X
- 1983
- R
- Geffen Pictures
- 1 h 39 m
- 1983
- R
- Geffen Pictures
- 1 h 39 m
Summary A high school senior is tired of being Mr. All-American and facing such traumatic decisions as which Ivy League college to attend. His life gets turned around when he meets a sexy call girl who transforms his house into a brothel while his parents are away. [Warner Bros.]
Directed By: Paul Brickman
Written By: Paul Brickman
- 1983
- R
- Geffen Pictures
- 1 h 39 m
- 1983
- R
- Geffen Pictures
- 1 h 39 m
Risky Business
75
3.7
Where to Watch
Summary A high school senior is tired of being Mr. All-American and facing such traumatic decisions as which Ivy League college to attend. His life gets turned around when he meets a sexy call girl who transforms his house into a brothel while his parents are away. [Warner Bros.]
Directed By: Paul Brickman
Written By: Paul Brickman
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 9 Critic Reviews
75
78% Positive
7 Reviews
7 Reviews
22% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 9 Critic Reviews
75
78% Positive
7 Reviews
7 Reviews
22% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
The very best thing about the movie is its dialogue. Paul Brickman, who wrote and directed, has an ear so good that he knows what to leave out.
Taking off from the format of a typical teenage sex comedy, Brickman deepens the characters and tightens the situations, filming them in a dark, dreamlike style full of sinuous camera movements and surrealistic insinuations. Brickman found a tone I hadn't encountered previously - one of haunting, lyrical satire.
User Score
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 144 User Ratings
3.7
35% Positive
50 Ratings
50 Ratings
15% Mixed
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
51% Negative
73 Ratings
73 Ratings
User Score
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 144 User Ratings
3.7
35% Positive
50 Ratings
50 Ratings
15% Mixed
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
51% Negative
73 Ratings
73 Ratings
"Risky Business" is a movie about male adolescent guilt. In other words, it's a comedy. It's funny because it deals with subjects that are so touchy, so fraught with emotional pain, that unless we laugh there's hardly any way we can deal with them -- especially if we are now, or ever were, a teenage boy.
The teenager in the movie is named Joel. His family lives in a suburb on Chicago's North Shore. It's the sort of family that has three cars: the family station wagon, Mom's car, and Dad's Porsche. As the movie opens, Mom and Dad are going off on vacation to a sun-drenched consumer paradise and their only son, Joel, is being left alone at home. It's a busy time in Joel's life. He's got college board exams, an interview with a Princeton admissions officer, and finals at high school.
It gets to be an even busier time after his parents leave. Joel gets involved in an ascending pyramid of trouble. He calls a number in one of those sex-contact magazines and meets a young hooker who moves into the house. He runs afoul of the girl's pimp. His mother's expensive Steuben egg is stolen. His dad's Porsche ends up in Lake Michigan. The family home turns into a brothel. He blows two finals. And so on.
This description may make "Risky Business" sound like a predictable sitcom. It is not. It is one of the smartest, funniest, most perceptive satires in a long time. It not only invites comparison with "The Graduate," it earns it. Here is a great comedy about teenage sex.
The very best thing about the movie is its dialogue. Paul Brickman, who wrote and directed, has an ear so good that he knows what to leave out. This is one of those movies where a few words or a single line says everything that needs to be said, implies everything that needs to be implied, and gets a laugh. When the hooker tells the kid, "Oh, Joel, go to school. Learn something," the precise inflection of those words defines their relationship for the next three scenes.
The next best thing about the movie is the casting. Rebecca De Mornay somehow manages to take that thankless role, the hooker with a heart of gold, and turn it into a very specific character. She isn't all good and she isn't all clichés: She's a very complicated young woman with quirks and insecurities and a wayward ability to love. I became quietly astounded when I realized that this movie was going to create an original, interesting relationship involving a teenager and a hooker. The teenage kid, in what will be called the Dustin Hoffman role, is played by Tom Cruise, who also knows how to imply a whole world by what he won't say, can't feel, and doesn't understand.
This is a movie of new faces and inspired insights and genuine laughs. It's hard to make a good movie and harder to make a good comedy and almost impossible to make a satire of such popular but mysterious obsessions as guilt, greed, lust, and secrecy. This movie knows what goes on behind the closed bathroom doors of the American dream.
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Risky Business may not appeal to other people but this is a good ass movie your parents watched in the 80's. Totally fell in love with Cruise.
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Sure, Risky Business is partially an adolescent fantasy, but it’s even more about how the prosperity pressures placed upon Joel Goodsen have frayed his nerves to the point that he can’t even bring his erotic dreams to fruition.
An adolescent-oriented farce so finely tuned it projects beyond its narrow intended audience - it's not only for adolescents, it's for anyone who remembers what adolescence was like. [05 Aug 1983]
Risky Business is like a promising first novel, with all the pros and cons that come with that territory.
Risky Business improves as it goes along.
I am legitimately pissed off that I just saw this movie because it's way better than what I thought it was going to be. I cannot believe I deprived myself of such an amazing movie the past twenty years of my life. I guarantee this movie stays a classic even a century from now.
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but nobody answers..
Risky Business
The sense of urgency and the thrill fades away quickly before the scrutiny even hits the screen where the stakes aren't high enough as the writers anticipated; a better build up would have been adequate. Paul Brickman; the writer-director, attempts to seek in on and communicate easily with audience by approaching through something that one can easily resemble which was a smart move but unfortunately wasn't taken care of throughout the course of it. Tom Cruise is brilliant and compelling as a teenager and carries it off all in its shoulder with head held high. Risky Business is not your typical teenage movie which is true up till certain point after which it turns out to be the same repetitive slog.
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There are some noteworthy aspects to this film which include its often funny, satirical teen humour and a fine performance from Cruise, but, and I may well be in the minority when I say this, "Risky Business" leaves much to be desired with its overall message with regards to business/capitalism. It proclaims that many-a new graduate should pursue life towards business and money because money will ONLY bring happiness. This message did not seem to be played for laughs and as a result, this serious piece of cynical corporatism gradually left me feeling bitter before the film's end. Having to reflect upon it while writing this review only provoked more internal frustration.
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Great acting and writing. But boy - this movie wasn’t very enjoyable. Extremely boring and felt pointless the whole way through.
Rating - 47%
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Why is the endorsement of unbridled carnal licence, drug use, and rampant immorality a recurrent theme in Fooliwood's releases? This movie endorses prostitution and pimping. Why is it that Fooliwood always lands square on its face when attempting to teach life lessons? You know, prostitutes usually have deep psychological scars from their life history and their line of "work". Drug use makes you stupid, and crime doesn't pay. That is what the movie should have taught, with or without humor. Not to mention that attempting to begin a relationship with an unreformed and unredeemed prostitute is a recipe for total disaster.
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Awards
Golden Globes, USA
• 1 Nomination
Writers Guild of America, USA
• 1 Nomination
TV Land Awards
• 1 Nomination