Happy 25th, Tango & Cash!

Well, 25 years ago to the day, audiences were presented with a manly movie gem (not sure I want to say ‘classic’) in the form of Tango & Cash.

This buddy cop feature began filming without a finished script.  It had firings left and right.  The movie had switched directors and had re-shoots happen right up to weeks before the movie was actually released, with strained filming still going ahead in October 1989.  It went 20 million over budget and was a comparative box office failure, drawing only 60+ million from a 40 million budget.

Still, despite this busload of problems, you really wouldn’t know it from the final product.  Well, not really.  It’s a solid movie even if it paled in comparison to the solid-gold Lethal Weapon series.  It also came back swinging in VHS sales.  Oh God, the good old days of VHS!

So then, December 22nd 1989.  A good day on the calender of manly movie lore.  Patrick Swayze was originally pegged for Russell’s role, I wonder who would’ve done it better…