: bad-boy Buddy (Richard Tyson). The assignment goes from bad to worse when Buddy challenges Jerry to an after-school fight.Terrified of fighting, Jerry employs every trick in the textbook in order to avoid the pending violence. Stashing contraband, getting detention, even trying to buy Buddy off doesn't dissuade the imminent beat down that has the student body placing bets.An out-there dark comedy, this 1987 high school sub-genre flop stands the test of time thanks to the enduring power of bullying. Awkwardly funny and brutally honest, this neglected after-school fistfight movie needs to be revisited. Incidentally, there'd be no after-school fights if child labour laws were abolished. Yellow Lightvidiotreviews.blogspot.ca

"Three O'Clock High" used to be a very famous movie in Brazil, due to the elevated number of times that the main channel displayed it. I remember seeing this when I was a kid, and last night I gave it another chance. The get go and the main plot are really promising: a young boy threatened by the school's biggest bad boy. From that perspective, anyone who wants to see it, has to have in mind that the film won't be any serious. In fact, the story is never serious; characters are very caricatured, gathering the most famous clichés of the high school genre. However, this movie proves to be interesting when it entertained me in a good way, making me root for the good guy to get away with murder, even if he did all those bad things to escape from his unwanted destiny. Directing isn't anything marvelous, and so isn't the acting, but the story is well written, delivering some laughs and some identifications with the characters. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention that it has a cool soundtrack, which may satisfy the whole audience. It is, surely, a nice piece of entertainment made in the crazy decade of the eighties. It's recommended, especially for the young audience.

Richard Tyson as Buddy Revell is a badass. He's scary as hell and doesn't take crap from anybody… anybody! When Jerry (Siemaszko) is assigned to write a paper about Buddy, he accidentally touches him (whoever touches him gets his ass whooped) causing Buddy to challenge him in a fight in the parking lot at yup, you guessed it, three o'clock. It's fun to watch all the things he does to weasel out of the fight, including paying the toughest school jock only to see him get taken down with ease, and then witnessing how Jerry implodes at how useless all his attempts are. What makes this movie good? Richard Tyson. Nobody could've played Buddy Revell better. If you've seen Kindergarten Cop, it seems like he plays the same character when he used to attend high school. This is one of the only main roles that Siemaszko does and he does it well. A go-to guy as a sidekick in most of his roles (Back to the Future, Stand By Me, Young Guns), he plays the Michael J. Fox card here with his innocent and clumsy look. It's just one of those fun movies you can watch over and over again. Kinda makes me think why Steven Spielberg wanted his name removed from the credits as executive producer but didn't mind that everyone knew that he directed Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.