An Exhaustive Breakdown of Patrick Swayze’s ‘Road House’

(Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/Ringer illustration)

All week, The Ringer will be celebrating Good Bad Movies, those films that are so terrible they’re endlessly amusing and — dare we say it? — actually good. Please join us as we give the over-the-top action movies, low-budget romance thrillers, and peak ’80s cheese-fests the spotlights they deserve.

The 1989 Patrick Swayze–starring film Road House isn’t a movie so much as it is a religious experience, and one that defines the Good Bad Movies genre. There may have been terribly awesome films before it, but as far as I’m concerned Road House invented the concept and is the standard by which every other Good Bad Movie should be judged. But in preparing to compose the opus you are currently reading — which required rewatching Road House three times in the past week — I came to a realization that can be summed up using a paraphrased quote from Emmet, the bearded dude who lets Patrick Swayze live in his barn: “Writing about Road House is like putting an elevator in an outhouse — it don’t belong.”

Seriously, have you ever read an entire article about Road House? My point is: It’s nearly impossible to write an article about Road House that doesn’t make you want to quit reading halfway through — solely because you just want to go watch Road House again. But it must be done — it’s Good Bad Movies Week, and Road House is the main reason such a week can exist. So we will forge ahead, covering every single fleck of gold from this cinematic classic over the course of multiple, ecstatically in-depth lists.

It’s going to be so great that the only people who might actually be able to read the entire thing are those who have never seen Road House. And if that happens to be you, let me just stop right here and say that you should come back and finish reading this after watching Road House.

First, the basics. Here’s the best spoiler-free synopsis I can give you: Road House stars Patrick Swayze as Dalton (no idea if that’s his first or last name because he just goes by “Dalton” throughout the movie), who is basically Jon Taffer, if Jon Taffer was more laid-back and had glistening muscles and a philosophy degree from NYU. He’s inexplicably world-famous for being a “cooler” (which is like a bouncer only, um, cooler?), and a bar owner in Jasper, Missouri, who wants to improve a dive bar he owns called “Double Deuce” tries to hire Dalton away from his current gig in New York. Dalton seems to understand that he’s a character in a movie and that it would kill the pacing of the film for him to take a few days to think about whether he should move halfway across the country to fight drunk rednecks in the middle of nowhere, so he accepts the offer immediately. He shows up in Missouri to find a bar where beer bottles constantly fly through the air, women are sexually assaulted, verbal arguments turn to knife fights with the snap of a finger, and not a single cop car or ambulance is anywhere to be found. Dalton eventually goes full Taffer on the place and cleans it up, much to the delight of the bar owner, who watches Dalton work his magic with an orgasmic smirk on his face like he’s Vince McMahon watching Roman Reigns land a Superman punch. Along the way, Dalton takes down a bunch of bad guys, has sex with one of the token hot chicks in town (she’s a doctor, which proves how classy Dalton is), turns down the advances of another (ditto), saves an old dude’s life, and occasionally wears a karate uniform top tucked into his jeans.

(MGM)

If you still aren’t sold, here is our first list:

Eight Mind-Blowingly Absurd/Awesome Things That Happen in the First 15 Minutes of ‘Road House’

Has any movie ever had a stronger first 15 minutes? The answer is no. While we’re at it, I don’t think any movie has had a stronger last 99 minutes. Which brings us to our second list:

Thirteen Mind-Blowingly Absurd/Awesome Things That Happen in the Last 99 Minutes of ‘Road House’

(MGM)

I can’t put it in any simpler terms: Road House is a masterpiece that should honestly be required viewing to obtain U.S. citizenship. But the real underappreciated genius of Road House — along with the fact that it was directed by a guy whose first name is “Rowdy” — is that the dialogue is just as great as the action. So here is one final list:

My Power Rankings of the Movie’s Best One-Liners

10. “You’re right. I oughta stop telling you what to do. Maybe I oughta kick your ass.” — Wade Garrett

Sam Elliott’s character, Wade Garrett, says this to Dalton when the two have a disagreement about whether they should stay in this lawless town in the middle of nowhere that’s run by a maniacal rich dude trying to kill them. Both have very compelling reasons to feel the way they do: Dalton, who is regularly having sex with one of the town’s residents, wants to stay. Garrett, who is not doing that, wants to leave.

It’s a great line for two reasons: (1) a character in an action movie saying he’s going to kick someone’s ass to their face is pretty much the biggest insult he can dish out; and (2) it’s one of the few semi-deep moments in the movie, as Dalton — who is basically a pacifist thanks to his philosophy degree — tries to punch Garrett after this line is said. Garrett — an old-school brute who never turns down a chance to fight — catches Dalton’s fist, tells Dalton that he’s learned a lot from him, and calmly walks away.

9. “When a man sticks a gun in your face, you got two choices: You can die or you can kill the motherf**ker.” — Garrett

Garrett drops this line early, giving us a glimpse into how his mind works. By the end of the movie, though, he has learned that there’s a third option — that sometimes discretion is the better part of valor. He eventually becomes content with walking away from both his fight with Dalton and the overarching war with Wesley. And then he gets killed.

8. “Nobody ever wins a fight.” — Dalton

7. “Pain don’t hurt.” — Dalton

I’m convinced that Dalton’s backstory of having a philosophy degree exists solely so he can say these two lines. That said, “Pain don’t hurt” is such a perfect Road House one-liner that it should have been the tagline for the movie.

6. “I see you found my trophy room, Dalton. The only thing missing is your ass.” — Brad Wesley

5. “I used to f*ck guys like you in prison.” — Jimmy (Wesley’s main henchman)

One of the more underrated aspects of Road House is that Wesley and his crew graduated from the Shooter McGavin School of Dishing Out Insults That Sounded So Much Cooler in Your Head.

4. “You’re too stupid to have a good time.” — Dalton

This line is basically the entirety of Road House in a nutshell: It’s terribly executed and makes no damn sense whatsoever, but Patrick Swayze’s sex appeal and ass-kicking ability somehow make it work.

3. “I sure ain’t gonna show you my dick.” — Garrett

This is just an all-time classic witty thing to say before a fight.

2. “Hey vodka rocks, whaddya say you and me get nipple-to-nipple?” — Random guy at the bar

Absurd and completely unnecessary one-liners like this are the icing on the Road House cake.

1. “I want you to be nice … until it’s time to not be nice.” — Dalton

This is the no-brainer no. 1 line from Road House and the reason so many consider this movie a religious experience. I mean, what other worldview does anyone really need? Be nice! And when the time comes to no longer be nice, stop being nice! What’s so hard about that?

So yeah, I think I speak for the rest of America when I say that Road House is a masterpiece that practically invented and literally perfected the concept of a Good Bad Movie. And if you disagree, well, it’s probably because you’re too stupid to have a good time.

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