matt dillon movies + my thoughts. (WIP)

matt dillon is a cool actor and i have many thoughts about him which are all normal. i have watched many of his movies and here are some of them and what i thought about them.

my bodyguard (1980)

i just did not like this one bit. this entire experience was quite unenjoyable. even this photo of matt dillon. and let me emphasize if it is unclear at this point that i think he was blessed with a beautiful face but something about his styling just rubs me the wrong way. i think it’s because he looks kind of like an evil shawn from boy meets world. he plays a high school bully who is so corny that i thought it was satire for quite some time but to my dismay, it’s very much serious.

to be fair i didn’t watch most of this. but the whole shtick is someone is charging someone else a dollar a day to be their own personal bodyguard to protect them from the high school bullies (led by matt dillon) (i could not tell you the names/descriptions of any other character in this godforsaken movie). to be honest this is probably what dallas winston would have actually looked like with greaser hair but thank god they did not go in that direction. it’s okay matt dillon don’t worry i will simply act like this one doesn’t exist. also he says the f slur here again like stop look at me this isn’t you.

little darlings (1980)

incredibly creepy movie by today’s standards, i remember reading somewhere that this was described as a children’s sex comedy… haven’t heard that movie genre before. different times i guess. the whole plot is this girl going to summer camp and she has the goal of losing her virginity to matt dillon’s character randy. tbh i skipped through a lot of this. uncomfortable scene of underage matt dillon and even more underage leading girl about to have sex (off camera, but 16-year old matt dillon is shirtless basically this entire movie and it’s weird). i guess props to them for a somewhat realistic portrayal of the awkwardness of teenage sexuality, but still left a bad taste in my mouth. also, the actress playing this girl later came out as a lesbian and respectfully, i could have told you that from any scene of them together in this movie.

also i totally forgot about this scene but she literally makes matt dillon character drink 10 beers and then he passes out and she goes “you’re supposed to get turned on stupid not pass out” WHAT THE HELL?? who greenlit any of this?? i feel like i’m gonna be put on a list just for talking about it.

little darlings (1980)

WAIT OMG THIS MOVIE IS SO CUTE. such a needed break from the same troubled teenage rascal roles that matt dillon was handed, also he looks just absolutely so very golden age hollywood handsome in this movie like truly marlon brando reincarnated. okay this is a very cut and dry romance set in the early 40s. not much info on this movie because it seems to have flopped. but the story is so so cute :(

matt dillon is a little farmer boy in texas and he falls in love at first sight with this cute little blonde who comes from money. they love each other and want to marry but the girl’s dad is all like he’s not right for you. we are led to believe this is because matt dillon is poor. they rebel and run away to louisiana and she gets pregnant. the gag is that it’s really because the dad knows the two are related. eww oh my god.

okay, the girl learns this and is like okay it’s fine i’m gonna have an abortion and get my tubes tied so we can’t have incest baby (what a crazy litmus test for true love like what would you do if you find out you’re related). but wait, he learns they’re not actually related. the mom had an affair and she switched some blood types or something so he’s not really the dad’s son. i don’t know, they kind of lost me at the end, but the point is they are not related YAY! but uh oh, she’s having the abortion because she doesn’t know yet. she almost dies. they lose the baby but find love.

it’s like teeth-rottingly cute and so cliche but i was smiling throughout, and he has a little soft southern accent i think i cried oh my god okay i’ve said enough.

tex (1982)

this movie affected me significantly more than i expected and i have to talk about it and it’s not really going to be silly because i kind of stared at a wall for 10 min straight when i finished it.

plot summary skip if u don’t gaf but very important context sorry:

this is another S.E.HINTON BOOK TURNED MOVIE STARRING MATT DILLON who plays tex, he’s this naive oklahoma farm kid and he loves horses. he’s got an older brother named mace and the mom is dead and the dad is a rodeo clown (?) so he’s never home. they’re really poor and kinda fending for themselves with mace basically his guardian. mace is a very talented basketball player and brings up to tex that he may apply to indiana university on a basketball scholarship. mace wants to prove to himself that he’s not a failure and that he is good at something, but he is also being held back because he needs to take care of tex and can’t leave him alone. this conflict his brother is in is completely lost on tex because he’s kind of in his own world.

to make things worse, tex learns one morning that mace sold his favorite horse so he could pay the bills. obviously tex is furious and again, doesn’t understand the weight of the financial situation. the brothers get into a physical fight which mace wins, after which he tells tex that with all his brawn, he just doesn’t know how to fight.

tex has this best friend johnny and johnny has a sister jamie who has a thing with tex but it’s just mutual crush level. they’re all troublemakers but not in a malicious way, they just do typical teenager stuff, pull pranks, drink, etc. there’s also another friend lem, who is mace’s age and deals drugs to support his family. mace doesn’t like lem because he knows his dealing is kind of sketchy and dangerous, but tex doesn’t really understand that yet.

mace starts to be pretty fed up with covering for tex’s behavior all the time. johnny and jamie’s dad is the classic southern overprotective dad who does things like polish his gun on the couch menacingly while tex sneaks into jamie’s room. he assumes tex is the bad influence in the friendship and after one night that the teens came home drunk, the dad comes to mace and threatens for tex to stay away from his kids, or else he will tell cps that there’s no legal guardian in the house. tensions are high.

one day when tex is driving mace into tulsa for some reason i can’t remember, they stop to pick up a hitchhiker (i now understand the rise of serial killers in the 70s). when he’s in the car, the hitchhiker pulls out a gun and points it at mace, threatening tex to keep driving to the state line because he’s on the run from the cops. tex runs the car into the side of the road and crashes it to get the attention of the cops, who shoot the hitchhiker dead. tex and mace are safe and tex gets interviewed by the news, in which he gets a lot of attention for his dimples and being cute (thanks matt dillon). this is the first moment that shit ever gets real for tex and his recklessness has some very scary consequences, but he gets extremely lucky.

later, tex and jamie come watch mace play at the high school basketball game. tex drives her home and they have backseat fun. tex tells her that he thinks he might love her and she says she thinks she might too. they begin to consummate their love i guess when she pulls away and says she’s not ready for that yet. tex is of course disappointed, but asks if maybe they could when they’re older - ‘i don’t know, we could get married’, he says delusionally.

then light is on the horizon again as the rodeo clown dad returns from rodeo clowning. he hears that mace had to sell tex’s horse and takes them to the farm the horse is at to try to sell him back to tex. they are unsuccessful and tex becomes even more resentful of his brother. out of anger, he hides mace’s college application from him. tex and johnny pull a major prank at school again, after which tex is taken to the principal’s office. bad news: he’s on the verge of being expelled. good news: a farm is hiring for help taking care of some horses. the principal recommends tex for the job if he gets his behavior in check. hey, he’s got his horses!

but things don’t stay happy for long. tex overhears his dad and his brother talking when his dad lets it slip that tex isn’t actually his real son. tex is overcome with anger and storms out of the house, finding the drug dealer friend lem and accompanying him to one of his deals at someone’s house. lem is like ‘this might get a bit sketchy just so you know’ and tex is like ‘i don’t care i hope it does because i need to beat someone up right now’.

at the house, the friend confronts lem for selling him garbage. when tex tries to dip, he points a gun at him and tells him he can’t leave. tex yet again makes an insane and life threatening decision. he lurches towards the man holding the gun and disarms him, but not before the gun is shot (we don’t see what it hits yet). tex holds the gun up to the man, debating killing him, before eventually taking mercy on him and leaving the house.

back in the car, lem realizes that tex has been shot in his stomach. he freaks out and refuses to take him to the hospital because they would ‘ask too many questions’. obviously tex is pissed and stumbles out of the car, telling him to go to hell. he finds a payphone and calls jamie, telling her he can’t remember his phone number and that he’s shot. he is very close to death at this point when lem finally pulls up to him, presumably out of guilt, and takes him to the hospital.

somehow tex survives yet again. along with his dad and brother, johnny and jamie visit him and it’s a touching moment. tex takes out the college application which he had hidden and fills it out for his brother. it seems that getting shot in the stomach really makes you grow up a bit.

the movie ends with tex at the farm looking as happy as a kid in a candy store surrounded by horses. his brother learns that tex is the one who filled the application for him, and he will be going to indiana. tex has a newfound maturity to him and we get the feeling that this kid really might be okay on his own.