Cocktail (1988)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094889/

Tom Cruise fits easily into the character of Brian Flanagan, a young, charming, ambitioius, and sometimes cocky bartendar who becomes the protege of restaurant-bar guru Bryan Brown. The music in this film is very catchy with your typical feel good 80's songs. Tom Cruise plays the character well and makes you think he has done this before because he has a certain charm and sex appeal. You can tell that the actors had a lot of fun making this film with all of the impressive bar tending tecniques.

Brian Flanagan, a young man recently out of the service decides to go to school for a business degree. To make extra money on the side he works at a cheap restaurant as a bartender (since his family was in the business.) His boss, Doug Couglin, becomes somewhat of a role model to Cruise and teaches Cruise everything he knows about bartending and how to make money off of it through his good looks and charm. After spending time on the Manhattan bar scene with Doug they have a fallout and Flanagan moves to Jamaica to become a bartender there. While there he meets Jordan Mooney, played by Elizabeth Shue. She is on vacation while her friend is passed out from drinking too much. After a while they become madly in love and she extends her vacation. After a while he gets scared of how much he likes her and has an affair with an older woman that visits Jamaica. When Doug commits suicide Flanagan has a change in heart and realizes that life is too short to be alone. Meanwhile Jordan is back home in New York and pregnant with his child. Flanagan goes to apologize to her and her father freaks out and says he cannot be with her. Finally she decides she loves him and goes with him even though her family disowns her. The couple ends up having a thrown together at a bar he opens for Doug called Cocktails and Dreams. After this, Jordan tells Flanagan she is going to have twins.

This movie is like a late day Romeo and Juliet because Jordans family disowns her for going with Flanagan. You can tell from watching the film that Cruise and Shue have a lot of on screen chemistry and their romance is very believeable. It is a very feel good romantic 80's comedy that is mainly directed toward adults.