Heaven Help Us

i rented the un-cut version of this movie. after it says bits of the edited version on comedy central. i watched the movie and liked it. it's a funny movie,and at times very funny. it's also entertaining. kevin dillon is most of the movie's humor. he is always saying funny wisecracks in this movie. all in all a good movie! i give heaven help us *** out of ****

Director Michael Dinner's wildly unheralded film about life in a Catholic boy's school in Brooklyn circa 1965. Andrew McCarthy, in what is probably his best performance (and role), is the new kid at the school, which is run by strict principal Donald Sutherland and ruled with an iron paddle by psychotic Brother Jay Patterson . Kevin Dillon is the school bully and Malcolm Danare is Cesar, a woefully incompetent brain. The movie is full of great things, capturing the look and feel of the mid-1960s with a lot of great (mostly Motown) music. Dillon and Danare are very funny and the supporting cast features Patrick Dempsey, John Heard, and, in an almost sublime cameo, Wallace Shawn, who reminds the attendees of a school dance that LUST is the BEAST WITHIN! McCarthy has great chemistry with love interest Mary Stuart Masterson. The exceptional screenplay is by Charles Purpura, who, it's hard to believe, went on to write the Justine Bateman vehicle SATISFACTION.

This is a realistic comedy about old fashioned Roman Catholic education. Some catholic schools did require daily mass, and the hilarious scene with the "clicker" actually happened many times. The corporal punishment scenes may have been brutal, but if anything, they are less violent than the reality of those days. And if you are wondering about the "au naturel" swim class, yes, it was once common practice, and would have been required at Catholic schools, YMCAs, and many public schools as well, at least for male students, in 1964. Summary: Dunne is a 16 year old from Boston who is sent down to Brooklyn after his parents die in a car accident. He and his sister are taken in by his grandparents. His grandma is convinced that he will become a priest and maybe the Pope. Dunne is enrolled in strict St. Basil's Academy, a no-nonsense Catholic school run by tough Irish religious brothers. Dunne is an excellent student who befriends both the school nerd and a group of underachieving wise guys. His association with the wise guys results in a confrontation with a violent brother. In the meantime, the honest and unaffected Dunne has time for a romance with a local working girl. He also befriends a young, hip religious brother, later to play Kevin's dad on Home Alone. See this film; it could hardly be better.

I disagree with previous reviewers who called this movie anti-catholic bigotry. I think the humor is in good fun, and the film is ultimately respectful of Catholic worship and traditions. I am catholic and I am not offended. I also think the corporal punishment scenes are quite real and not "over the top." The catholic high school I attended did allow slapping, punching, kneeling on cement, being in push up position, kicks in the butt, slams into lockers, and hard paddlings. Frankly I was glad I never had to take that scary stuff on the open palms; brothers who used paddles or straps were mercifully allowed to strike only the buttocks. We also had to swim *, but after the first embarrassing freshman day it was no big deal. Virtually all boys at all schools had to use public showers, so why is * swimming a big deal? A brief synopsis: Michael Dunn is a Boston teenager sent to live in Brooklyn. His chain-smoking grandmother has delusions about him being a priest someday, and he is sent to a rigid, stern Catholic boys academy. After befriending the school's brain and a group of non-academic goofballs, he ends up in trouble with the school's strictest teacher, the unethical Bro. Constance. Michael falls in love with a local girl, a truant who runs a soda fountain and takes care of her disabled father. The brothers shut down the shop, and the police take the girlfriend away. A hilarious prank is launched for revenge, and chaos ensues. This film succeeds on two levels: it is both a comment on Catholic education and an engrossing character study. You really come to love and root for the characters.

..and I was an altar boy, and went to church every day, and confession.. So watching this the other day brought some of that back to me. There were Brothers in the parish but nuns taught school. As some other comments have suggested, this movie is unimaginable without Kevin Dillon. He's riotous, from beginning to end. He's given all the good lines and makes the most of them. You barely hear Patrick Dempsey's voice at all. I was and am not an Andrew McCarthy fan, but he's very tolerable in this. Its the lead but the less showy part. His scenes with Mary Stuart Masterson don't exactly jump off the screen, but they are adequate to the movie. Movie also gets some points from me for the Elvis references. The guys go to an Elvis movie after seeing the Pope (and get in trouble for it), plus the King is heard over the credits at the end. 8/10.

This film takes place during the mid-60s in Brooklyn, at a fascist-like Catholic school for boys. The kids who attend this school, have to deal with ridiculously strict teachers, who are all church elders. The teachers walk around in long brown robes, and have haircuts like monks. Naturally, the boys find clever ways to rebel against their school's stifling regulations, and are constantly getting into mischief. Back in the mid-60s corporal punishment was still common in all schools, not just Catholic ones. The difference in this film, is that the teachers try to use Catholic religious values, to justify their harsh punitive treatment of the students. One teacher in particular, is very sadistic whenever he wants to punish his pupils. He locks them in a closet, viciously whips their hands with a wooden paddle, slaps them, pulls their hair, ETC. When a group of boys vandalize a statue, the sadistic teacher tries to paddle their behinds with a gigantic wooden paddle. This is the last straw for the boys, who are fed-up with being brutally disciplined by this teacher. And they decide to take matters into their own hands. This is a good film overall, about 60s teens. It was very realistic, in showing the life that urban teens led in that era. By showing how barbaric corporal punishment was back then, this movie can make the viewer glad that it's been abolished in schools nowadays. I can only imagine how many kids who were in school in the 60s, have been psychologically damaged by getting beaten by their teachers. Since they had to cope with this, it's no wonder that most young people growing-up during the 60s, vehemently rebelled against authority.

One of the worst, if not, the worst films I have ever seen. Just nothing but a film made by some ingrates who try to use comedy and humor by making fun of the Catholic Faith. Some scenes with Rooney and Williams weren't even funny. Rooney was a low life, idiotic bully. As for Williams, he was a lustful student who played with himself every 5 seconds. He was caught masturbating in public while sitting in a cafeteria full of male students. He also had the "brilliant" idea to faint/jerk off while serving the communion wafers to the girls who attended the female school the virgin martyrs. The girls were not right for tempting Williams into lust while receiving Euchirist. But who decides to drop on the altar and jerk off? Seriously? The writers must of had sick minds.

HEAVEN HELP US (1985) *** Andrew McCarthy, Kevin Dillon, Mary Stuart Masterson, Malcolm Dunare, Patrick Dempsey, John Heard, Donald Sutherland, Wallace Shawn, Stephen Geoffreys. Nice coming-of-age comedy set in a Catholic boys' school in 1963 with some fine ensemble acting. Vintage soundtrack.

This movie depicts a time that has now become a part of history. St. Michael's School closed its doors earlier this year. The neighborhood which was populated by Irish and Italian kids is now primarily Latino and lower-income,who couldn't afford the rising tuition. The situations, as portrayed, were actually quite realistic for an inner-city parochial school. Some might say the brutality toward the boys was extreme- but pretty close to the truth. Actual scenes were used in the neighborhood. The building that housed the candy store is still there, empty and derelict. The movie caught the aura of the era and is becoming a 'cult classic'

First: I'm not Catholic and I didn't attend a parochial school in New York City. I grew up in the Midwest and most of the Catholic and Protestant students attended the public school system. My partner of many years grew up Catholic, though is no longer practicing -- and he's told me that what is depicted in the movie is pretty darned accurate even given the satire; and I've checked with other who grew up Catholic and they've said pretty much the same thing. So, for some of us -- this movie is a window into what life was like in strict, 1960s-style, just-barely-past-Vatican-II Catholicism. It's interesting to note that the ultra-conservative, fundamentalist tradition I grew up in during that time is not so terribly different in attitude from what the students in this movie (and real-life ) endured: the books we read, the movies we watched, the television programs we watched, the friends we made were all prescribed by our ultra-fundamentalist pastor. I think the movie is very under-rated and well deserves to be viewed in its uncut version.