Weird Science (1985)
Directed by John Hughes
Two unpopular teenagers, Gary and Wyatt, fail at all attempts to be accepted by their peers. Their desperation to be liked leads them to "create" a woman via their computer. Their living and breathing creation is a gorgeous woman, Lisa, whose purpose is to boost their confidence level by putting them into situations which require Gary and Wyatt to act like men.
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What critics compared Weird Science to
The nature of creativity and desire, the alchemy of the imagination and the power of will, the relationship between creator and created - it's a theme that has raised many questions, from Pygmalion to Play It Again, Sam; from Weird Science to Frankenstein.
Rather than being Stranger Than Fiction with insightful gender politics, Ruby Sparks is more a hipster Weird Science (John Hughes, 1985).
Even presuming that Calvin’s on libido-suppressing antidepressants, Ruby’s a curiously asexual construct for a man in his late 20s — this redhead’s got less erotic heat than the fantasy woman concocted by a pair of teen nerds in “Weird Science’’ (1985).
Not for Kazan the male fantasies of " Weird Science ," in which two panting teenage boys create a swimsuit model, or even "Splash," with Tom Hanks teaching his pet mermaid everything she knows.
That blend of Weird Science poured through a Charlie Kaufman meta-filter is what nudges this one helpfully into SFX territory.
But as it is, I think the creators – producers James Wan and Blumhouse, writer Akela Cooper and director Gerard Johnstone – just wanted to have fun with its high concept, which is also reminiscent of movies like War Games (1983) and Weird Science (1985).”
Instead, those moments in Sixteen Candles , or Weird Science , we'll say, where he seemed to capture something so elementally correct about the human teen condition -- its churning chaos, and everyone's desperate bid to try and match a series of feelings and predilections to an actual identity -- it was if he were writing seated at a den filled with his angst-ridden protagonists as they wailed and laughed and sobbed their stories out to him.
The movie is saved from complete disaster by Duke, Green, and Marsden (who is clearly having a blast improvising a riff on Sean William Scott's Stifler or, even more appropriately, Bill Paxton's Chet from Weird Science), but the awkward, poorly cast leads and the lackluster script cause this car to break down long before it reaches its destination.
Clark Duke basically steals the show on many occasions, but Marsden destroys his pretty boy humility with this spastic machismo fueled bully a la Bill Paxton in “Weird Science” who proves to be a constant obstacle in character Ian’s journey for self-discovery and coming of age.
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Possessing all the finest qualities of HAL 9000 in 2001: A Space Odyssey and Kelly LeBrock in Weird Science , “Samantha,” an operating system voiced by Scarlett Johansson in Spike Jonze’s Her , is a fully customizable virtual mate—with the privacy settings defaulting to “off.”
Similarly, many human/AI relationship movies have a human protagonist bring an AI into consciousness through some quirky action — like Lisa in Weird Science , or Edgar in Electric Dreams .
Instead, it quickly becomes clear that the film is more in tune with the dumber films of the era--the plot is essentially a mixture of the idiotic jiggle-fest “Hot Dog: The Movie” and the garish John Hughes gumdrop “Weird Science” with chunks of “Back to the Future” as a garnish.
Hedges' Ian struts around at times like Bill Paxton's Chet from "Weird Science" … er, until his demeanor turns on a dime and becomes something quite unsettling.
And, yeah, there’s the entire conceit of Weird Science .
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Apart from a pair of consistently hilarious yet realistic-looking gal pals played by Aidy Bryant and Busy Philipps, nearly every woman on-screen looks like she was designed by the retrograde computer program two John Hughes hornballs used to conjure virtual girlfriend Kelly LeBrock in “Weird Science.”
It hopes you won’t complain so long as werewolves and warlocks are fighting demonic dogs and goth-rock villains who look like the dudes who trashed Ilan Mitchell-Smith’s house near the end of Weird Science.