Cocktail - Review

As some of you may know, I recently starting working at a bar as a porter (bartender's assistant). After I got the job, my aunt recommended I watch a movie called Cocktail. I had never heard of it. So I do some research and I find out that it stars a young Tom Cruise as a hot-shot bartender. It immediately caught my attention and I wanted to give it a shot. I didn't even care that it had received a 6 or 5 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes. I thought this maybe could be like Bachelor Party where there isn't much of a plot but the film is enjoyable to watch anyway. What I got was exactly that, for the most part. I am a huge Tom Cruise fan so I'll watch anything he is in. Plus, this movie takes place in the 80's and the main location of the film is a bar of some sort. You know what that means? A great opportunity for a great soundtrack and boy does this film have a great soundtrack. One scene where Tom Cruise is making drinks and dancing to Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love", man does he make bartending look so cool. Now, I've worked behind a bar and let me tell you, it's tough. However, this film shows you the fun side of being behind a bar, which does exist, but it's met with lots of work in an extremely fast-paced environment where you don't get home until 4 in the morning. So this film had everything I loved in it for about 2 thirds of it. Tom Cruise, bartending, 80's music, tropical landscape (for portions) and all the characters were having a fun time. I was enjoying myself. However, for some reason, the filmmaker's decide they are making an episode of The Young and the Restless. It got dark, gloomy and extremely dramatic. Why does this belong in a movie where Tom Cruise is a bartender dancing to Ry Cooder's "All Shook Up"? If the filmmaker's kept this film as a light romance, feel good movie that just happens to center around Tom Cruise as a bartender, I would have really enjoyed this movie. However, the last third of this movie is full of dark subject matter, stuff I don't care about and extremely bad and cheesy acting, even from Tom Cruise. So, you almost had a home-run movie, at least in my books. Glad I was able to have some fun with it.

PS - Is that not the coolest poster ever?!