Joysticks: The Greatest Video Game Movie You Never Saw

Posted by Chris Ward at 8:44 AM Apr 03, 2008

So I watched "Joysticks" again over the weekend, and I think this movie deserves a hell of a lot more cult status among gamers then it actually has. The fact that it's on DVD is nothing short of a black magic dealing with Pan, the Goat God. The fact that it's supposedly "Digitally Re-Mastered" is something that makes sense only to the fully conscious beings like the Star Child from 2001: A Space Odyssey.
If you are a serious gamer, there is NO REASON not to own this movie, to hear its theme songs ("Totally Awesome Video Games" and "Totally Awesome Video Games (feat. T-Pain and Fu Schnickens)" and to see Joe Don Baker phone it in even more than his appearance in "Mitchell."There are 35 for 7 bucks on Amazon, for Christ's sake. Here are just a couple reasons this is a must watch, as if an 80s sex comedy cashing in on video games, with an hour and a half of thinly veiled dick jokes weren't enough.

5. Token Nerd Guy 2: The Tokening

Straight outta the Michael Zorek school of "HAH-MUH-NUH, HAH-MUH-NUH BOOBIES?!?!" is this guy. What makes this geek stereotype awesome in Joysticks, however, is the fact that he's still an inept virgin in a movie where the coolest guy in the movie owns a fucking video arcade. In fact, the hero of this movie IS a Johnny from Karate Kid-esque douchebag who runs the town's biggest gaming hangout—which is a total mindfuck in terms of eighties movie archetypes knowing their place in society.

2. The Ol' Hot Dog in Boobies Tricks

HOW do these things ALWAYS happen? And WHY is someone always standing nearby, conveniently, with a trombone AND a slide whistle?
America the beautiful? You bet your sweet ass.

3. Biggest Arcade Machine Ever

The Guinness Book of World Records: Gamer's Editionrecently listed the painful G4 Network and it's PAINFUL "Attack of the Show" as having the world's biggest arcade machine, a prop which they unveiled in 2007 at some remote broadcast. Too bad Joysticks was unfunny WAYYY before Adam Ferrari and Olivia Munn (or whoever) were unfunny, and they also unveiled a big ass prop arcade machine years before as well. Joysticks: 1, Cable TV Posers: 0. And Joysticks' machine plays fucking Satan's Hollow, as well. All G4's machine plays is reruns of Cops all day.

4. The Pac Wipe

For years, the Star Wipe sat atop its throne as the undisputed King of All Video Wipes. Not even George Lucas, with his Side-To-Side Wipes could touch it. But then came Joysticks, and it's whiplash inducing Pac-Wipe. The experience goes like this: a bunch of girls with Tig Ol' Bitties agree to play "Strip Pac-Man," and they aren't even drunk. And the guy they're playing it with, isn't even straight!


How do I know he's not straight? A closer examination of the freeze frame reveals all. Allow my good friend, The Helpful Pointing Black Guy, to show the less observant of you.



Show me a guy who keeps a Dick Mug on display in his office, and I'll show you a guy whose not that into saggy eighties tits. I'm proven right when it turns out the ENTIRE strip video game is a charade. The douchebag convinces his geeky friend to pump smoke into the room. The girls think it's a fire and go running out, nekkid as jaybirds, into the arcade. They run RIGHT into the arms of the Joe Don Baker. The douchebag is RIGHT there with a camera, to take his picture—thereby framing him, and getting Joe Don Baker to ease off on trying to shut down his arcade! WHEW! Got all that? And just when your mind is blown, Pac-Man—the yellow one himself—goes wokka wokka wokka across the screen in a blaze of un-copyrighted glory. I need a nap.

5. Beverly Hills Brats Trailer

When Joysticks ends, the head-fuck doesn't. Included on the Joysticks DVD are four other trailers for equally trashy films. One is called "Beverly Hills Brats," and it's par for the 80s course:

Private Schools and Swimming Pools/A different car each day/but my parents never seem to hear a single word I say!

goes the phoned-in hair metal theme.

The song goes on to say, predictably, as teens race around in red sports cars:

You think it's easy being born into a perfect life/Well, I tell ya, it ain't easy when you wish your mother was your wife.

Wait. Whoa. What the fuck? I rewound (rewinded?) that part 8 times. That's definitely the fucking line. Since this stars Peter Billingsley AND Martin Sheen, I can only assume this is a deep and insightful, modern day Oedipus tale, set in Beverly Hills.

The trailer's finale is truly the most bat-shit insane thing I've ever seen, and these stills don't do it justice. However, no one has put this trailer online yet, and I have no skills or technology to do so.
Two sports cars pull up to a red light, and one of nutsacks says, "Hello?" into a giant car phone


Then the dipshit girl, who can apparently call his 1980s cell phone from her fucking 1980s Walkie Talkie, says "Goodbye!" and speeds off.



Naturally, this causes Whoopi Goldberg to pull up into frame, shrug her shoulders at the camera, and say "Beverly Hills Brats!"



The intonation in her voice is supposed to be saying, "Beverly Hills Brats...What are ya gonna do? They're crazy!" However, the intonation in her voice, to the trained ear, is REALLY saying, "Listen, I don't know what the fuck I'm doing here either. Just go back to sleep and this will all be over."