Adventures of Ford Fairlane, The (1990)

Controversial standup comic Andrew Dice Clay crashed and burned in this awkward misstep from action director Renny (Die Hard 2: Die Harder) Harlin.

The over-hyped Clay plays rock ‘n’ roll detective Ford Fairlane (pictured at right) who is investigating the onstage death of a heavy metal singer in this crude adventure which is big on empty spectacle but very low on honest laughs.

Fairlane has an office on Sunset Boulevard and roams nightclubs and rock concerts in search of clients, suspects and action. He gets a lot of action – one of the motifs of the film is how he gobbles up women, usually two at a time, and spits them out the next morning.

He has a faithful Girl Friday (Lauren Holly) who waits patiently in the office, taking phone calls and telling lies.

Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger in the Nightmare on Elm Street opus) turns up as a killer with a bad English accent while Priscilla Presley and Wayne Newton (as a nasty band manager) send themselves up as usual.

For a movie about the music business, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane has surprisingly little music in it. Of course, there’s the wall-to-wall background score by Yello, but there’s little in the way of performance; Sheila E. and Mötley Crüe‘s Vince Neil get one song phrase apiece on camera, and Clay himself belts out half of a rock number.

A little Clay goes a long, long way.

Ford Fairlane
Andrew Dice Clay
Jazz
Lauren Holly
Julian Grendel
Wayne Newton
Colleen Sutton
Priscilla Presley
Lt Amos
Ed O’Neill
Don Cleveland
Morris Day
Zuzu Petals
Maddie Corman
Johnny Crunch
Gilbert Gottfried
The Kid
Brandon Call
Sam
David Patrick Kelly
Smiley
Robert Englund
Bobby Black
Vince Neil

Director
Renny Harlin

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