'80s Roulette: ISHTAR

I have every single movie released in theaters in the ‘80s in the United States on a hard drive, and once a week, I’m going to hit shuffle and review whatever film comes up first.

Welcome to ‘80s Roulette!

MAY 15, 1987

Ishtar
Warren Beatty, Dustin Hoffman, Isabelle Adjani, Charles Grodin, Jack Weston, Tess Harper, Carol Kane, Aharon Ipalé, Fuad Hageb, David Marguiles, Rose Arrrick, Julie Garfield, Christine Rose, Abe Kroll, Hannah Kroll, Herb Gardner, Bill Moor, Edgar Smith, J.C. Cutler, Bill Bailey, Ian Gray, Maati Zaari, Bouhaddane Lerbi, Fred Melamid, Ron Berglas, Neil Zevnik, Matt Frewer, Alex Hyde-White, Stefan Gryff, Slexi Jawdocimov, Phillip Schopper, Aziz Ben Driss, Kamarr, Eddy Nedari, Adam Hussein, George Masri, Warren Clarke, Arthur Brauss, Sumar Khan, Jon Paul Morgan, Nadim Sawalha, Haluk Belginer, Mark Ryan, Stuart Abramson, John Freudenheim, Bruce Gordon, Paul Ständig, Joseph Gmerek, John Trumpbour, Marie Jean-Charles, Patrice Jean-Charles, Danielle Jean-Charles, Dylan Baker
cinematography by Vittorio Storaro
music by Dave Grusin
songs by Paul Williams
screenplay by Elaine May
produced by Warren Beatty
directed by Elaine May
Rated PG-13
1 hr 47 mins

Two struggling singer-songwriters are sent to play a gig in Morocco and end up in the middle of a CIA plot to prevent a coup.

“Forget herb. There’s never been a hit song with the word ‘herb’ in it.”

One of the weird truths I’ve learned over the years is that musicians love Ishtar.

Elaine May’s 1987 comedy was released under a black cloud, and for years, it was a punchline when people talked about the worst movies of all time. Gary Larson famously made a joke about it in The Far Side that he later walked back when he admitted that he made the joke having never seen the movie. I think that was true for a lot of people in 1987, and it took a long time, and people actually giving it a chance, for opinion to start to swing on the movie. Honestly, I wonder what would have happened if May had been given a fair shake when the film was first released. This feels like the moment that finally broke her as a filmmaker, where she just couldn’t fight any more, and I don’t blame her. She had to feel like she got kicked by everyone for no good reason. But even in 1987, even as soon as the film came out, when I would talk to musicians about it, they loved it like they loved Spinal Tap, and they all seemed to have spread the word to one another. “Ishtar gets it, man.”