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The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Blue Thunder is a rarity in film. When it first came out, it packed them into theaters with the wry humor of its characters and dialog, and the white-knuckle action for which everything else is a set-up. And once that action starts, it does not stop until the very end.Still, it explored a theme that, to some viewers (including me at the time), seemed far-fetched and typical Hollywood political. But today I watched it again, on the Sony HD Channel. It could have been made today! In short, this film was thirty-one years ahead of its time. And when you watch it, and consider modern headlines and recent history, you find yourself leaping out of your seat and shouting, "They knew then!""Blue Thunder" is, of course, the name of the world's first police SWAT helicopter gunship. The name is slightly ironic, for reasons you will have to watch the film to catch. More to the point: the filmmakers built a truly frightening piece of machinery, and one of the things that makes the lead character such a hero is that he discovers, to his horror, what Blue Thunder is really meant to be. Had the developers of "Blue Thunder" the helicopter simply taken a Cobra helicopter gunship and painted it police blue (or maybe Mountie red), instead of Army green, the results would be no more chilling to anyone who thinks that maybe--just maybe--the government is not his friend. But of course the concept developers didn't do that. They built something that looks far more fearsome than an Army Cobra ever looked.And no one embodies the cynical thrust of the project better than Malcolm MacDowell (Col. F. E. Cochrane USA). He is villainous almost to insanity, as cinematic villains almost have to be. He gets to be as bad as he can be, and clearly enjoys it.Nor can you imagine a better hero than Roy Scheider (Officer Frank Murphy, ASTRO Division). And very early in the film you will know why he is the only one who would want to, and be able to, expose "Blue Thunder" and its underlying project for what they are.For this much I will reveal: Blue Thunder the film exposes the awful over-militarization of municipal police departments in the United States over the last half-century. That's what John Badham (director) and his writers dared expose in 1983. Blue Thunder the project is the logical endpoint of that over-militarization (and you will readily accept that logic before the film is halfway over). That might have seemed far-fetched in 1983. Today, as the Department of Homeland Security (in real life) sells or gives away Army surplus Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles (MRAPs) to police SWAT teams, you can only wonder whether police air-support divisions will soon turn into "Air SWAT" forces. If a killing/snooping machine like Blue Thunder the helicopter was feasible then (and I have confirmed it was, from military sources), imagine what a modern-day Blue Thunder could do! Which means: as you watch this film now, you might forget, except for one temporal reference to a then-upcoming event in Los Angeles history, that you are watching a thirty-one-year-old film set in 1983. This film will have you checking the sky to see if anything like Blue Thunder the helicopter is looking at you (and listening, too).Warren Oates provides almost comic relief as a boss who hears the immediate complaints and doesn't understand what Murphy is trying to tell him. Candy Clark, as Murphy's girlfriend, provides more comic relief--but also sets up her part in the wild adventure of the last act in a way that Anton Chekhov would stand in awe at. The two TV reporters will have you wishing more like them were "in the business" today.One last bit of advice: after you see this film, get active to make sure it stays fiction. Do not, in other words, be a "JAFO." And you'll have to watch the film to get *that* reference, too.

I like Roy Scheider a lot. He boxed in the Golden Gloves, and who could not admire that nose? He's the protagonist here, a Vietnam vet who patrols Los Angeles in eponymous Super Duper helicopter that is designed to awe the audience. It's armored, it has a 20 mm. Gatling gun that automatically follows the gaze of the pilot, immune to radar, equipped with infra-red detectors, and it has a "whisper mode" in which the whop whop generated by the whirling rotors is dimmed by the sound man. It is supposed to be the ne plus ultra of military helicopters. And maybe in was in 1983. It's nothing new today. Except I suppose no current helicopters have a "whisper mode" because no sound man is present.The problem is that any experienced viewer, anyone who has tapped into one or two examples of the James Bond franchise, isn't going to feel awe as much as boredom.The helicopter is already obsolescent and the plot isn't anything new either. Roy Scheider is good; Malcolm McDowell is bad. Scheider, the pilot, has a radar officer next to him, a young "Gee Whiz" kind of guy who is cheerful, helpful, moral, and hasn't been around much. You know he's dead meat ten seconds after he appears.The musical score pounds on our tympani. So does the dialog. "Okay, boys, this time we play Follow the Leader!" Scheider makes the kind of wisecracks under stress that can be found in an Arnold Schwarzenegger action movie, even as his helicopter whirls in circles and heads for the deck.Lots of action scenes. The helicopter demolishes a cardboard test town. Cars chase a car. Helicopter chases a car. Helicopter chases helicopter. Car chases bound and gagged man waddling down the street. Exploding fireballs all over the place. Kids will love it.The final shoot out takes place at about a thousand feet over and between Los Angeles' glass office buildings. One is flown by the good guy and the other is flown by the villain. Guess who wins.

This is a typical 80's action movie. Actors only open their mouths to move the story line along combined with a fairly contrived/predictable storyline. So why do I still enjoy it? it is simply that the film makers manage to do the basics well. The storyline is sound and probably even more relevant now, 30 years on, than it was when it was first made. The acting line up is excellent, with Roy Schneider, Malcom McDowell, Warren Oates and Daniel Stern. The film is well made with a good script, crisp editing and good cinematography.But above all, I love the helicopter battle at the end.Plus I always love Malcom McDowell as a bad guy.A simple synopsis for a simple, well structured and fun 80's movie. It doesn't challenge, it doesn't make you think too much but it delivers a fun experience. It's so 1980's!

"Blue Thunder" is certainly my kind of movie as it achieves in casting actors I enjoy watching and has a military helicopter with state of the art weaponry and exceptional flying capability. When you such names as Roy Scheider, Warren Oates(aka God), Daniel Stern, Candy Clark(who I have never liked more than in this movie), and Malcolm McDowell, I'd be hard pressed to imagine how it could go wrong. Blue Thunder is a new form of police duty. Scheider plays a former helo-pilot during Nam who has the grueling task of warding off past demons which return to cause unneeded stress as he's in the air with co-pilot Stern hunting down street scum. Scheider is to pilot along with Stern the Blue Thunder much to the chagrin of McDowell who knows him from Nam. We later learn of a nasty little incident between the two which explains the obvious tension both share whenever they are near each other. McDowell is government now and contributes to a specific event, regarding the shooting of a political figure out to help the lower rung of society by one of the very kinds of criminal low lives she was vocal in her community at protecting. How McDowell is involved and how Scheider is out to shake him(and those others who are participants in this covert incident)is the meat of the film's storyline which accompanies the helicopter action that is the bread and butter of "Blue Thunder". Candy Clark is Scheider's girlfriend who is dragged into the developing plot concerning a conversation on a recorded tape and how she will be needed to deliver it to a news organization in order to see those involved are brought to justice. Stern is the affable partner of Scheider who suffers a tragic fate in order to lend a hand in taking down those who are responsible for a murder cover up. Oates is Scheider's disgruntled boss who has trouble defending him during moments of reckless behavior(Stern uses the photographic equipment to peep in on a naked woman doing aerobics! Scheider stealing the Blue Thunder in order to see that the tape is turned into the proper people). Oates, even in such menial roles which service the plot as a barking police captain, manages to steal all his scenes! Lord knows, Oates' captain has plenty to complain about when his pilots cause such disturbances as using the helicopter for other means besides police work! Candy Clark's driving in this movie is of supreme comedy relief as she evades certain harm repeatedly, particularly at the end when being chased by police out to arrest her. But, I wanted action in the air, and there are plenty of helicopter chases, even if such instances are preposterous when pondering them realistically(would even as good a pilot as Scheider really be able to outsmart heat seeking missiles fired at him from military jets?!). McDowell is, as always, perfectly loathsome, as a hot shot helicopter pilot whose superiority complex and treatment of Scheider make him such a wonderfully hissable villain. Badham keeps this movie humming along despite a long running time, staging some impressive action sequences along the way. Scheider, always quite the charmer, is appealing in the lead hero role. Regarded as unable to carry a movie, I always thought Scheider did so effortlessly. Scheider and Oates, you guys may be gone, but will never be forgotten.