Ep 242: Be Kind Rewind (Real Genius)

This week on Be Kind Rewind, Dave, Cody, & Geek Jackson revisit Real Genius (1985): the smartest teen comedy of the 80's(?) and the movie that proves Val Kilmer was one of the great comedic actors we barely got to see.

We dig into what holds up (Kilmer at his most magnetic, a movie where being smart is the whole appeal instead of a handicap to overcome, and an anti-military-industrial-complex streak that hits harder in 2026 than it did in '85), what doesn't (Mitch is fifteen, the Kent pranks get genuinely mean, and somebody destroyed a man's house with a satellite laser and nobody went to jail), and the behind-the-scenes stuff — Val got the part by being rude to the producer, the popcorn house took three months and 190,000 pounds of kernels, and the drawings on the dorm wall were made by Val's late brother Wesley.

Plus a Pastor's Corner on Chris Knight telling a crying fifteen-year-old that his brain isn't a machine, a fight about whether Kent or Gabriel Jarret is the real story here, and a game guessing Val's five highest-grossing films. Cody sends us out with a Val Kilmer poem.