Retrospective Film Review

Road House (1989) • 35 Years Later — the bar-brawling epitome of cheesy ‘80s action

A bouncer is hired to clean up the baddest honkytonk in a Missouri town.

10 years before David Fincher’s Fight Club (1999) introduced its rules for brawling, Rick Dalton (Patrick Swayze) was already lecturing on the topic. What’s Dalton’s first rule for being a bouncer? Never underestimate your opponent. The second rule? Take it outside. And the final, most important rule? Be nice, of course.

Anyone who wants to be a bouncer would want to listen to Dalton — he’s the best in the business, after all. It’s for this reason that he’s headhunted by Frank Tilghman (Kevin Tighe), a bar owner in Missouri who wants help cleaning up the place. After Dalton accepts the offer and moves out to Jasper, he discovers there’s more to this Midwestern town than meets the eye…

Though criticised upon its release, Rowdy Herrington’s Road House has aged surprisingly well. Perhaps because 35 years have passed, our expectations of what a 1980s action flick can achieve have been suitably lowered…