Losin' It (1982)

Must See Movie...

Fantastic!

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Jackie Earl Haley totally blows away the urban legend about Spanish fly. Great part of movie.

Considering how endless the supply of horny teenager movies was in the '80s, it's not surprising when actors who would become big stars turn up in them. Consider Johnny Depp in Private Resort and Tom Hanks in Bachelor Party. Oh, and Tim Robbins in Fraternity Vacation and Kevin Bacon in Animal House. Rarer is a director who would go onto bigger and better things, which is what we have here. Curtis Hanson won hearts and minds over ten years after this film about teenagers trying to lose their virginity when he made LA Confidential, and later, 8 Mile. Losin' It is a lot better made than the majority of teen sex movies, but that is not saying a whole lot. Most of them were clearly turned out as quickly and cheaply as possible; it was not uncommon for the boom mic to make several uncredited appearances in these movies, and the lack of budget showed in other ways, like very few inner location shots: the characters may be in high school or college, but we'd rarely see the inside of a classroom. So while Losin' It has a much better director, better actors and a better budget... it really doesn't have that much going for it. There's the usual fast talking, utterly sex (and Frank Sinatra) obsessed teen, played by Jackie Earle Haley, and the also usual shy, more sensitive teen, played by Tom Cruise. There's also the sullen and aggressive Spider, played by John Stockwell, and Haley's mercenary younger brother, who joins them on their trip to Tijuana to buy illegal firecrackers he can sell across the border.They get into the usual hijinks involving hookers, cops, and trying to hit on the wrong girls. There's also an older woman who comes along for the ride to get divorced - can you guess which of the guys mentioned above she falls for?I wasn't that interested in the exploits of these characters, clichéd and simplistic as they were, past the halfway mark, but at least they spent time on the inside of buildings other than the director's house, and the boom mic didn't keep mugging for attention.

I wasn't expecting a whole lot from this movie, but was still disappointed, but not upset, for this flick did have its moments, even if not laugh-wise.A reasonable cast that would go on to bigger and better things is something positive and whilst "Losin' It" didn't have a whole lot laugh wise, there was some good drama - Tom Cruise saying goodbye to Shelley Long, Spider being thrown in jail and Cruise backing out of "losin' it" at the last minute with the sincere hooker being the highlights. Despite lacking laugh out loud humor, "Losin' It" for me worked as a coming of age light Drama, and for that alone it deserves 5/10.

I thought that this movie was very funny the first time I saw it ten years ago, and I still do today. This is a movie that is in the same genre as Porky's or Revenge of the Nerds. True fact, Tom Cruise said in a Playboy interview that he did this movie because of Jackie Earle Haley. Since Haley had been in Breaking Away, Cruise figured that this movie would be just as good. It didn't quite work out the way he expected, at least not right away. Cruise fan or not, it's worth a look. For me, Jackie pretty much steals every scene he's in. Anytime I watch this movie, I have to laugh at Tom Cruise because he ended up becoming one of the biggest stars in the movie world, and he started out in this. If you REALLY want to see Cruise in another light, check out Endless Love, with Brooke Shields. It's his first movie, and though he's in it for less than a minute, it's worth a look, just like Losin' It. Check it out!