Penelope Spheeris directs Chris Pedersen, Bill Coyne and Flea in this punk alienation flick.

Bad acting and pretty dull when the music ain’t pumping. There is animal cruelty, nihilism and a working parallel between the abandoned kids and unemployed older men who vilify them. It is a movie that begins and ends with a death of a small child. The first is dog attack, out-of-the-blue shock, the capper is an unabashed melodramatic cliche. Bad behaviour but not much fun. You’ll need to wash your eyeballs after. Spheeris’ career trajectory from punk documentaries to this to Wayne’s World to toothless nostalgic TV remakes has to be one of the stranger Hollywood creative journeys in my lifetime.

5

Perfect Double Bill: Out Of The Blue (1980)