Popular reviews

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  Review by Justin LaLiberty ★★★

  charming, and largely forgotten, Joe Dante directed made-for-TV remake of the not-as-charming 50s movie -- gets by on very clearly being a Joe Dante movie (opens with a projection booth scene, has Roger Corman and Sam Arkoff cameos, Dick Miller is prominently featured, someone says "don't crowd me") but there's also much worse ways to spend 90 minutes than with 90s Jenny Lewis and Paul Rudd

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  Review by nathaxnne [hiatus <3] ★★★½ 1

  A Showtime remake of American International Picture's 1956 original as part of their 1994 Rebel Highway series, Runaway Daughters also totally works as a gentle, laconic companion piece to Joe Dante's previous film Matinee, with a group of girls self-liberating from stifling Southern California Suburban Conformity by stealing a car and heading to San Diego to confront the loser paramour of one of their number. Runaway Daughters has a great cast, including Dick Miller as a low-rent private eye with loud ties, Paul Rudd as a motorcycle tough, Dee Wallace Stone and her husband as bored libertine parents, and Roger and Julie Corman as proud, grilling parents, among many others, including most of the cast of The Howling! Runaway Daughters is suffused with the uneasy, nonspecific paranoia of the Sputnik Panic, and the restlessness of youth culture on the precipice of radical change. Props to showing I Was A Teenage Werewolf at the drive-in, too, for bonus werewolf coding!

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  Review by Gabriel Jewett ★★★★

  This might be my last Rebel Highway for a while, not because I'm bored or anything but because I'm starting to reach a point where they're getting harder to find. So if anyone has any tips for finding cheap legal versions of Motorcycle Gang, Dragstrip Girl, Reform School Girl, Jailbreakers, or Cool And The Crazy I would be very grateful.
  But have no fear young readers for I'm not giving up hope, and I will track down each one eventually.

  Anyways, let's talk about Runaway Daughters.
  Starting this film with a montage of real events which cuts to kids watching I Was A Teenage Werewolf was perfect, very inspired which made me clamor for a Rebel Highway entry that was…

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  Review by Rembrandt Q Pumpernickel ★★★

  Starts off acerbically, with a montage of horrible events (Nixon, Korean war, effigy lynchings, atomic explosions) set to "Let the Good Times Roll," but that doesn't seem to at all be prep for the film itself, which while satirical at points is a lot more good natured and hokey than the opening montage hints at.

  Could've been rated higher but takes too long to get to the "Dante bits," although when it did, I really liked them. Jenny Lewis yells about the terribleness of cops, a P.I. suddenly lectures about the sexual perversion of a new generation, and our titular daughters celebrate when they find out some people who just died were murderers.

  My favorite part though is that Paul Rudd basically plays the same character that he did in Wet Hot American Summer only straight.

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  Review by izzy ★★★½

  i had way too much fun watching this and also i want paul rudd to destroy me

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  Review by MoeMents ★★★

  Zehn "Rebel Highway" Filme fürs Fernsehen unter dem Aushängeschild "1950s drive-in classic B-movies remade with a '90s edge", war das Konzept von Lou Arkoff und Debra Hill. Einer dieser Filme war Roadracers von Robert Rodriguez oder der für mich furchtbare Cool and the Crazy von Ralph Bakshi! Eindeutig mehr Hoffnung setzte ich da in Genreliebling Joe Dante.

  Schon hier wird Dantes's Liebe zum Film/Genre ersichtlich, startet RUNAWAY DAUGHTERS doch schnuckelig im gruseligen Autokino, ehe die rebellische Damenrunde (u.a. Julie Bowen) sich ein Auto klaut und auf einen Road Trip nach San Diego ausbüchst - um einem Typen die Leviten zu lesen, der die schwangere Freundin wortlos sitzen ließ, indem er sich "vermeintlich schlau" zur Marine meldete. Pfosten! Die widerliche Männerwelt…

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  Review by Kyle B. ★★★½ 1

  This film had been a curiosity ever since I searched Joe Dante's name on Netflix. A film directed by Joe Dante in 1994 starring Julie Bowen and Paul Rudd? Weird. I finally threw it on not knowing what to expect and was met with a teensploitation movie by way of the Lifetime Channel. A quick Wikipedia search explained all that--a loose remake of an AIP film for Showtime's "Rebel Highway" series. While not something I would have ever considered watching without knowing Joe Dante directed it, it wasn't that bad. Although I probably enjoyed the Corman camp nods more than the film itself--a cameo by Julie and Roger Corman, "American International Petroleum," plenty of old AIP posters at the local…

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  Review by Alex Kittle ★★★½

  Fun and cleverly put together so that it acts as both a straight genre picture and a referential parody, simultaneously. The central characters are played mostly realistically while their parents and boyfriends are goofy caricatures. The story is exciting and compelling while the dialogue is over the top and generally played for laughs. It's the kind of balancing act Joe Dante is adept at, and the stellar b-movie supporting cast (Dick Miller, Dee Wallace, Joe Flaherty, Don Steele, Cathy Moriarty, etc) amps up the good times.

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  Review by Evan ★★★

  "Do you have a phone?"
  "Normally my daughter would be on it, but she's been kidnapped."

  This will be the year that I complete Joe Dante's filmography. Thank you Scarecrow Video for having this 1994 made for Showtime movie. I am truly flummoxed by the existence of Rebel Highway, but this was a pleasant enough time. I think the main reason it works at all is that Joe Dante actually loves these AIP pictures; there's nothing ironic about it.

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  Review by Joe ★★★½

  Probably the best Dick Miller character Joe Dante ever gave us.

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  Review by Rob Gonsalves ★★★½

  Joe Dante remade the 1958 AIP non-classic for Showtime's Rebel Highway series. High-schooler Mary (Holly Fields) is pregnant; her boyfriend (Chris Young) skips town to join the Navy. So Mary and her wilder friends Angie (Julie Bowen) and Laura (Jenny Lewis) fake their own kidnapping and take off for the road, planning to bring sailor-boy back to town. The movie is typical Dante: nostalgic, jokey, movie-obsessed, packed with schlock-buff cameos and in-jokes (characters are named after various Z-movie producers/directors of the '50s). As a movie in and of itself, though, it's self-consciously campy -- the vaguely depressing result of a hip director spoofing crap that was already a self-parody. Dante did this sort of thing much better in Matinee -- after that terrific film, this one kind of seemed thin and redundant. The great Dick Miller is hilarious as a detective with a thing about "the twisted half-light" of "sexual equipment ... rubber balls, dildoes."

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  Review by TerrC ★★★

  A very slight but still quite enjoyable Dante flick.

  Perfectly cast including Paul Rudd ("don't crowd me!" what a catchphrase!) in one of his first roles and a cool as ice Dick Miller as a detective (with a great theme to match!)

  However, it's really the central trio led by Julie Bowen that give the movie the charm it needs to be a good breezy time.