Director
Hoite C. Caston
Cast
Peter Billingsley - Jack Simmons
Anne Bloom - Janet Simmons
Stuart Pankin - Mr. Hodgkins
Chad Sheets - Bo
Patrick Collins - Mike
Weasel Forshaw - Big Slime
Sage Parker - Mazie Clavell
The 1985 movie The Dirt Bike Kid is saturated with clichés and cheesy 1980s tropes. This movie has all of that stuff I mentioned above. Any satire of 80s films out there must surely pull some inspiration from this movie. So much so that I was a little embarrassed to post a review.
I came across this movie several times at California Video and thought about renting it. But, I never did. After all these years I've remembered the cover art depicting Peter Billingsley, whom I only knew from A Christmas Story, flying on a motorcycle over some random city. How could I forget this picture?
This movie definitely pulls from E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial and Disney's The Love Bug.
Director Hoite C. Caston said in the DVD commentary that it's inspired from the story Jack and the Beanstalk.
In this movie, Billingsley plays Jack Simmons who's a typical T.V. watching, yet somehow imaginative kid, who lives with his mom, Janet (Anne Bloom). His dad died sometime before so it's just Jack and Janet.
Jack's mom gives him their last $50 to go buy groceries. On his way to the store, he stops by a dirt bike race.
During the race, Jack sees one of the competitors, Max (Gavin Allen), riding a Yamaha YZ-80 (also known as a dirt bike for people like me who could care less).
The motorcycle performs poorly during the race, infuriating Max who yells at it and kicks it like a downed horse.
Jack takes interest in the mud-caked bike, wishing it could be his. A random mysterious old spectator starts telling Jack that the bike is special and magical, and that Max doesn't deserve a bike such as that.
So, Jack offers Max his mom's last $50 and the bicycle he rode in on, for the motorcycle.
Jack discovers the bike is self-aware, and indeed magical. In fact, the bike can actually fly.
When he returns home with his new trade, his mom is naturally furious he blew all their food money on this thing. She confiscates it, puts it in the back of the family station wagon, and goes to sell it a local bike shop.
Of course, moms never "understand."
Jack goes to the bike shop later, asks to get the bike back from the owner, and offers to work for the cost. The owner happily agrees.
Meanwhile, Jack's little league baseball coach, Mike (Patrick Collins) is facing a financial crisis. His hot dog restaurant, Mike's Doghouse, which is the team sponsor is in dire straights as ruthless and self-centered bank owner, Mr. Hodgkins (Stuart Pankin) wants to tear it down in order build a second bank branch.
Jack and his girl-loving, Playboy magazine reading friend, Bo (Chad Sheets) use this sentient bike and some computer hacking skills to help uncover Hodgkins' corrupt plans and save Mike's Doghouse.
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| Peter Billingsley as Jack Simmons in The Dirt Bike Kid. |
Meanwhile, a motorcycle gang led by a guy named Arthur "Big Slime" (Weasal Forshaw) has it in for Jack because...he's a kid, I guess? There's no reason given as to why this motorcycle gang (all adults) hates jack and is out to take him down.
The Dirt Bike Kid is such a ridiculously obvious story. It's one of the most archetypal movies of its decade I have ever seen as far as structure and storyline goes. I feel like I almost have to like it.
The film contains the innocent and loveable main character with his quirky and boob-loving buddy, a beloved town hangout threatened to be taken down by an evil and unsympathetic rich banker, adult bullies with completely unclear motives hell-bent on taking down the main character, and a story so predictable readers will probably gather what happens just by reading my short synopsis.
It's fascinating, even speaking as someone who lived through the 1980s, how cookie cutter a movie The Dirt Bike Kid is.
I can't blame the film for these same old tropes. I think time didn't serve these aspects of the movie well. However, I can't imagine adult audiences in 1985 viewing this movie with a mindset far from mine right now in 2021. Or, maybe that's what they expected to see in a PG rated movie of the mid-1980s.
There's even a pie fight. That's comedy on par with slipping on a banana peel or shoving 20 clowns in a dinky car.
Spoiler. At the end of the movie, when all is resolved, the bike loses its magic for Jack. Some other random kid takes interest in the bike which suddenly has its magic back. And also back is the same random old guy from the beginning who, once again, tells this kid how special the bike is. The term "forced" doesn't seem big enough.
And the fact that the bike is magic and can fly seems like a plot point that was thrown in at the last minute. There's nothing substantial to indicate this bike is going to be magic. Yes, the cover art shows Billingsley's character flying over the city. But the term "dirt bike" denotes racing and sweet bike jumps.
And, yes, the movie's tagline begins with "if you're crazy about magic..." That's open for interpretation.
The original title was Crazy Wheels. That actually sounds better as it places emphasis on the magic dirt bike rather than the "dirt bike kid." It denotes a uniqueness about the bike. If the movie title referenced the bike rather than the kid, then it would take away some of that apparent tacked-on placement of the magic flying self-aware bike.
Director Hoite Caston said the movie was made on an $800,000 budget, and sold 100,000 VHS tapes. One of them landed at California Video in Oakland, California's Lincoln Square Shopping Center.
According to imdb.com, this is Caston's first and only film he directed. Otherwise, he also directed episodes of a tv series called Not Necessarily the News.
Honestly speaking, The Dirt Bike Kid is proof not everything from the 1980s is worth remembering. Still, this easily falls into that weird "so bad that it's good" category.
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