"Do You Know What It's Like To Peak When You're 18 Years Old?"

Revisiting 'Summer Rental (1985)

Produced by the author using paid Generative AI.

Jack Chester is a good man, but the pressures of modern life in 1985 have him down. He doesn’t have time for his wife or children, and his job as an air traffic controller is so stressful that he has become a public safety hazard. His union is forcing him to take the Summer off. So, he’s taking his whole family to Florida for a month where, over 88 minutes of on-screen narrative, he will discover his life’s purpose at the temporary expense of his dignity.

Summer Rental moves at a blistering 1980s comedy pace that is so refreshing one could miss the poignant central conflict of the same loss of manhood that has seen the suicide of middle-aged men skyrocket during our modern times. As modern men, we are often removed from that which brings purpose, and therefore, our task in life is to find that purpose but do it in a way that also brings support and healing to our families, friends, and community. There is no greater quest for the modern man, and this benign 1980s comedy offers treasures for this journey if we are patient and wise enough to see them.

Jack Chester’s storyline of redemption goes like this:

1. Burnt out Father | Husband | Worker retreats from modern life to Florida for rest and recuperation.

2. Hijinks ensue when he leaves the known boundaries of his tired existence.

3. Jack makes a “Good Enemy” of the local smarmy rich asshole named (brilliantly) Al Pellet, who is also the great local sailor and reigning champion of the annual Regatta. Jack is established as the “Loser Renter” and Pellet as the “King of the Locals.”

4. In a last-ditch attempt to salvage his dignity, Jack tries to drown his sorrow and failure in alcohol but ends up befriending a sullen old pirate (Scully) who has been shored from the sea and doomed to a life of selling frozen fish sticks to renters like Jack Chester.

5. The moment of crisis comes when Jack asks Scully an honest question when both of their defenses have been erased by alcohol. “Do you know what it’s like to peak when you’re eighteen years old?” Scully takes a moment before answering in the affirmative and offers to teach Jack how to sail.

6. Their shared pain of living life without meaning fuses together into a defiant resilience that will redefine life for both hearty losers and upsets the temporary balance of power in Citrus Grove, Florida, during the fictional fateful Summer of 1985.

7. With only 28 minutes left to go in the film, Jack Chester has the brilliant idea to take the sailing knowledge Scully has taught him, applying the sage wisdom of Jimmy Buffett to treat the ocean and Life “like a lady,” applying Scully’s bathroom wall maxim, “You can’t control her. You’ve got to give yourself to her.” These misfits and goons combine with the entire Chester family to convert a floating fish restaurant into a sea-worthy craft, borne to the wind with the only 50-foot sail in the Tri-State.

Short story short, Jack and his ragtag crew win the Regatta by a few seconds, thanks to some help from John Candy’s prodigious 2 yards of fat pants fashioned into an additional wind sail. He also uses his knowledge of aviation air currents to exploit his enemy’s ignorance and beats the smarmy prick Al Pellet at his own game. Jack Chester finds his family and his purpose again.

88 minutes with this 40-year-old Comedy remains time well spent. It’s funny, heartfelt, and meaningful.

Notable B-storylines include:

• A wacky hot neighbor who goes around showing her fake tits to everyone, one by one, asking their opinions. Reiner pulls off this running joke with zero gratuitous nudity.

• John Larroquette is a mostly silent supporting role that could have been a romantic foil to Jack Chester. Larroquette could have tried to bang Chester’s hot wife while her wayward husband was learning to sail. None of this happened; instead, he was a truly supportive friend to the Chesters, with only two lines of dialogue.

• A poor White family breaks into a rich Black family’s home, and no one is jailed or shot.

• Dumping a freezer and dozens of boxes of frozen fish sticks into the open ocean during a public Regatta, but no one is jailed or fined.

• Conniving and lazy dog causes havoc and receives no beating.

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PS: I miss John Candy and Rip Torn.

Also, Kerri Green, I still love you! Call me, sweetie!

SUMMER RENTAL (1985)

Written by Jeremy Stevens & Mark Reisman

Directed by Carl Reiner

Shot on 35mm

Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1

Filmed in Florida March-May 1985

PAID SUBS ONLY

Read my hand-written first draft (where I consistently misspell the main character’s last name…)