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1985
Directed by J.S. Cardone
Synopsis
Rock 'n' Roll . . . It's a long way to the top.
A group of friends start a rock band, but as they start their rise in the music world, they get mixed up with drugs.
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- Cast
- Crew
- Details
- Genres
- Releases
Cast
Roger Wilson Jill Schoelen Scott McGinnis Cindy Eilbacher Clancy Brown Leif Garrett Phil Brock Melanie Kinnaman Brian Cole Bert Kramer Carol Kottenbrook Henry Kendrick Frederick Flynn Susan McIver
DirectorDirector
J.S. Cardone
ProducerProducer
Bill Ewing
WriterWriter
J.S. Cardone
EditorEditor
Daniel Wetherbee
CinematographyCinematography
Karen Grossman
Executive ProducersExec. Producers
Menahem Golan Yoram Globus
Production DesignProduction Design
Joseph T. Garrity
Art DirectionArt Direction
Pat Tagliaferro
ComposerComposer
Robert Folk
Studios
Golan-Globus Productions The Cannon Group
Country
USA
Language
English
Alternative Title
雷巷
Genre
Drama
Releases by Date
- Date
- Country
Theatrical
01 Aug 1985
USAR
Releases by Country
- Date
- Country
USA
01 Aug 1985
- TheatricalR
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Review by nomenclature ★★★ 4
[Shifty-eyed man in trenchcoat whispers from an alley] Pssst!....hey, kid. You like movies?
Kid in baseball cap, unsure whether he's being spoken to: Y-yeah...
[Man emerges into light] Let me tell you about a time, a simpler time, when people cared about good movies.
Kid: Uh, my mom's waiting for m—
[Man hastily reaches over and knocks copy of Captain America: Winter Sport out of kid's hands] Shut up and listen to me! There isn't time! What I'm talking about are movies that were real, that cared, that dared to dream, movies like Thunder Alley (1985) about a humble farmboy who believes [his eyes begin to water] that he can conquer the world with his guitar and become a rock…
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Review by Brian Saur ★★★
One of the sweeter Cannon films and kinda neat that Roger Wilson & Leif Garrett do their own singing in this. Songs are not terrible and a couple may get your toes tappin’.
Clancy Brown kinda saves the movie in a supporting role though.
Also - Surgical Steel suuuuucks. -
Review by Curtis ★★½
Richie, a kid from the sticks with guitar talent and...not really much of a dream, ends up playing in a friend's band just as they start a rise toward local, maybe even regional, stardom. But will he be able to deal with an egotistical frontman, shifty management, the lure of those 80's drinks and 80's ladies and still keep his heart where it belongs...on his girl? And the music?
You've seen a movie before? You can almost see how this is going to play out from minute one. Your mileage will vary depending on how much you enjoy watching one of these band stories hit all of the expected tropes.
It's got some moments (Richie's short-lived excursion into anti-drug vigilante)…
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Review by Stefano Monteforte ★★
We meet Richie (Roger Wilson) as he's faced with an existential dilemma; arduously toil his days away on his dad's (Bert Kramer) Arizona cotton farm or play guitar for local nightclub ass-rockers, Magic, as headed by frontman Skip (Leif Garrett), who dances like Carlton Banks on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air while crooning disposable dross like "Danger Danger", "Can You Feel My Heartbeat?", and "Just Another Pretty Boy" (a veritable treasure trove of non-hits composed and arranged by a gaggle of also-rans and studio musicians). Decisions, decisions! Clancy Brown (Bad Boys, Pet Sematary Two) plays the band's road manager, "Weasel". Jill Schoelen (The Stepfather, Popcorn) plays Beth, Richie's native American hometown sweetie with an abusive drunken father. Surgical Steele, an…
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Review by Dan Gorman ★★★
standard "ups and downs of a band with a dream" stuff. the band is hilariously just named "MAGIC" and they seem to not have a discernable sound outside of various types of watered down rock and roll genres.
I had hoped this would have more wildly cheesy ups and downs with melodramatic histrionics but it's pretty expected stuff all around. couple songs were pretty catchy!
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Review by The Professor ★★★ 1
This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.
There is that moment when your dreams turn to fire. That fire then becomes reality. "Thunder Alley" is that moment. That moment when everything crystallizes and, what was once a dream, blazes within you and manifests itself as flesh.
"Thunder Alley" is a movie about a band. Not just any band. But EVERY band. When mediocre keyboardist Donnie invites hotshot guitarist Ritchie to join up-and-coming, pop-metal combo Magic, all bets are off.
You see, Ritchie is the real deal. He sits in his barn, amps piled among the hay bales, and plays his four echoey chords by kerosene light. He is sensitive. He is God.
Opposing Ritchie's tenure in the band is Skip (Leif Garrett), a self-absorbed lead singer who…
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Review by stunt_rock ★★★½
Hayseed Richie (Roger Wilson) has dreams of success, but can’t find his place at home. He starts hanging out with his friend Donnie and his band Magic, which is fronted by Skip (Leif Garrett). Eventually Richie starts subbing on guitar, then writing songs, then doing vocals, which slowly pushes Skip out of the spotlight.
There’s an entire subplot wherein Magic’s manager, Weasel (played by character actor Clancy Brown), repeatedly tries to convince them that they, an AOR band, are better than the other act he manages, Surgical Steele, a Judas Priest style metal band? The fact the filmmakers expect us to believe these two bands can play shows together and have the same audience is a hilarious oversight. Surgical Steele…
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Review by Dawson Joyce ★★★½
Cannon Fodder
Given that the chief creative force behind this film would go on to have a hand in such projects as The Covenant and the remakes of Prom Night and The Stepfather, Thunder Alley is far better than it has any right to be, as while writer-director J.S. Cardone occasionally takes the material into after-school special territory, he nonetheless crafts an engaging and often deeply human story about a band's rise to success and the toll it takes on its members, aided by a rocking soundtrack and naturalistic performances from a charismatic cast.
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Review by Daryl : Part One ★★★
High on drama, low on charismatic leads, Thunder Alley is a quality Cannon Group picture. If you squint a little, it actually looks like a real movie.
This is the story of a small-town rural boy with floppy hair, sick guitar skills, and a boundless void where his personality should be. The band he joins are in that awkward transitory period between new wave and hair metal, landing somewhere in the mirky mire of power ballads, but the songs are decent enough. In fact the depiction of life in a band is pretty accurate besides the ham-fisted narcotics cautionary tale (newsflash guys... losing the keys player in this rock band is no big deal).
The real star here is Clancy…
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Review by Watch-it-Pal 👻 ★★★
This movie is so aggressive 😳
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Review by William Puddle ★★★
There should be an "I think I've watched this before" option on here for movies like this. It's a super generic rock biopic about a band that never existed that sounds like Styx, Journey, early Van Halen, and America. The through line is DRUGS ARE BAD and the tunes are impressively faceless, as though a songwriter was having a mid-life crisis.
I would be lying if I said this was entertaining all the way through, but I would be a joyless asshole if I told you not to watch it.
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Review by Justin Decloux ★★★
Fun music!