Breaking Loose: Summer City II

A sequel to the Mel Gibson film Summer City. Breaking Loose has a real warmth to it. Peter Phelps (a young Paul Newman) leaves home & hooks up with an old surfer who was a friend of his father. The surfer & his aboriginal mate live in an old shack on the beach and are constantly harrassed by a local cop who hates surfers & what they stand for. Peter Phelps & Vince Martin are great in the key roles & the beautiful Abigail is well cast as the down trodden wife. Great cinematography, good cast and a quirky story you can watch again & again.

BREAKING LOOSE's energetic opening credits shows a guy dancing in his apartment as he gets dressed for a night out. Sorta like Tom Cruise in RISKY BUSINESS but with influences from FLASHDANCE and Chippendale strippers!?!? After seeing the opening credits, I knew nothing else in the movie would top this scene and it would be downhill then on. And, as expected, the film actually went downhill after that.

Bad acting, bad story. A total waste of time. The gang of thugs is the funniest bunch since the one in "FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 3".

A bad showcase of Australian commercial film-making. The movie is only available on VHS and will probably never make it to DVD.

2 stars just for the out-of-place opening credits. Arf!