It’s been a little while since my kick at the ol’ Twitch-o-Meter can last came up and so as I began prepping this I had a wide range of ideas to choose from. At first the thought was to go serious, maybe talk about page-to-screen adaptations. Yeah, that’d do it, something good and highbrow to show people I’m a thinkin’ man. But then I got thinkin’ about my youth and the binges of theme-renting my friend Steve and I indulged in during the first glowing explosion of video. There was the run of bad martial arts films. The stack of films starring musicians. The month we did nothing shorter than three hours - and discovered At Play in the Fields of the Lord in the process, thank you very much. And then, of course, the onslaught of beefcake.
This was the eighties, remember, and in the eighties men were men, movies were tough, and by tough we meant homoerotic though none of us knew the term at the time. And in the quest for lusty, glistening toughness the eighties saw a rush of ‘film stars’ recruited from the ranks of professional sport. Arnold is the most obvious example, of course, but there are more. Oh, yes, there are more. And Steve and I saw them all. I’ve seen all of Brian Bosworth’s films and most of Howie Long’s. I’ve seen football players fumble more lines than passes and stroke firearms in a way that would make any decent man blush. And here are five of my favorite examples of the genre.
A couple rules for this list. First, the athletes had to be professional - so Jason Statham doesn’t count nor does the utter insnaity of Born to Fight. Second, they had to be pros in a high end league, so no Kurt Russell. Third, they had to be beefy, so bye-bye Vinnie Jones.
5. The Rundown. Beefcake provided by The Rock. Ironically, this ranks so low because it’s actually a pretty good film. Were it not for the fact that his next action picture was horribly bad - and tanked at the box office - and that he’d shown some decent acting chops that got him into higher grade (read: non-action) parts in this film’s aftermath, The Rock could easily have claimed the throne as the current day’s leading American action star. It’s fun, energetic, Peter Berg deserves much more notice for his skills behind the camera, and it has the good sense to cast Ewen Bremner as the comic relief.
4. Action Jackson. Beefcake provided by Carl Weathers. Okay, it’s been at least fifteen years since I last saw this and admittedly, I watched it as much as I did at the time only because of the naked breasts, but this attempt at casting the former football player as some sort of blaxploitation hero has a curious sort of charm, largely thanks to the fact that Weathers has by far the most charisma of the football guys who moved to the big screen.
3. Conan. Beefcake provided by Future-Governor Arnold. Hey, California! I’ve seen your leader wielding a sword in a loincloth! Twice! The first one makes the list because it’s actually quite good, the second because it’s so gloriously bad, both because they seem to exist only to put Arnold on screen as often as possible wearing as little as possible. Yeah, yeah, he’s manly and all but why is the core audience male? I should also point out here that the table saw blade frisbee scene alone gets Arnold an honorable mention for Commando as well.
2. They Live. Beefcake provided by Rowdy Roddy Piper. I can hardly bear to watch this movie but good god do I love it. Glasses. Bubblegum. The most pointless breast shot ever. You know the rest.
1. Predator. Beefcake provided by Future-Governor Arnold, Future-Governor Jesse, and Carl Weathers. A football player, a wrestler, a professional body builder and an on-set feud over who had the biggest arms - it was Jesse, and I didn’t even have to look that up - should not a good film make but John McTiernan cemented his reputation as the best action film director of the 80s with this film. An unlikely, but true, classic.
J’ai le #2 on VHS—and number Freakin 4 on DVD, if you wanna borrow ‘em. Oh hells yes.
True. Predator was the most homoerotic action movie of the 80’s now that mantle has been proudly passed on to 300. Also agree with The Rundown, fantastic action movie and far better than it should be. Too bad The Rock hasn’t been as successful as I thought he would get.
The Marine is also a great beefcake action flick but it was made last year.
Predator was hilariously beefcake. At one point Arnold signals with his hand, but the sole purpose of the shot is obviously to show the extreme size of his upper arms!
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