Yeah, we all know you've seen Karate Kid, wax on/wax off and all that jazz, but do you remember these flicks?


COSMIC BOY: Rob Krupp was a pretty ordinary kid. In fact, he had only one real extraordinary talent: he was a master of video games! He'd made it to level 74 on the famed "Cosmic Boy" game at the rec center, while none of his friends had even made it past level 50! But his talents would be put to the test when he finds himself mysteriously transported inside the video game, and forced to play for the fate of the universe... or at least of the cute neighbor girl Jenny! Can he make it to Level 80 aided by his mysterious guide (played by David Bowie), or will he prove too ordinary?

TRIPLICATE GIRL: Sue Baker's whole family were CIA operatives, and they were disappointed when, rather than joining the Company, she decided to become a corporate lawyer. But she was happy with what she did, and her dedication to making sure everything was signed in triplicate earned her quite the reputation among her employers! One day, however, when her law firm was taken over by terrorist operatives trying to secure arms for a Central American guerilla army, she had to make use of all the skills she picked up from her family, and kick some terrorist ass!

trivia note: "Cosmic Boy" was actually supposed to be Matthew Broderick's film debut, but his WAR GAMES filming schedule conflicted.

BRAINIAC 5: Intended as a "Revenge of the Nerds" for the young-teen set, five 14-ish science nerds turn the tables on the jocks who bully them. This film was noteworthy only for its Human League soundtrack, which speaks volumes.

COLOSSAL BOY was the original working title for BIG.

WILDFIRE: A movie about a girl and her horse, who gets lost in a storm, and she runs out and gets lost in the storm trying to find him. Oh wait, it was just a song. Nevermind.

DAWNSTAR: The unrealized sequel to the movie DARKSTAR, about a bomb that has an existential crisis and doesn't want to blow up. The sequel involved a hyperactive overachiever of a planet-busting bomb that wants to blow up, before it actually leaves the manufacturing plant on Earth! While Darkstar ended up being a metaphor for 'failing to launch' (i.e. impotence), Dawnstar serves as a metaphor for premature, uh, exploding...

DREAM GIRL: Story of a girl who goes into Walter Mitty-like flights of fancy. Runs on Broadway for a year, then is adapted into a movie, then adapted into a completely different movie and now only exists as a two-line blurb from messageboard poster Set.

a true 80's classic...

LIGHTNING LAD:
Set to revitalize the "Smokey and the Bandit" franchise and capture some of the success of the "Dukes of Hazzard", Corey Feldman, stars as the son of "Frog" and Bandit. Running moonshine through the Virgina countryside and outwitting and out driving Sheriff Blok. Co-starring Corey Haim as "Streaky".

SHRINKING VIOLET: An art film by an acclaimed director from Eastern Europe. The film is about a flower in a deserted graveyard somewhere in a war-torn country. The flower is heartrendingly beautiful, but due to drought and not being watered, it gradually dries up and shrinks. Finally, in the last shot of the film, a cruel soldier steps on it.

It's like a metaphor for democracy!

THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN: In this remake of a classic, we see what happens when Laurel doesn't get enough fiber...!

MON EL: A quirky indy film about a Frenchman's love for the elevated urban rail system.

TIMBER WOLF: A lycanthrope in a northwestern lumber camp.

PRINCESS PROJECTRA: A Molly Ringwald vehicle. Molly plays the daughter of the owner of the local movie house. She falls in love with the local rich boy who is the school karate champ.

MATTER-EATER LAD: Uber geek Anthony Michael Hall stars in this rip-off of Porky's.

STAR BOY: A young alien gets left behind on Earth. He searchs for his parents and a way to fight the evil interstellar empire.

Better than being a movie, adapted into a Broadway show which then gets made into a movie.

QUISLET - An experimental film made on film stock which is specially treated so that when it's run through the projector, both the film and the projector explode. The idea was to make a film that could only be shown once and never again. No one is quite sure what the film's title means.

EDIT: The working title for <i>Quislet</i> was <i>X-Bomb Betty</i>, for equally enigmatic reasons.

BOUNCING BOYS- Timothy Hutton and Rob Lowe were set to star in this feel good movie about mentally challenged basketball players from Nebraska who overcome a host of obstacles on their way to winning the state championship. However, funding fell through after Rob's romp with a minor.

I saw The Producers the second weekend of previews here in Chicago. The sad thing about the film is that the live performance was so FREAKING enjoyable. I wanted to love the film version, and found it hard to even like it.

OF course the original film version IS a classic.