Spoonatects
Am i the only one who thinks........Average?
Curapedi
I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.
Rexanne
It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny
Drake Lamar
I love where the movie take place (Chicago) , the actor choice is nice , and the soundtrack is well too . There is some funny scene who give a good look of the movie . The movie give a good picture from the bully at school who want money for a work , and the victim instead of tell this to an adult at school or his parents prefer give his lunch money instead of receiving a blow . But unfortunately some scene ( I will not mention them ) are gone bad and give an bad image of the movie , but i'll close my eyes thinking to it was an old movie . For conclusion I will say this is a good old movie with a good story and we can feel he want's to give an message .
orialk57
When we saw "My Bodyguard", we were at school, in year 9 (senior in Junior High School), we were studying the problem of bullying. Our first impressions : the film looked very old (the kids have no mobiles, Clifford has a strange haircut, their clothes are typical eighties !)The actors are very talented : we preferred Clifford and Linderman. Moody looks very much like a school bully. The teachers are not realistic because our teachers would never be so lax.Overall, the film works because we identify with Clifford. We give the film a 9 out of 10.nochairocking57
amidalasky
What with the recent headlines about extreme bullying in school, this film is eerily prescient.Chris Makepeace, as the primary target of a mean bully at his new high school, gives a strong, warm performance that makes one wish he hadn't virtually disappeared from the acting scene. I think he could have had as good a career as his co-star Matt Dillon (who plays the bully). As it is, he makes his character easy to root for. When he enlists the "bodyguard" services of Adam Baldwin as the sullen school outcast (who is feared as a psychopath because of his size and because he was rumored to have killed his younger brother), the two forge a beautifully written friendship that you rarely see in movies anymore. Makepeace also finds out from a very kind teacher/counselor that Baldwin's younger brother accidentally shot himself, and that trauma is why Baldwin is so withdrawn.Of course, Makepeace can only rely on Baldwin's protection for so long, because Baldwin isn't really a psychopath. Dillon shows up with a bigger, tougher guy as HIS bodyguard, and Makepeace watches helplessly as Baldwin allows himself to be beaten and humiliated. Afterward, he asks Baldwin, "Why didn't you fight?", because he's honestly puzzled. Baldwin spits, "I never wanted to be anybody's damn bodyguard anyway!" Later he reveals the painful truth about his younger brother: that he did actually shoot the boy. It was an accident, but he is racked with guilt over it. The scene has heartbreaking acting not just from Baldwin but from Makepeace.Eventually the two reconcile, and Baldwin decides to confront Dillon and his bodyguard. At first Baldwin pretends he's going to back down again, and then in a great moment that always makes me cheer, lets out a primal howl as he bodily flings himself on top of the larger guy and proceeds to pound on him. He wins that battle, but there's still another: between Dillon and Makepeace. Baldwin urges Makepeace to fight for himself, and he does, breaking Dillon's nose and revealing what a coward Dillon truly is.The film's ending is great: Baldwin trailing after Makepeace and jokingly asking him to be his bodyguard.Wonderful film. It deserves more recognition.
TxMike
I somehow missed this one in the 1980s. I was able to watch it via Netflix streaming movies. It is about a new kid at a Chicago public high school, 10th grade, and right away he encounters the local kid bully, who makes the weaker kids pay him every day for "protection." But the new kid refuses, and soon his time at school is made miserable by the bully and his friends.Chris Makepeace, who doesn't seem to have gone anywhere as an actor, was 15-yr-old Clifford. His mom had died, and his dad was the manager of a nice hotel in downtown Chicago. His eccentric grandmother lived with them. A very young and somewhat small Matt Dillon was the pretty boy bully, Moody. He played this role very well. But the one I liked most was Adam Baldwin, making his movie debut as the bigger, taller, but troubled student Linderman. None of the other kids wanted to get near him, and rumors were that he had killed people. But Clifford decided to befriend him, and ask him to be his "bodyguard", and in return he would pay him and help him with his homework. (Note, Baldwin, now in his 40s, is currently in a recurring role as a CIA agent in the TV series 'Chuck.') Another interesting young actress was a teenage Joan Cusack as one of the students, Shelley.Anyway the "bodyguard" thing didn't quite work out, Linderman didn't really want anything to do with that, but he and Clifford became friends anyway, and they went scrap yard hunting together, to find parts for an old motorcycle Linderman was rebuilding. Many of the scenes were shot in Lincoln Park, a place we visited a couple of years ago, it was fun seeing it from 30 years back.Nice movie, a chance to pull for the good guys. SPOILERS: The reason Linderman didn't want to get involved, he had accidentally been responsible for his kid brother getting shot and killed when the two of them were playing with a loaded pistol at home. Linderman lied to authorities, said he found the gun in his brother's hand, when in fact it was in his own hand when the shot was fired. So when Moody hired his own, somewhat older "bodyguard" Mike, in a confrontation in the park Linderman not only did not fight, he let them take his motorcycle, dump it in the pond, then he ran away. However after admitting to Clifford what his real issue was, in a second confrontation in the park, while retrieving his motorcycle, Linderman had to fight, and beat up Mike, while Clifford fought, and broke Moody's nose, with some coaching from Linderman. Thus the two bullies were neutralized and presumably all was going to be well.
