SummaryThe cop test pilot for an experimental police helicopter learns the sinister implications of the new vehicle.
Directed By:John Badham
Written By:Dan O'Bannon, Don Jakoby
Blue Thunder
Metascore
Generally Favorable
66
User score
Generally Favorable
7.4
My Score
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Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
66
55% Positive
6 Reviews
6 Reviews
45% Mixed
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
88
John Badham's exciting thriller about an L.A. detective (Roy Scheider) who battles against the government creeps who have created a monstrous helicopter to be used for 1984-style crowd control. Great action in a David-versus-Goliath story. [22 July 1983, p.10]
75
Expertly executed action flick that starts out fast and winds up faster. We've seen it all before, but the execution here supersedes the concept.
70
Blue Thunder hovers just this side of trash and the other side of credibility, but it propels a willing audience into adrenaline heaven.
63
Instead of connecting the film's action with Murphy's personal crisis, director John Badham (Saturday Night Fever) gives us several aerial dogfights which seem to be drawn out only for the sake of giving the audience a bigger bang for its buck. The pacing and camerawork are gripping, to be sure, but in the end Blue Thunder achieves only the excitement of a good action movie. [14 May 1983]
60
The most coherent thing about the new action thriller Blue Thunder is its eagerness to succeed and its rabble-rousing spectacle of stunt flying and aerial combat. Blue Thunder, a chase melodrama with police helicopter pilots as the good guys, transposes the salty tone of The French Connection and Dirty Harry to a chopper squadron in Los Angeles. [13 May 1983, p.B1]
60
The script self-destructs, but the performances — including Daniel Stern as an expendable sidekick — are fun, and John Badham stages some super stunts with the insectile title machine.
50
When the action founders on cliches and implausibilities, there are only the characters to fall back on. And this time, they're papier-mache. [13 May 1983, p.C2]
User score
Generally Favorable
7.4
78% Positive
14 Ratings
14 Ratings
17% Mixed
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
6% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
Jan 18, 2019
10
If you're interested in watching police attack choppers and fighter jets engaging each other in downtown LA, as well as using state of the art technology to zoom in on hooker's breasts, then you should enjoy Blue Thunder, this absolute gem of an 80's movie, which pits Rob Scheider against Malcom McDowell in one of the most epic, action packed and thrilling cop movies you'll ever see. Among the worse off in this film are the poor bystanders, who have to endure missiles tearing through the sides of their office blocks as these cops try to kill each other, along with smashed up choppers and jets falling on them from above. It's pure machoness and testosterone, just men, in power, duking it out in the skies with big war machines whilst they have Nam flashbacks and try and hold their **** together.
Production Company:
- Columbia Pictures
- Rastar Pictures
Release Date:May 13, 1983
Duration:1 h 49 m
Rating:R
Tagline:The Skies Will Never Be the Same!
Awards
Academy Awards, USA
• 1 Nomination
Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films, USA
• 1 Win & 3 Nominations
Jupiter Award
• 1 Nomination
