**SPOILERS** Somewhat different kind of movie-by its title- that you would expect to see with the focus being on this young beach-combing drifter Tom Skelton, Peter Fonda,in sunny and out of the way Key West Florida trying to start up a fishing guide business just to keep himself busy.
Tom soon runs into trouble with those fishing guides who are established in Key West Nichol Dank, Warren Oates, and Cart Carter, Harry Dean Stanton, who feel that he's cutting into their profits. It's when Nichol plays a dirty trick on Tom that left him both high and dry, and knee deep in the Key West swamps, that he retaliated by torching Nichol's fishing boat. The rest of the movie has Nichol trying to get even with Tom that leads to a major confrontation on his fishing boat that's more comical then anything else.
Both Fonda and Oates seem to be having such a real good time doing the movie that they have trouble convincing the audience that their really bitter enemies and willing to go so far, at least in Oates case, to kill each other. There's also William Hickey as Tom's bed ridden dad and Burgess Meredeth as his shyster lawyer grandpa Goldsboro. Both father and son have been at odds with each other for years ever since pop, Hickey, refused give grandpa, Meredeth, a freebie at the whorehouse he once ran in town. Gramps is also having a hard time with his secretary Bella, Sylvia Miles, who's mind is on how to screw him out of all his money, that's to go to his old lady, then in him keeping most of it.
To round things off there's also Cart's daffy wife Jennie, Elizabeth Ashley, who's shopping sprees are just about bankrupting him as well as Tom's teacher girlfriend Miranda played by a pre-Lois Lane and sexy Margot Kidder. It's Miranda's relationship with Tom that leads to a major cat-fight, in Jennie making light of it, between her and Jennie at a seaside picnic that livened things up a bit when the movie was stuck on neutral. Just when you thought that you've seen it all in pops Ollie Slatt, Joe Spinell, with a free coupon for a fishing trip that he, the way he acts, has been eagerly looking forwarded to for his entire adult life!
There's not much of a plot in "92 in the Shade" but the interaction between the films zany characters, especially Tom & Nicol, more then makes up for the films very simplistic storyline. There's also the added attraction of the scenic Florida location that gives the movie a travelogue-like effect. It in fact makes to want to get in your car or go to the nearest airport bus or train station and get a ticket for Key West and, if your lucky enough, run into the same kind of interesting and off-the-wall characters that you've seen in the film.
Tom soon runs into trouble with those fishing guides who are established in Key West Nichol Dank, Warren Oates, and Cart Carter, Harry Dean Stanton, who feel that he's cutting into their profits. It's when Nichol plays a dirty trick on Tom that left him both high and dry, and knee deep in the Key West swamps, that he retaliated by torching Nichol's fishing boat. The rest of the movie has Nichol trying to get even with Tom that leads to a major confrontation on his fishing boat that's more comical then anything else.
Both Fonda and Oates seem to be having such a real good time doing the movie that they have trouble convincing the audience that their really bitter enemies and willing to go so far, at least in Oates case, to kill each other. There's also William Hickey as Tom's bed ridden dad and Burgess Meredeth as his shyster lawyer grandpa Goldsboro. Both father and son have been at odds with each other for years ever since pop, Hickey, refused give grandpa, Meredeth, a freebie at the whorehouse he once ran in town. Gramps is also having a hard time with his secretary Bella, Sylvia Miles, who's mind is on how to screw him out of all his money, that's to go to his old lady, then in him keeping most of it.
To round things off there's also Cart's daffy wife Jennie, Elizabeth Ashley, who's shopping sprees are just about bankrupting him as well as Tom's teacher girlfriend Miranda played by a pre-Lois Lane and sexy Margot Kidder. It's Miranda's relationship with Tom that leads to a major cat-fight, in Jennie making light of it, between her and Jennie at a seaside picnic that livened things up a bit when the movie was stuck on neutral. Just when you thought that you've seen it all in pops Ollie Slatt, Joe Spinell, with a free coupon for a fishing trip that he, the way he acts, has been eagerly looking forwarded to for his entire adult life!
There's not much of a plot in "92 in the Shade" but the interaction between the films zany characters, especially Tom & Nicol, more then makes up for the films very simplistic storyline. There's also the added attraction of the scenic Florida location that gives the movie a travelogue-like effect. It in fact makes to want to get in your car or go to the nearest airport bus or train station and get a ticket for Key West and, if your lucky enough, run into the same kind of interesting and off-the-wall characters that you've seen in the film.