The Station that Rocked
Having once again been chucked out of a record company for trying to hand over his bands demo tape, Chazz (Brendan Fraser) finds his day going from bad to worse when his girlfriend Kayla (Amy Locane) has enough and turfs him out. In an attempt to win her back and get a recording contract Chazz and band mates Rex (Steve Buscemi) and Pip (Adam Sandler) sneak into KPPX the home of Rebel Radio in the hope that DJ Ian (Joe Mantegna) will play their demo tape. But things don't go to plan and before they know it the place is surrounded by cops, they are holding the staff hostage with machine gun water pistols loaded with hot sauce and their demo reel is destroyed leading to the cops trying to find Kayla to get the spare. It's going to be a crazy night.
Along long time ago before some of you were even a twinkle in your daddy's eye there was a young man called Adam Sandler who was funny, he was different to other comedians and had some amusing ideas. But sadly the evil beast of the movie industry got their fangs into him and drained him off all his creativity until all he did was play angry, obnoxious young men in all his movies with the same supporting actors filling up the background. Okay enough of that fairytale nonsense but trust me if you choose to watch "Airheads" which sees Sandler third billed behind Brendan Fraser and Steve Buscemi you will also wonder what went wrong as he is funny in this as is Fraser and Buscemi. In fact I will just say it; "Airheads" is a surprisingly good comedy, utterly daft and full of time fillers but fun from start to finish.
Now "Airheads" is simple stuff, three dudes in a rock band called The Lone Raiders, of course the source of humour as how can a lone ranger remain lone if there are more than one, holding the staff of a radio station hostage, queue lost of incidents. So we have them pretending to be armed with machine guns but are water pistols filled with hot sauce, they hand the cops some outrageous demands, they tie up the station manager, they do a whole lot of daft stuff whilst the cops on the outside do just as much daft stuff as they try to negotiate they hostage situation which a crowd show up to cheer them on.
But here is the truth whilst it is amusing when you see their demo tape go up in flames or the studio manager being discovered as a sell out, the entertainment comes from how many recognizable faces there are and the characters they play. Brendan Fraser, Steve Buscemi and Adam Sandler all look the part of a rock band with their long hair and Sandler's shaved head beneath a beanie, and they rock it out with some outrageous fist pumps and comical rebellious behaviour. But then you have Joe Mantegna who is just as much fun as a cynical old DJ who thinks modern rock is hollow but falls in love with the bands antics and it is hard to ignore the sexiness which is Nina Siemaszko in her figure hugging red dress. And I could go on because the cast of "Airheads" impresses with the likes of Chris Farley, Judd Nelson, Marshall Bell and Ernie Hudson all having a good time playing stupid characters.
What this all boils down to is that "Airheads" is utter daftness but it is so much fun. And if the thought of watching a rock band take over a radio station only for one thing after another to go wrong sounds fun, you would be right it is.
