Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot

Quite possibly the most ridiculous team-up imaginable for a buddy action film, Stop or My Mom Will Shoot was Sylvester Stallone's misguided attempt to cash in on Schwarzenegger's success with Twins. Stallone has since gone on to say that it's 'the worst movie' he ever made, and this is from the guy who made Rhinestone with Dolly Parton. Stop or My Mom Will Shoot is kind of a hybrid between an action film and a senior citizen comedy, with Joey (Stallone) and his mum playing out this weird romantic-comedy styled character arc - even with the requisite scene where an apologetic Joey runs through the airport to find his mum before she leaves forever.

It starts off like any other cop actioner. Stallone and his poor man's Danny Glover partner are on stakeout, and it turns into a casual shoot-out bookended by pithy remarks from Stallone's wiseass cop. Things start to go a little off-course a few minutes later though when he goes into the station the next day, and we find out that his boss is both female and also his girlfriend. She calls him into her office and starts chewing him out for going out drinking the night before, which is all kinds of offensive because it suggests that a woman can't do a serious job (like run a police station) without getting all hysterical and letting her emotions get in the way. And this is even before the 'mom' character shows up.

The jokes in Stop or My Mom Will Shoot fall into the following categories:

1. Estelle Getty regaling complete strangers with embarassing stories about Joey's childhood.
2. Estelle Getty spouting cliched concepts relating to traditional notions of motherhood.
3. Estelle Getty handling weapons and taking murders in her stride like she's Dirty Harry.

So many different elements come together in this film to make it a really unpleasant experience...

• The hokey Randy Newman-esque woodwind score.
• Stallone writhing around in his bed in just a pair of undies.
• Estelle Getty hanging out with Stallone while he takes a shower.
• Stallone in a nappy.
• Estelle Getty peering over the top of a steering wheel in a high speed chase set to upbeat hillbilly saxophone music.
• Stallone and Getty making goey eyes at each other.
• The freeze frame ending of Stallone smiling at his mum's joke.

The list goes on and on. Just who was this film supposedly aimed at? It's a PG action film, so virtually no adults are going to take it seriously. It co-stars Estelle Getty, so kids aren't going to be interested either. It's not even in the so-bad-it's-good category... a lot of it consists of just Estelle Getty wandering around a big bad city, blissfully unaware of her surroundings, while Stallone acts either exasperated or comically despondent. There's no plot to speak of, and the concept of teaming up an action icon with the oldest star of The Golden Girls must go down as one of the worst ideas of all time.