The Road Warrior of Teen Cinema – The Golden Age of C. Thomas Howell.
Before he became a cult hero of late-night cable, direct-to-video thrillers and erotic noir, C. Thomas Howell was one of the most promising young stars in Hollywood.
For a remarkable stretch from the early 1980s through the early 1990s, Howell seemed destined to become one of the defining leading men of his generation. He worked with Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, John Milius and Robert Harmon. He starred alongside future icons including Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Ralph Macchio, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Juliette Lewis. And for horror fans, he delivered one of the great performances of 1980s genre cinema in The Hitcher — screening at Monster Fest Weekender: Highway To Hell.
It all began with a small but memorable role in Steven Spielberg’s E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial in 1982. Playing Tyler, one of Elliott’s schoolmates, Howell made his feature-film debut in what would become one of the most beloved and successful films ever made. Spielberg’s tale of a lonely boy befriending a stranded alien captured the imagination of audiences around the world and became a cultural phenomenon. Howell was only on screen briefly, but it placed him at the centre of one of cinema’s most magical moments.
Just a year later, Francis Ford Coppola handed the young actor the role that would define a generation. In The Outsiders, based on S.E. Hinton’s classic novel, Howell played Ponyboy Curtis, the sensitive young Greaser trying to navigate a world divided by class, violence and tragedy. The cast remains one of the most astonishing collections of young talent ever assembled: Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio and Diane Lane all appear. Yet despite being surrounded by future stars, Howell carries the film. Ponyboy’s innocence and vulnerability provide the emotional backbone of the story, making his performance one of the most memorable coming-of-age turns of the decade.
For many actors, The Outsiders would have been the peak. Howell was only getting started.
In 1984 he reunited with Patrick Swayze in Randal Kleiser’s Grandview, U.S.A., one of the decade’s most underrated teen dramas. Howell played Tim Pearson, a small-town teenager uncertain about his future who finds himself drawn into the orbit of a demolition derby promoter played by Jamie Lee Curtis. With Swayze playing a charismatic but volatile demolition derby driver and future The Hitcher co-star Jennifer Jason Leigh as his restless young wife, the film captured the uncertainty of adolescence with a warmth and sincerity that deserves rediscovery.
That same year he appeared in John Milius’ Cold War action classic Red Dawn. As Robert Morris, one of a group of American teenagers forced to become guerrilla fighters after a Soviet invasion of the United States, Howell helped create one of the defining action films of the Reagan era. Alongside Swayze, Charlie Sheen, Lea Thompson, Jennifer Grey, Harry Dean Stanton and Powers Boothe, he transformed from teen heartthrob into action hero. The Wolverines became a pop-culture phenomenon, and Red Dawn remains one of the most influential action films of the 1980s.
If Red Dawn showed Howell’s toughness, Secret Admirer revealed his charm. Released in 1985, the comedy follows Howell’s Michael Ryan as the recipient of an anonymous love letter which falls into the wrong hands and sparks a chain reaction of romantic misunderstandings and comic chaos. Directed by future Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator David Greenwalt and co-starring Lori Loughlin, Kelly Preston, Fred Ward and Dee Wallace, it’s one of the most delightful teen comedies of the decade and a reminder that Howell was every bit as capable in lighter material.
Then came 1986.
For most actors, starring in one iconic film in a year would be enough. Howell delivered two.
The first was The Hitcher.
Directed by Robert Harmon and featuring an unforgettable performance by Rutger Hauer as the enigmatic killer John Ryder, the film follows Howell’s Jim Halsey, a young man transporting a car across Texas who makes the mistake of offering a ride to a stranger. What follows is less a conventional thriller than a waking nightmare, with Ryder seemingly appearing everywhere Jim turns. Howell is asked to carry almost every scene, taking Jim from carefree young traveller to a traumatised survivor pushed beyond his limits.
While Hauer’s terrifying villain tends to receive most of the attention, The Hitcher simply wouldn’t work without Howell’s terrified everyman at its centre. Jim feels like a real kid caught in an impossible situation, and Howell sells every moment of fear, desperation and exhaustion. Without him, the film doesn’t work. With him, it becomes one of the great horror-thrillers of the 1980s.
Monster Fest Weekender is proud to bring this cult masterpiece back to the big screen, where its vast desert landscapes, nerve-jangling suspense and powerhouse performances can be experienced the way they were meant to be: with a packed audience of fellow genre fanatics.
The same year also brought Soul Man, Steve Miner’s controversial campus comedy. Howell played Mark Watson, a privileged white student who disguises himself as black in order to qualify for a scholarship. Co-starring Rae Dawn Chong, James Earl Jones, Melora Hardin, Arye Gross, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Max Wright and Leslie Nielsen, the film was a commercial success upon release but quickly became one of the most debated comedies of its era. Fairly or unfairly, its legacy would come to overshadow much of Howell’s extraordinary run throughout the decade.
Yet even as controversy swirled around Soul Man, Howell continued to demonstrate his range. In 1987’s A Tiger’s Tale, he tackled family adventure, while 1988’s Young Toscanini saw him take on the title role in Franco Zeffirelli’s lavish historical drama. Few actors of his generation moved so effortlessly between teen comedy, action, prestige drama and genre filmmaking.
The early 1990s brought further highlights. In the beach-volleyball comedy Side Out, Howell starred as Monroe Clark, a law student who discovers an unexpected passion for competitive volleyball on the California coast. It was pure early-’90s entertainment: sun-drenched, energetic and endlessly watchable.
More impressive still was That Night, Craig Bolotin’s nostalgic coming-of-age drama. Howell starred opposite Juliette Lewis as Rick, one half of a troubled young couple observed through the eyes of a teenage neighbour played by another future Buffy the Vampire Slayer alum, Eliza Dushku. Tender, bittersweet and beautifully acted, the film offered Howell one of the most mature performances of his career and stands as one of the under-seen gems of the period.
As the 1990s progressed, Howell found a new niche in the booming direct-to-video market. Between acclaimed work in films such as Gettysburg and a steady stream of thrillers including Acting on Impulse, Jailbait, Payback and Dangerous Indiscretion, he became a familiar face for anyone who spent time browsing the thriller section of a video store. These sleek erotic thrillers and neo-noirs may not have enjoyed the prestige of his earlier work, but they helped establish Howell as one of the most dependable and prolific actors of the VHS era. He even stepped behind the camera, directing Hourglass, Pure Danger and The Big Fall, proving he was just as interested in creating films as starring in them.
In 2003, Howell came full circle when he reprised the role of Jim Halsey in The Hitcher II: I’ve Been Waiting. While few would argue the sequel matches the stark brilliance of Robert Harmon’s original, it remains a fascinating coda to one of horror cinema’s most memorable everymen. The film essentially retreads the original’s setup, with Jake Busey stepping into the Rutger Hauer role as a mysterious psychopath who once again turns Jim’s life into a waking nightmare. Nearly two decades after escaping one nightmare, Howell returned for another, proving that sometimes the same damn thing really can happen to the same damn person all over again.
But for many fans, the real magic remains that extraordinary run from E.T. through Side Out and beyond.
Few actors can claim to have headlined a Coppola classic, fought off a Soviet invasion, performed in blackface, survived Rutger Hauer, and shared the screen with virtually every major young star of the 1980s.
C. Thomas Howell did exactly that.
So before the lights go down on The Hitcher at Monster Fest Weekender: Highway To Hell take a moment to appreciate one of the great unsung careers of cult cinema.
Stay gold, Ponyboy.
