Guilty pleasure films aren’t always critical darlings or standouts in terms of story or production, but they have a way of sticking with audiences all the same. No matter the reviews, fans keep coming back to them, like a 1988 film starring Tom Cruisethat many may have forgotten but still holds a certain charm.
By the late '80s, Cruise became a star in Hollywood after playing the role of Pete "Maverick" Mitchell in Top Gun. He also appeared in The Outsiders and Risky Business, but in 1988, he starred in the leading role of the romantic comedyCocktail. IMDb ranks the film at No. 3 on the list of the Best Guilty Pleasure Movies, with fans calling the film "simple entertainment." Others call the film "mindless, but still fun" and a "trip back to the 80's."
Directed by Roder Donaldson, Cocktail's storyline was written by Heywood Gould based on his book of the same name. The story appears simple: a business student becomes a bartender, travels to Jamaica, and falls in love. Cruise played the leading role of Brian Flanagan, a naive and shallow young man who returns to New York after being discharged from the Army.
His hopes of get-rich quick and landing a high-powered business job fail, and he becomes a bartender while attending business school. Two years later, Brian is in Jamaica as a bartender, and personal setbacks and betrayal force him to reassess his priorities, leading him to seek a more meaningful path in life and love.
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Cocktail was a box office success, grossing over $171 million at the box office against its $20 million budget. The movie became the eighth highest-grossing film of 1988, but didn't sit well with critics. Rotten Tomatoes commented, "There are no surprises in Cocktail, a shallow, dramatically inert romance that squanders Tom Cruise's talents in what amounts to a naive barkeep's banal fantasy."
After criticism, Gould commented that he "was not happy with the final product" and was accused of having gone against his own work. Cruise also admitted to Cocktail not being a "crowning jewel" in his career. Despite their dislike for the film, fans tagged it a guilty pleasure, with one fan saying, it's "a classic 80’s film. Amazing music. Powerful acting performances. Gritty and realistic. Full of fun but also serious moments when needed."
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