My Bodyguard

1980's MY BODYGUARD is a compulsively watchable, wildly entertaining coming of age drama that resonated strongly with yours truly.  It was released while I was still in elementary school, though junior high was not far off and loomed forbodingly.  Like a ten foot tall 7th grader standing at the end of a dark hallway,  punching his left palm with his right fist, staring right at you.  My classmates and I talked about our fears, how we virtually expected to have our asses hung out to dry on the first day.

Some of the older kids in my neighborhood took great delight in warning/terrorizing us with stories of incoming students who dared mouth off or merely looked at someone the wrong way.  I can still taste the nausea, feel the butterflies.  The summer between sixth and seventh grade was, pardon my French, pretty fuckin' terrifying, mainly due to the imagery my brain conjured.  Scenarios of dread that featured my certain death (or at least significant injury).  This movie did not assuage my fears.

Clifford (Chris Makepiece) is a well to do kid who lives in Chicago with his father (Martin Mull) in the luxury hotel dad manages.  Life is just grand until Clifford begins at Lake View High School, where he is almost immediately bullied by Moody (Matt Dillon) and his cronies.  The bullying and extortion for lunch money is justified by the goons as protection from an even more fearsome kid - Ricky Linderman (Adam Baldwin), reputed to have committed all sorts of heinous acts and allegedly killed his brother.  Legends such as this spread like wildfire among students, especially ones like Carson (Paul Quandt, quite funny) who offers to Clifford - "Feel under the desk.  The gum's not so bad, it's the boogers that freak me out."

Clifford is a bit wiser and more pragmatic than his peers and meets with Ricky, though mainly as a plea for his services as a bodyguard.  Ricky agrees, and the two bond, learning about each other's worlds.  Clifford learns that the big guy is really a big softie, a decent kid who's suffered a fair amount of tragedy.  Things look up after Moody's playground ambush is thwarted.  But the story isn't quite over yet.

Alam Ormsby's screenplay and Tony Bill's direction for MY BODYGUARD are just a cut or two above a made-for-network-T.V. movie, albeit a solid one.  The story has many expected developments and scenes, but also a few surprises.  The film treats its characters like real people, and that's especially refreshing when most films of this time period treat adolescents as either sex-crazed or merely fresh meat for a serial killer (or both).  These kids sound real too, no litany of the sort of phrases that seem to dominate youth culture these days.  Maybe some of the scenes with Clifford's grandmother (Ruth Gordon) feel like gratuitous comic relief, and the entire film is pleasant and upbeat, but not too much so to take the edge off the story.

My appreciation for this film may well have been different had I not been of age during its original release.  Had I been older it may not have resonated as strongly, though maybe it in fact would've.  Incoming students have always faced these pressures. Such fears are timeless. 

I survived junior and high school with no more than a few harsh words flung in my direction, by the way, but the anticipation is usually the worst part, you know?