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Rumble Fish (1983)

tomatometer

33

Average Rating: 4.6/10
Critic Reviews: 6
Fresh: 2 | Rotten: 4

No consensus yet.

audience

77

liked it
Average Rating: 3.6/5
User Ratings: 22,657

My Rating

Movie Info

One of two S.E. Hinton novels Francis Ford Coppola directed in 1983, Rumble Fish is a stylized black-and-white film about the death of gang culture in a rough-and-tumble town full of stunted youths. The central character is the strutting Rusty James (Matt Dillon), a foul-mouthed lunkhead clad in sweaty tank tops, who passes his time at the billiards hall waiting for "something" to happen in his life. That something might be the return of his brother, known only as the Motorcycle Boy (Mickey

R,

Drama

Francis Ford Coppola

Sep 8, 1998

Universal Pictures

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All Critics (24) | Top Critics (6) | Fresh (19) | Rotten (7) | DVD (21)

If Rumble Fish fails as a traditional movie about real people, it is beguiling as an exercise in hallucinatory style.

December 11, 2007 Full Review Source: TIME Magazine
TIME Magazine
Top Critic IconTop Critic

Overwrought and overthought.

December 11, 2007 Full Review Source: Variety
Variety
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Coppola's recent viewing seems to have been German silent films of the '20s, so he has decided to coat the whole enterprise in a startling Expressionist style, which is very arresting but hardly appropriate to the matter in hand.

February 9, 2006 Full Review Source: Time Out
Time Out
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This is a movie you are likely to hate, unless you can love it for its crazy, feverish charm.

September 1, 2005 Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times
Chicago Sun-Times
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A number of the images in Rumble Fish are more memorable than the film is as a whole, sometimes for the wrong reasons.

May 21, 2003 Full Review Source: New York Times
New York Times
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The action is clotted and murky, and Coppola obviously hasn't bothered to clarify it for the members of his cast, who wander through the film with expressions of winsome, honest befuddlement.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: Chicago Reader
Chicago Reader
Top Critic IconTop Critic

Rumble Fish is like a unisex Sweet 16 gift for children whose favorite hangouts are the pool hall, the Cinématheque Française, and the rings of Saturn.

January 22, 2012 Full Review Source: Nick's Flick Picks
Nick's Flick Picks

Teen-gang saga is more intense, violent than the book.

September 14, 2010 Full Review Source: Common Sense Media
Common Sense Media

Beautiful.

March 4, 2008
ColeSmithey.com

A bit too over-stylized to allow for any great involvement, the most interesting part of this is spotting the young actors before they became stars -- most notably nephew-of-the-director Nicolas Cage.

August 1, 2007 Full Review Source: Empire Magazine
Empire Magazine

Transcends the conventions of its roots to present a moving showcase of agitated, fitful youth.

November 10, 2005 Full Review Source: Now Playing Magazine

An offbeat experiment that, while certainly not a brilliant movie, flies far more than it fails.

October 11, 2005 Full Review Source: DVD Clinic
DVD Clinic

Visually stunning but dramatically inert coming-of-age tale

March 24, 2005
Film Journal International

Art for adolscents, tricked out in quasi-seriousness. Once hip, now amusing.

June 29, 2004

Audience Reviews for Rumble Fish

Released back-to-back with his previous 'teen-novel' adaptation "The Outsiders", Francis Ford Coppola attempted another of S.E. Hinton's books. Like his previous release, he assembled a brilliant cast but approached it in a different style. This time, the results were far more impressive.
Rusty James (Matt Dillon) is a troubled young man from a broken background. His mother left him years ago and his father (Dennis Hopper) has turned to alcohol. He's the leader of a small gang in a time where gang fights are dying out and most people of his generation still idolise his absent older brother 'The Motorcycle Boy' (Mickey Rourke). Rusty James refuses to accept and believes he can make as much a name for himself as his legendary sibling. When his brother returns to town, the life that Rusty James envisioned begins to change.
Admittedly, I never got around to reading the book on this one and given Coppola's sumptuous visual take on it, I'm sure it would have made for an interesting comparison. Much like "The Outsiders", this also has a feeling of a teenage audience at heart but is executed with much more darkness and depth. Coppola's use of monochrome - with momentary flashes of vibrant technicolor - is simply astounding and quite beautiful to observe. Several scenes throughout the film border on surreal and dreamlike and the intense performances add to this; Matt Dillon is on great form as the tearaway teenager who can't stay out of trouble and as his brother, Mickey Rourke delivers a character of quiet, tortured intensity. The rest of the cast are great also with Dennis Hopper playing the alcoholic father and Laurence Fishburne, Chris Penn and Nicolas Cage making up the rest of Rusty James' crew. Added to which, there is a welcome cameo appearance by Tom Waits, mumbling his way through a short but memorable character. Coppola once described this film as "an art-film for teenagers" and coming from the man himself, there is no better description. It might have been experimental or ambitious for him at this time but it still stands as one of his most visually refined pieces of work. Special mention must also go to Stephen H. Burum for his ethereally stunning cinematography and Stewart Copeland (from the band "The Police"), for his unsettling and impressionistic score.
This makes a perfectly dark companion piece to the lighter side of "The Outsiders". They couldn't have been shot any more different and if viewed together, would make a great double bill.
June 12, 2010
MrMarakai

Super Reviewer

I remember when The Outsiders came out, I watched it and enjoyed it but what I remember most is my sister and her friends going mad over it, more precisely, its cast. Rumble Fish passed me by, probably because of its higher rating but until now I have to admit I never knew of the connection between the two. It's a little bit like a mainstream Jim Jarmusch film, an '80s doing the 50's' Rock n' Roll noir, complete with ultra cool characters, striking black and white film (with occasional splashes of colour) and a certain disjointed charm. It feels like there is something not quite right about it though, but in turn, that might be what I really liked about it - it didn't quite work but if it had been this ultra-glossy tidy production, it would have been laughable. Definitely of its time and great to look back on, the cast is pretty unbeatable. The Outsiders for the Girls and Rumble Fish for the Boys? Matt Dillon's 'out of body experience' scene is fantastic!
March 13, 2012
SirPant

Super Reviewer

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Foreign Titles

  • Rusty James (FR)
  • La ley de la calle (ES)
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