One of my favorite films too! I love hearing the song “Eveyrbody Wants To Rule The World” because whenever I hear it I immediately think of Real Genius.
Lazlo was at least partially based on a real guy. My husband found this interesting transcript of an interview with “Chuck of Arabia,” done around the time of RG’s release.
…and I’ve only just now realized that your user name is Atomicktom, and not Atomickmom.
You’re the 2nd person at the Dope to make that comment! I’m way too XY chromosomy to be a woman.
Really. I promise.
See? This is why I love the Dope.
A discussion of a hallmark 80’s movie digs up a couple of physics nerd who debate the size requirements of a rather esoteric variety of laser.
I wonder if this movie is in my On Demand…
Thanks for the discussion. My wife and I watched the movie a few months back, and it still holds up. I’m glad to know that the science and milleu’s pretty authentic.
We’ve used the laborers line a few times, especially with our son after we see his report card 
Atherton plays a great asshole. He was the villain in Ghostbusters and the target of Bill Murray’s great line, playing off Ackroyd’s “Dickless here shut down the power.”
“Is that true?”
Murray: “Yes, this man has no dick.”
The best part about the vending machine bit:
“Is that liquid nitrogen?”
(Is it Knight showing contempt for Mitch’s stupidity or Kilmer showing contempt for the screenplay? Or do we fanwank and say that it’s dry ice being kept in a nitrogen-filled thermos?)
One question I have on the laser front. In drafts of the script I’ve seen, the breakthrough is ‘echoes’ - adding mirrors to ‘turn it back and supercharge the gas’ or something like that. Even to me that sounds kind of dumb (I don’t see a mirror giving you more power), but does anyone think it likely they changed it to a slightly more scientific-sounding solution, or was it just something that changed?
Well, it’s pretty obviously dry ice, so I’d say the last option is best. It may just be a mismatch between the camera angle and the dialogue–maybe it was supposed to be focused on the flask when he said that.
As for the question of keeping it in the freezer in the first place–well, the freezer wouldn’t slow down the loss very much, but it might help a bit. More importantly–it’s ice; of course you file it under “H” for “freezer”.
Now, an odd question: I had thought that I remembered a single, brief scene in which Jordan was actually dozing, maybe on the end of a couch. This would have happened at some point after the kiss scene. I just watched the movie for the first time in far too long, and I didn’t see that scene. Did I just miss it, or was it a complete fabrication of my imagination?
Because of this film, my best friend, a girlfriend, and I wore animal slippers to our Astronomy final. I wore Beauty and the Beast Feet. (The slippers looked like the Beasts feet.) My girlfriend wore penguins, and my best friend wore bunnys.
I also use the Socretes line often whenever I screw up.
“So tell me Mitch, are you going to miss your friends?”
“No.”
“Good boy.”
The quote I still use today.
“Don’t worry, take as much time as you need…WHAT’S TAKING SO LONG!”
The guy that passes them in the hallway is one of the technical advisors on the film (Dave Marvit) and is responsible for the many DEI references (Darlington Electronic Instruments, Drain Experts Inc., several bits of graffiti, et cetera). Also, the main headquarters of Darlington Electronic Instruments, where Chris is interviewing in the third scene of the film, is actually the main library on the San Diego campus of General Atomics, which was designed to resemble an Orion spacecraft, GA’s first program (along with the development of the TRIGA reactor).
I think this is something that got screwed up in the editing. The ‘thermos’ is a lab grade Dewar flask, and it appears to be filled with liquid nitrogen, into which a rod of frozen dry ice is stored, as normal freezer temperatures are insufficient to prevent solid carbon dioxide from sublimating. (The prop used in the movie appears to be plain water ice to me, but that wouldn’t make any sense for a number of reasons, nor would it provide the inspiration for Knight.) The use of dry ice slugs in a vending machine would be a violation of the Honor Code (mentioned in passing by Dr. Hathaway while handing out an exam).
I’d have to go back to check, but I believe this is right after they install the receiver on Kent’s braces, and they’re getting ready to have Jesus talk to him. “And Kent…stop touching yourself.”
Stranger
Stranger, you might want to explain “DEI” to those poor folks who don’t live in SoCal. I’ve sent several students to CalTech over the years, so it’s familiar to me, but East Coasters might be missing it.
If it’s familiar to you, why don’t you explain it to us East Coasters (because, admittedly, I don’t really get the reference).
It comes from the slogan of Dabney Hovse (“Dabney Eats It”), which one of the seven residential houses on campus. (Like Princeton University, Caltech long ago abolished the fraternity system, or rather, asked it to voluntarily disband, and replaced it with a collection of residential houses that are kind of a cross between very loosely run dormatories and the traditional residential college system of the Oxford/Cambridge tradition. The residences themselves vary from being kind of plainish sprawling boarding house affairs (North hovses) to beautiful pseudo-Classical architecture (South hovses) and large flagstoned courtyards.)
Here is some hypothesis of origins of the phrase, but I take no responsibility for the authenticity thereof. I seem to recall some SDMB poster being a former Darb but I don’t recall who, and a search doesn’t turn up anything.
Stranger
According to Harold Ramis, Atherton has been haunted by that line ever since. People see him and yell out, “Hey! Dickless!”
Yes. This is one of my favorite movies. It’s good SF, I know there are some things that the writers had to play fast and loose with, but nothing I recognize kicks me out of enjoying the story.
And as other’s have mentioned the two hotties in the film were well worth the price of admission. (grinning)
Continuing nerdy nitpick, but considering the nature of the movie in question… 
Bolding mine.
Although the vast majority of excimer lasers currently in use are of the heteroatomic “rare gas / halide” variety, the first excimer laser was a true “excited dimer”:
That’s why the name “excimer” was first applied, even if the term was later (wrongly) extended to include heteroatomic systems. [Plenty of relevant papers here.]
Ar[sub]2[/sub] excimer lasers also exist.
However, the most prevalent true “excited dimer” laser uses F[sub]2[/sub] at 157nm. It’s trivial to run F[sub]2[/sub] on many commercial “excimer” lasers just by changing the gas mixtures and the cavity mirrors; I’ve done it myself when I’ve needed 157nm photons. The gas lifetime is usually much lower than rare gas / halide “excimers”, but one can buy off-the-shelf F[sub]2[/sub]-optimized lasers.
[I mentioned F[sub]2[/sub] lasers last – even though they’re the most commonly-used of the above examples – because, unlike Kr[sub]2[/sub] and Ar[sub]2[/sub], the ground state of F[sub]2[/sub] is stable, whereas in the rare gas examples the dimer only really exists in the excited state, leading to a “natural” population inversion in the lasing medium. However, although one wouldn’t use F[sub]2[/sub] as the introductory example in a discussion of excimer lasers, it has to qualify as a “true excimer”.]
Cal and Stranger, what symmetry rules are you thinking of that would forbid rare gas excited dimers?
This movie is a lot like the Dope. Full of insanely smart people and beauticians, with the ability to go on completely random tangents about all kinds of interesting stuff.
I had a big crush on Michelle Meyrink (Jordan) when I first saw that movie. Come to find out she lives in my neck of the woods… Bowen Island off of Vancouver - married, kids and buddhist.
I guess my chances are just as slim - slim meaning NONE. 
I saw this movie for the first time last year. I think my Netflix queue was influenced by a conversation I’d had about 80s movies years previously, because all of a sudden, I started getting 80s movies in the mail, and I can’t remember at all what led me to queue them all up.
Anyway, Real Genius was by far the best. I was surprised by how well it held up. (Especially because I saw it right after Better of Dead, which I had also never seen before, and, IMHO, sucked. I was getting really annoyed by the 80s movies by this time, but I thought Real Genius was great.)
Pardon?? *Better Off Dead * is hee-larious! It’s absurd and fun and tackles important teen issues, like being called out to ski against the school king for the affections of your ex-girlfriend when it’s soooo obvious the French exchange student is hot for you. Who among us hasn’t walked in Lane’s shoes?
[angry on] Put 'em up! Put 'em up![angry off]