Gleaming the Cube (1989)

Director:

Graeme Clifford

Writer (WGA):

Michael Tolkin (written by)

Release Date:

13 January 1989 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Drama | Mystery

Tagline:

Skate or Die

Plot:

Brian's adopted brother is killed when he discovers that the shop he works in sends weapons to Vietnam instead of medications...

Plot Keywords:

Murder | Police | Vietnamese American | Hanged Boy | Teenager

Cast

Christian Slater	...	Brian Kelly
Steven Bauer	...	Al Lucero
Richard Herd	...	Ed Lawndale
Le Tuan	...	Colonel Trac
Min Luong	...	Tina Trac
Art Chudabala	...	Vinh Kelly
Ed Lauter	...	Mr. Kelly
Micole Mercurio	...	Mrs. Kelly
Peter Kwong	...	Bobby Nguyen
Charles Cyphers	...	Harvey McGill
Max Perlich	...	Yabbo
Tony Hawk	...	Buddy
Tommy Guerrero	...	Sam
Christian Jacobs	...	Gremic
Joe Gosha	...	Nick Oliver

Also Known As:

A Brother's Justice
Skate or Die

Runtime:

100 min | USA:105 min (FMC Library Print)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Certification:

Iceland:12 | Australia:M | Finland:K-12 | UK:12 | USA:PG-13

Filming Locations:

Anaheim, California, USA

Company:

David Foster Productions

Trivia:

While Brian and his friends are on the plane, his friends start applying skateboarding stickers to the plane's windows. One of the stickers reads "Tony Hawk." Interestingly, Tony Hawk portrays Buddy, one of Brian's friends.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Brian is hiding in the backseat of the car, Nguyen is shot in the back. This causes blood to splatter on the window. However, in the next shot, no blood is visible.

Quotes:

Gremic: [While in the plane scouting for a pool] Check it out, there's my mom's, there's my dad's house.
Buddy: Hey, there's my Pizza Hut!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Robot Chicken: Suck It (#2.1)" (2006)

Soundtrack:

RIGHT NOW

A fun stupid film

This is the story of a young confused high school punk who loses his adopted Vietnamese brother to a couple of gun runners. What is he to do? Well he could figure out who these people are and when he's frustrated, he could just skateboard while he's pissed. To lighten things up, he could hit on his dead brothers girlfriend.

There are many famous skaters who lent their abilities to this film. This does rank above the break dancing movies ('Breakin'')and the evil dancing movies ('Footloose' and 'Dirty Dancing') of the eighties, but I don't think it comes close to bike movies ('Rad' and 'The Dirtbike Kid')