Band of the Hand (1986)

Brilliant and touching

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

The Miami Vice influence is heavy in this silly cheesy film. Michael Mann is the producer. Director Paul Michael Glaser also directed several episodes of Miami Vice and you will spot several Mann regulars in this movie such as Martin Ferrero and Stephen Lang.Lang plays a military survival expert and former Vietnam veteran in the Florida everglades, an improbable native Indian. He has created a program to rehabilitate a small bunch of juvenile delinquents in this hostile environment, one of them even gets bitten by a snake. However the group of youths after some complaining soon bond in the Everglades.After that the youths move to a house in Miami, however they fall foul of the local drug lords who rule the area. The group led by Lang wage war against the violent gangs.There is a lot of mid 1980s music here as well as the title track sung by Bob Dylan. The film is uneven in pace, I could never buy these bunch being somehow rehabilitated and united in the Everglades, never mind becoming a fighting force in the streets of Miami.

In an attempt to ease themselves back into society, five juvenile criminals are sent away from prison into the Everglades, for a survival training under Indian Joe. When they have successfully completed their 'training', they move back to Miami. However this means the illegal inhabitants of their house have to up sticks and leave without warning, all loyal customers of local drug baron Cream. The conflict leads to a street war of sorts.......It's another one of those films from the eighties where you would have had to be there I. Order to appreciate the full cheesiness of the narrative and mise en scene, because seeing for the first time in 2015, it's a real dog of a film.It's as if the makers have taken every single politically incorrect ethnic stereotype, made them a gang member, and joined them in to some sort of unit, all led by a caked in make- up Stephen Lang, who looks like he doesn't want to be there one bit.Add a sub-plot involving James Remar trying to channel Willem Dafoe in To Live And Die In L.A, and separate incoherent narrative with music video type scenes, and you have this epitome of the eighties, which I would usually love, but the characters are just so unlikable and offensive to their native culture, you cannot help but really strongly dislike the film.The film cannot decide who it's for, it's way way too dark for younger people, and too bonkers for the Freidkin and Mann audience it desperately wants to grab, so it ends up in purgatory.But the music is good, and some of the camera-work is as bonkers as the outfits, but come the end, it just doesn't work in anyway.Watch Toy Soldiers instead.

I found this movie in a video store shelf when I was 14. At the time, this movie was phenomenal. This movie gives you a very nostalgic feel of what the 1980's would be like in Miami. I am a very big 80's buff so this was a definite for my collection. I am very pleased to see they released it on DVD. What really makes this movie neat is that at the time, almost all of the actors were unknown, with the exception of James Remar. This movie is based upon the many programs that were employed to straighten up troubled minors and make them realize the value of life. Unfortunately, many of those programs were cut because of mismanagement, lack of funding, or were bogus boot camps run by abusive individuals. I do believe with the right people, a program like this can work, and that is what this movie portrays. Although this plot is fictional, it still leaves you with that feeling of "Wouldn't it be great if this actually worked". This movie was one of the first '80's films I can recall to touch racism, drug trafficking, assault weapons, gang warfare, and the effect it had on the youth at the time and put a positive spin on the outcome. One more thing, Bob Dylan and the Heartbreaker's (from Tom Petty) recorded a song for this movie specifically that cannot be found anywhere else. It is called "Hell Time" and it is pretty awesome. The rest of the soundtrack could use some work as they did not include Mr. Mister or Prince. If you enjoyed the Miami Vice series or if your a big action packed '80's buff, I highly recommend this movie whether you rent it once or add it to your collection as I did.

This is one of those movies that you had to see when it first came out. It also helps I think if you were the same age as the kids in the movie. The locations were magnificent. And some of the performances were not too shabby either I might add. This was an atypical 80's movie, set in Florida (do you think that a Miami Vice relation was intentional?). When I was a kid I loved this movie, and upon watching it again recently, I didn't even remember how cheesy it was. I just remembered these 5 deadbeat kids, forced to work as a group to survive, and everyone thinking that it would never work. Even now that I've seen it and know how cheesy it is, I still just remember it the way I used too.