Best Defense (1984)

Thanks for the memories!

A waste of 90 minutes of my life

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

C'mon you can't be serious thinking this is of comedy value...dudely moron is his usual pathetic self...even the women in the cast are taller when he wears elevator shoes...not only does this jerk have to buy all his material he has to pay for the phony laughs as well...the truly funny part of this fiasco was seeing kate "the Body" capshaw in the same scene and bed with dudley doofus...she must have been paid a handsome bonus to appear in this film about non-sense....yes, total disregard for arabs in general ....helen shaver actually had a moment of spark but remained fully clothed for a change...on a scale of bad to worse i'd rate this a minus 20

In 1982 Wylie is working for a company located in a former bowling alley which is about to go under. In 1984 Lt. Landry is demonstrating a tank in Kuwait that causes chaos. This is confusing, but the events are related.Wiley meets a man in a bar who is designing technology for a tank and is about to meet with KGB spy Jeff. Fearing what may happen (and he is right), he sneaks his design into Wylie's briefcase.Wylie finds the technology, and given that he will save his company by doing so, he reluctantly goes along with a co-worker's scheme to pass the work off as his own. The technology doesn't work perfectly but it can be improved. Wylie secretly asks a co-worker to investigate the plan further and discovers even worse problems.During all this Wylie also cheats on his wife with boss Clair and runs for his life from Jeff and other goons. And let's not forget Landry, who has troubles of his own. With plenty of silliness from the natives. In the end, we have to wonder if Wylie can fix the problems before Landry gets blown up by a tank that has already performed poorly.This is no masterpiece, but it's pretty good and offers lots of laughs and excitement. The ending is especially satisfying.Dudley Moore does a pretty good job. I'm aware he has received acclaim for some of his roles. This isn't one of them.I know David Rasche best as a reckless cop supposedly based on Dirty Harry. He's nearly as talented here. Eddie Murphy dies what he does best: laugh and cry. However, I've seen better from him.Don't expect too much, and I don't believe this film will disappoint.

The Dudley Moore / Eddie Murphy debacle. The premise has enough promise, but it never really takes off. The shenanigans in the factory are plain dull. Moore gets to be sarcastic, but not funny, and gets into woman trouble (Helen Shaver and Kate Capshaw are most easy on the eye), but is soon interrupted by a bumbling group of agents who need his help to catch the Rasche character, which leads to some okay consternation in a parking lot. Then there is the whole situation in the Middle-East with Eddie Murphy; I didn't find a single good joke in there. The supposed-to-be-suspenseful (right?) inter-cutting with the other half of the film doesn't work one bit, either.Moore, Murphy, Rasche and other assorted actors may have given it a good go, but without funny jokes and / or an entertaining story, it don't WAMmo, no sir.2 out of 10.

I'll go against the crowd and point out that this much-reviled movie actually was quite prescient in premise. It anticipated a lot of History... and a lot of Human Error.Mayhap it was too 'out there' for audiences in 1984,...and mayhap it has become an easy target for arm chair critics to despise out-of-hand without due consideration....But after Afghanistan and Iraq... After the highly-publicized and critical defense industry design errors such as the Osprey and basics such as protective armor in Hummvees and personal protective gear for troops on the ground.... After the loss of life due to a 'so-what-if-it-works-take-the -$$$-and- we'll-fix -it-later-if-we-have to' attitude prevalent in the defense manufacturing industry....Can anyone really throw rocks at the plot line of 'Best Defense'...?Sure, it could have been executed better... Sure, Dudley Moore was still under the character-success-type-casting curse of '10'; having to be a perpetually the befuddled Randy-But-Inept Nice Guy in his every movie role....Sure Eddie Murphy was ...well...stuck being 'Eddie Murphy'... (but you really can't take that away from him, y'know !)I still maintain that in the cold, hard light of 2014... 'Best Defense' makes A Lot Of Sense....(sadly, so..SO... sorry to say)