User reviews

This movie is a real 80,s movie but in a positive way. It also brings back those memories of the cold war that used to be. Especially in East-Berlin the movie becomes tense. Besides tense the movie is also quite funny.Anthony Edwards is well-cast as the young man being whirled into the wicked world of espionage behind the Iron Curtain, and I can´t help falling in love with Linda Fiorentino..That woman is so seductive and sexy in a strange mysterious way. She, and the border-tension of East Berlin, is my main reason for really liking this movie...They don´t make´em like this any more....Its Spy Game of the 80,s...

Quite an appealing and quirky, if dated (with its politics) mid-eighties teen romantic comedy-thriller set mainly in Europe and starring a young Anthony Edwards as a college sophomore who's simply an ace at a campus assassination game known as Gotcha, although he can't seem to score with the girls. He hopes that this would change when he travels to Europe for a summer vacation and things do turn out for him when he meets a young lady Sasha. Everything is going well, until they travel to East Berlin where he learns she is not all that she seems. She disappears and he finds himself on the run from some Russian spies who believe he has something they want. "Gotcha!" starts off like your typical simple minded teen comedy, before slowly setting the situation up (dangerous spy games) and then having the novelty (our hero being a pro with a paint gun) ending in an ironically smart manner. Director Jeff Kanew (who was behind "Revenge of the Nerds") does a workable job blending its romantic shades (which familiarly plays out its message) with the lethal action in some amusingly funny exchanges (like those scenes involving the worried parents; "You had to let him go to Europe"!) and thrilling on-the-run scenarios. The script is sharply penned with its dialogues. A likable Edwards is perfectly cast in lead role as the naïve hero who actually becomes a target for real and Linda Fiorentino is ravishingly mysterious as the lady who he falls for. Gotta love the title song too… it has a catchy hook and also showing up in the cast is Alex Rocco.

"It's just a game."

Reteaming with director Jeff Kanew one year after "Revenge of the Nerds", the amiable Anthony Edwards plays another socially awkward college student. Jonathan Moore (Edwards), master of a campus paintball game called "Gotcha!", travels to Europe with his friend / roommate Manolo (Jsu Garcia). In Paris he meets an alluring Czech woman named Sasha (Linda Fiorentino) who ends his days as a virgin. But she also draws him into danger by involving him in espionage; they are soon pursued by a ferocious-looking Russian goon (played by German actor Klaus Lowitsch).

Although interest did wane for this viewer at times, he found this to be a fairly engaging Cold War era movie overall. Kanew manages a fairly light tone at first, and prevents the movie from ever getting *too* grim by coming up with some funny comic bits of business. (Such as Jonathan disguising himself as a punk rocker to avoid detection by the bad guys.). The pacing and the action scenes are reasonably well handled, but what really perks up a lot of scenes are the international locales used.

The tantalizingly sexy Fiorentino is effective as the stranger whom we automatically suspect isn't playing it completely straight with Jonathan. She and the boyish Edwards do have good chemistry, and he also seems to get on well with Garcia (whom you'll recognize as Rod Lane from the previous years' horror classic "A Nightmare on Elm Street"). Alex Rocco and Marla Adams do fine as the well-off parents who refuse to believe their sons' outlandish story, and assume that he's on drugs. Lowitsch is a decent if underdeveloped villain.

The story isn't fleshed out all that much; for one thing, we never do find out the full importance of the object of everyones' interest. Still, the movie does build towards a pretty bright finish, and is basically slick, decent entertainment for fans of the two stars.

Seven out of 10.

Gotcha is a perfect example of the old expression "you can't judge a book by it's cover". In this case, you can't judge a film by the art on the video box. If you can manage to ignore the misleading 80's teen sex romp box art long enough to give Gotcha a chance, what you'll find is a fast paced, surprisingly suspense filled, action-comedy starring everybody's favorite ER doc Anthony Edwards (who knew he ever had this much hair?) as a college loser hoping to find himself as he embarks for a few weeks in Europe. What he finds is espionage, assassins and a beautiful stranger with a secret.

Anthony Edwards played an 18 year old college student from Los Angeles, California where he goes to Paris, France on vacation. He meets Sasha, a Czech woman played well by Linda Fiorentino. The film begins with a silly game called Gotcha! I thought the film would be more funny than expected. It has some serious moments. Linda Fiorentino and Anthony Edwards' characters have chemistry onscreen. The adventure abroad in Europe during the last days of the cold war in the eighties were interesting. Alex Rocca and Marla Adams were cast as Jonathan's parents. The film is enjoyable and entertaining. I didn't think it was such as serious film with the title so I was pleasantly surprised. Both stars were getting their career started with films like these. The plot and mystery isn't as predictable to the audience.

Great movie, it has everything; action, comedy, suspense and even some thrills in it. If the paintball guns weren't in it the movie was probably very boring, but that is what the movie is all about; a paintball high-school game named 'Gotcha!'. I recommend this movie to everybody who likes 'cold 80's movies'.

Jonathan Moore (Anthony Edwards) and his college roommate Manolo play a campus-wide Gotcha! game where they hunt their assigned targets with paintball guns. They go on a school sponsored European trip. Jonathan meets Czech woman Sasha Banicek (Linda Fiorentino) who only likes virgins. She talks him into taking a detour to Berlin and even going over to East Berlin. She is transporting a package back over to the West. She gets taken and he escapes from Soviet agents.

I don't like Anthony Edwards' character. It's not as bad as hate but I find him annoying. I totally get why the girls avoid him. He's not funny, too needy and pathetic. There is a way to play the hot cute nerd. This is not it. He should be shy and scared to approach girls. It would also help if the character is younger. He's played for jokes like his conversation with the waiter but it's fingernails on the chalkboard for me. Rosario is even worst. Linda Fiorentino is a great femme fatale as always. He's a little too dumb to live but Fiorentino can make a guy that dumb. The story is outlandish. I'm willing to accept the movie but I don't like the guy.

In my book, Gotcha! is another good movie in Anthony Edward's catalog of 80s movies. Edwards is Jonathan, a somewhat wimpy looking college student who's afternoon frat boy fun of tagging his rival classmates with a dart gun as he chases them around campus, is about to come a reality in an arena of gritty international espionage. And Jonathan oughta know, these guys don't f**k around.

Jonathan and his buddy, Manolo (Jsu Garcia) take a trip to Europe during semester vacation. For Jonathan, he'd like to spend times soaking up the local culture with beautiful girls, but he's just too quiet for all of that, unlike Manolo, who's so brazen that his pick up lines are thinly disguised stories about him being a spy and needing an escort to help distract those who are following him. So, of course Manolo gets the girl.

But Jonathan soon get's lucky, too, meeting an elegant, but secretive Russian woman named Sasha (Linda Florentino) who gives him some story about being an exchange student and all of that. He even ditches his friend, Manolo (they were supposed to go to Spain) to go with his girlfriend to Germany, which is not an ideal vacation destination in 1985. But Jonathan, smitten with his new girlfriend, finds out there is more going on, and soon enough, his little games of pretending to be a spy are going to help him get out a real jam, or else he's going to wind up dead. It is actually a really enjoyable movie, seeing this quirky guy stuck in a real life game of cat and mouse.

"Gotcha" is one of those movies most people forgot, but one they easily remember when you mention the title. It's a typical product of the Eighties: corny, as subtle as concrete, lots of spies and plenty of sex (especially in the dialogues). Jonathan Moore goes to Europe for the summer holidays and meets an intriguing woman who is actually (can you guess it?) a spy! She seduces him (not that difficult) and gets him to accompany her to East-Berlin (which is Eastern-Europe and that means... oh my God, the Russians!). Not good there, go back to West-Berlin and the Freedom. The first thing Jonathan Moore does when he's back on the Good Side is visit Burger King where he orders "a large American burger with large American fries" and of course a tasty American cola. (Well, actually the first thing he does is raise his middle finger to East-Berlin, an act that makes an American soldier whisper "I wanted to do that for the last six months".) But how could this movie know that five years later down would go the Berlin Wall? When "Gotcha" was made we were all in the middle of Star Wars (not the epic plan by George Lucas, but the big-budget movie by Ronald Reagan). Yes, it's dumb, but still entertaining (apart from the dull first half hour).

Oh, what happens there then? Well, after five minutes of paintball and a hand full of jokes on sex Jonathan and roommate Manolo arrive in Paris where the not-so-talented-in-French Jonathan asks a woman out for dinner. He says: "Voulez-vous coucher avec moi?" We laugh and cry (well, certainly the latter) and we wait for the spy. After all that's the hyper-talented Linda Fiorentino in one of her first roles. As if director Jeff Kanew (he who gave us a Revenge of the Nerds movie) knows of her talent, all the parts of the movie with Linda are decent or even good. The rest indeed is forgettable.

This largely has to do with the character Manolo, a true Mexican stud. You get the feeling they needed him to make the movie longer (bad move). Later in the movie Jonathan asks him if he's still a homeboy. "Of course", Manolo replies. In the next scene the spies are stopped by big fiery Mexicans with big fiery guns. Exit Manolo.

"Gotcha" is a movie like a bubblegum: tasty, but after a while you need to spit it out. Only to be seen once every decade.

I remember seeing this movie when it first came out, it instantly became one of my favorites. IT was fun, had a nice plot, and Linda Fiorentino was a bombshell. If those that have seen it did not notice, but this movie can pretty much be single handedly thanked for PAINTBALL. In fact when the movie came out they even had the Gotcha Guns, which was pitched by quarterback Jim McMahon. The game was played by Anthony edwards(E.R, Top Gun) and his friends around college, they each had a id card and were assigned a person to kill, honestly I thought it to be a great idea that could be a lot of fun.so everyone that is out there playing paintball every weekend which I am sure there are a lot of you, thank this movie. If you are a fan of the 80's this is a definite must see.

Do you know those teenager sexy comedies oriented largely used in the eights like Porky's, Nerds, Bad Medicine, Three O'Clook High and so on, well Gotcha fits in this genre, however the producers dared mixing it a spy thriller at iron curtain through a trip a Europe also in the charming Paris, when the still virgin teenager Anthony Edwards expects get gorgeous girls there with his best mate Jsu Garcia aftermaths a schedule trip at Spain.

He randomly runs into a mature Euro girl Linda Fiorentino in Paris, it becomes a torrid love affair, nonetheless the scheming girl taken him to Berlin whereof she is a spy courier, thru this silly companion expect deceive the hard surveillance at Deutche Demokratic Republik D. D. R., he is used aftermaths as baith by Linda Fiorentino on that dangerous place at its time, soon he gets been chase by KGB's agents put him in dire straits on bleak iron curtain.

Starts a routine teenager sex-comedy, out of the blue lifts in another level, when Anthony Edwards in a double jeopardy on spy thriller, dropping the silly outcome back on America, sadly the filmmakers didn't resist much longer in a Hollywood patten love-story-happy ending, it make deep damages on this promising picture, they did again.

Thanks for reading.

Resume:

First watch: 1991 / How many: 3 / Source: TV-DVD / Rating: 7.

What can I say, but this is one of those "eighties movies" featuring Anthony Edwards before he was "Goose" and Linda Fiorentino before she was that chick in M.I.B.

Plot Summary: A paintball enthusiast utilizes his finely tuned skill at hiding behind things when he gets involved with a CIA courier working behind the Iron Curtain. East Germany meets West L.A. with some really funny stereo-types that weren't all that tired when this movie came out in '85.

This film is primarily aimed at entertaining young men with a 007 lust. Still, there are so many one-liners and funny bits that my sister and I still make references to this movie when joking around, e.g. "I thought he was KGB from Russia." ~ "He's a CPA from Encino! Are you outta your mind?"

The utilization of various on-location landmarks make it fun and almost like a travelogue movie. There's a German fortress, the Louvre (pre-pyramid entrance), the eiffel tower, the UCLA campus, Olvera Street in Downtown L.A., and the Bonnaventure Hotel.

I also love this movie for introducing me to Pernod, and the scene in which it is introduced is so funny I can still remember it line for line!! I love this movie!!

The setup: Jonathan plays a game called Gotcha in which he hunts and is hunted by other students with paint guns. After a big win, he goes off for a vacation in France where he meets the sexy Sasha who says she is only interested in him because he is a virgin. She takes him with her to East Germany where they are separated and he has to escape back to the west on his own, all the while being trailed by East German spies. He arrives home only to find the game is still going on, and a canister of film is in his backpack. Then Sasha re-appears.

The verdict: Awesome fun! I refuse to totally dismiss this, because I find it quite engaging, in a guilty pleasure sense.

I'm pretty sure I liked this movie better when it came out in the eighties. For that decade this was an entertaining movie. Not that it isn't entertaining anymore now but let just say the movie industry evolved, in a good way, there are just much more better movies made now in the same genre. Gotcha! is a bit simple sometimes, but there is that comedy romance that keeps you watching it, plus it's fair to say there is some suspense as well. The acting is what to expect in this genre for the eighties, it's not Oscar winning but it's not cringing to watch either. Some movies age better than others, this one doesn't really in my humble opinion but it's still worth watching.

After an opening gag that tries way too hard and doesn't surprise the audience one bit, this proceeds to remind us of all the things we desperately want to forget about the 80's, starting with the title song that literally fits with the name of the flick, and which is invariably a lousy pop. This is an entirely run-of-the-mill quirky teen comedy... and I use that term loosely, as an extensive search revealed no more than maybe two genuine jokes(and they didn't actually make me laugh). Starring Doc Greene before he put on glasses, a serious face and letters after his surname as an incredibly moronic dude(and honestly, was anyone *that* ignorant during the Cold War?), the primary focus here really appears to be to make fun of all the stupid foreigners that too much of the country thinks the rest of the world is made up of. The material includes lame puns, awful stereotypes and a really poor routine on bureaucracy. It isn't the worst piece of propaganda that this period in history has produced in the form of mainstream entertainment, but it can still be quite sickening. Isn't it ironic how the entry into East Berlin, as shown in this, mirrors getting into the US today, except for the guns? The acting is decent. There is some tension and excitement to be found in this. And hey, the voice of Roger Myers(the guy who runs the fictional animation department that produces Itchy & Scratchy in The Simpsons) is in it. And there's a little hot content, including seconds of nipple-less Fiorentino side-boob. There's a tad of sexuality, and occasional strong language in this. I recommend it purely to those who can't get enough of movies from the decade that have "love" as the subject. 6/10

A very hairy Anthony Edwards stars as a teenager caught up in Cold War espionage in GOTCHA. He meets and falls hard for a femme fatale (Linda F.) on a European vacation and ends up following her into Russian-held East Berlin (this was 1985, remember). She slips an item in his backpack and he's off and running, and returning to the western world does nothing to stop KGB thugs from coming after him. Edwards is in almost every scene and does a fine job portraying a naive nebbish. Linda F. is her usually sexy self, and in th end has a couple of surprises for our very young and very stupid hero. But the movie is at best a throwaway, and probably was from the day it first appeared. The music is typical awful '80s era schlock. You may safely skip this one.

When I first saw this I couldn't wait to get into college and play paintball...and when, over a decade later, I actually did go off to college I played paintball once and then switched to Disc Golf and Ultimate Frisbee.

It still looks like it is a hell of a lot of fun, but the bottom line is that you would be arrested and tried on charges of terrorism and assault with a deadly weapon if you went around campus playing paintball...especially with guns that looked like those.

So instead people got stuck playing other college games on campus...

And watching Gotcha!, because it is fun.

That's really where it's at, it's one of those movies that are "What if the typical American Male gets thrust into a James Bond role." And, like If Looks Could Kill, it works. The difference is Gotcha! is a little more muted and a lot more down to earth.

What if an American college kid gets thrown into the French Connection...more like that than James Bond.

And...for a Cheery...it's when Anthony Edwards had hair which was well before he became a Doctor. So double trouble.

Sharp action-comedy with Edwards starring as an American college student in East Germany who undergoes a strange sequence of events which lead to his involvement with the C.I.A. Fine mix of humor and suspense, plus sexy Fiorentino as Edwards' love interest is worth the watch.