The Pirate Movie

The Pirate Movie
August 6, 1982
Fox
Comedy, Musical, Romance, Historical
DVD
B

Released the same summer as Grease 2 and resembling it in some ways, this was aimed at teens, but I at 14 was mostly oblivious to both movies at the time, instead discovering them in heavily edited versions on TV a few years later.  I do remember remarking to my then-boyfriend in '86 that this movie was already dated, and no, not just because it's set in the 1800s.

As with G2, the two main themes are time and sex.  Like the Gilbert & Sullivan play which this is very loosely based on, this film is set in 1877, when pirate apprentice Frederic-without-a-K (21-year-old Christopher Atkins) is 21 but as a leap-day baby has had only five birthdays.  Mabel-also-without-a-K (19-year-old Kristy McNichol), however, declares, in what is probably the worst piece of dialogue in the movie "Frederic, these are the 1880s. You can't live your life by the outmoded conventions of a neo-imperialist society. Find your true center!"  To which he replies, "What?  You mean Zen piracy?"  The movie, which turns out to be Mabel's dream, mostly covers two days, although, as in Sgt. Pepper, there are flashbacks and forwards to things that never happen.  (This includes the butler, the only character who's not chewing scenery, emerging from a pond bearing these awesome-looking blue drinks that are in another scene as well.)

There's a series of flashforwards when F & M see each other on a beach and immediately sing a duet about first love.  (The movie is apparently influenced by not only Wizard of Oz and a dozen movies that are referenced throughout, including the then year-old Raiders of the Lost Ark, but also The Tempest.)  They then share a French kiss and we get this sparkling romantic exchange:
M: Do you live around here?
F: I've never really lived till now....Look, I know this is going to sound silly, but I think I love you. I think might even want to marry you.
M:  God, that was a short love scene!

G2 definitely has the more memorable music (more about that later), but PM  definitely has the worse dialogue.  At one point, Mabel's father, the Modern Major-General, demands to know what's going on, since pirates have invaded his lovely Penzance estate.  The Pirate King (executive producer Ted Hamilton) says, "Two words: it's a beach party.  And I'm Frankie Avalon."  His black sidekick Samuel* (Chuck McKinney) holds up his hands as mouse-ears and says, "And I'm Annette Funicello."

This "two-word" explanation sort of explains the movie, in that, just like in the Frankie & Annette Beach Party series, there's a lot of fourth-wall-breaking and there's an obsession with sex, although almost no one gets laid.  (The exception is below.)  The sexual references are mostly in dialogue, rather than song (unlike in G2), although some of the updated lyrics to the G & S songs are surprisingly raunchy and there is one song, well, I'll get to that.

The thing is, I can't believe I'm saying this, but the attitude towards sex in G2 is relatively healthy compared to what we get here.  If Mabel got this dream analyzed, her therapist would discover that she finds rape and castration (or at least threats to male crotches) hilarious.  Starting with the accidental changing of a Chinese pirate captain from "Irish tenor" to "soprano," and continuing on to Mabel kneeing Frederic in the groin when he thinks she's going to kiss him, with her cheerfully telling the audience, "War is hell," there's enough of this sort of humor to please a '90s America's Funniest Home Videos audience.  As for the "rape humor," that starts (in the "real-life" sort of first scene) when the guy-who-may-or-may-not-be-named-Frederic tells the crowd that "less than 100 years ago" pirates used to "rape and pillage," which makes Mabel remark, "God, I'd hate to be pillaged!"  And there are more jokes like that.  Also, there's a lot of "gay" humor, mostly involving the pirates, two of whom Mabel pairs up when she's marrying off her sisters.  (Gay weddings were still mostly unimaginable, although I did go to a lesbian wedding in the '70s.)

There is off-screen sex between the blindfolded Pirate King, who thinks he's with Mabel, and Ruth the Nurse.  Freddy's nurse from his childhood, except she hits on him.  (This happens in the stageplay, too, though.)  It never ceases to amaze me that this movie is fondly remembered by people who were little kids (mostly girls) who used to watch it on cable in the years following its release and failure.

Oh, yes, this was a box office bomb, just like G2.  I think the 1980s soft-rock ballads have aged surprisingly well, but that doesn't make this a good musical.  Not with something like "Pumpin' & Blowin'" in it.  (I can't really do justice to that song quickly, but in a few words: double entendres, badly animated fish with legs.)  The choreography generally doesn't reach Patricia-Birching, although the MMG number and the two bouts of "Happy Ending" are shockingly amateur.  Yes, there are multiple endings, and multiple beginnings.  Hell, the movie starts with an old pirate movie clip playing on a VCR, with the words "The End" appearing on the screen before we cut to present day.

I can't believe I've gotten this far without saying what a terrible actor Christopher Atkins is, but he's dreadful.  My ex and I used to call one scene the "yulg-yug scene," because he conveys his consternation by saying something like, "Yulg!  Yug!  THEY'RE ANCHORING OUTSIDE THE COVE!!!"  Even when he's not overplaying, he never is in the slightest convincing as a pirate or an actor.  (He is OK as a teen idol though, wearing his Blue Lagoon loincloth for several scenes.)  McNichol is far from her Little Darlings level, but she's not bad here, if a bit too smirky at times.  In their matching blond perms, they're cute together, and let's face it, the romance isn't that convincing in the original play, nor meant to be.  Surprisingly, McNichol has a nice daughter-father scene with Bill Kerr, who died just a month ago, at 92, but mostly the movie plays at the level of farce.  I no longer find it as equally entertaining as G2 but they would make a hell of a double feature!  (Or a double feature in Hell.)

Ken Annakin's rambling 2005 DVD commentary adds little information to the movie and in fact was chosen as a "commentary track of the damned": http://www.avclub.com/article/the-pirate-movie-22325.  He had been directing since the '40s and would do The New Adventures of Pippi Longstocking six years after this.


*I go back and forth on whether the Samuel character is the best thing about the movie or an embarrassment.  Maybe both.  Anyway, kudos to McKinney for giving his all to lines like "Hang five, honkey!" and "Avon calling."

"You're gonna have to swallow something more than water, it's your pride."

Grease 2

Grease 2
June 11, 1982
Paramount
Musical, Comedy, Historical, Romance
DVD
B+

Although I used to watch this movie regularly, it'd been a long time since my last viewing, and I'd forgotten how dizzyingly bad it gets at some points, particularly during the musical numbers.  I believe it's roughly equivalent as a so-bad-it's-good movie to Stigwood's Sgt. Pepper, although the feel of it is as different as, well, 1982 was from '78.

We need to start with a discussion of time, because time is one of the themes of the movie and yet it is handled so poorly.  The movie begins in the Fall of '61 and yet seems to end (if the talent show is any indication) in the Summer of '61.  JFK is President, as we're frequently reminded.  And yet there's been very little effort made to capture the look of the time.  Maureen Teefy of Scavenger Hunt, 28 at this point, plays high-strung Sharon, who claims she's got a Jackie Kennedy look, but she's simply been given a pillbox hat and she has no sign of a bouffant.  Twenty-nine-year-old Lorna Luft, as Paulette, is more plausibly modeled on Marilyn Monroe, which may be why the movie is afraid to go forward to the Summer of '62.  The main female character is Stephanie, played by 24-year-old Michelle Pfeiffer, and she looks pure early '80s, from her hair to her makeup to her wardrobe.  The men, including almost-age-appropriate 22-year-old Maxwell Caulfield as Michael Carrington (not to be confused with Sextette's Michael Barrington), fare a bit better, although they're arguably more '50s than '60s.

One of the musical numbers is "Girl for All Seasons."  We first see the "Fall" portion performed, because Paulette (who's a June bride) is always late, so the group (the Pink Ladies and assorted other girls) have to start in the middle.  Then we get "Winter" in another scene.  And then in the end, it's Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter, in that order, but this last part is interrupted by Stephanie's "(Love Will) Turn Back the Hands of Time," which she seems to be singing both in her head, where she's mourning a supposedly D-E-D dead Michael, and onstage to a baffled but appreciative audience.  I think that's the answer: love turns back, forward, and sideways the hands of time in this movie, so that there are crazy continuity "errors" and things like a break-up that takes an entire school year.

Profound, eh?  Well, this also a completely idiotic movie that will have your jaw dropping more than once.  The dialogue is inane and remarkably unrealistic.  In Grease, it was often stupid but plausible.  The same is true of the situations.  G1 achieved some poignancy with Rizzo's pregnancy scare, even if the situation was resolved simply, but here a similar situation is just a throw-away joke, as a nameless girl confides in Eve Arden's Principal McGee that she's missed two periods.  McGee replies that the girl can make them up later.  Ba-dump-bump!

There's no moment in this movie that feels like real life.  But that makes it all the more enjoyable.  Things go completely off the rails during the musical numbers, notably the show-stoppers "Back to School Again," "Score Tonight" (a single-entendre bowling tribute, with nuns!), "Reproduction," and of course the timeless "Rock-a-Hula Luau."  Even the less-crowded numbers, like the so-wrong-but-amazing "Do It For Our Country" and the rancid "Prowling" (sung three times by the T-Bones, sorry, T-Birds) are unbelievable.  The lyrics often have forced rhymes ("motorcycle"/"Michael" and "enigma"/"stigma" stand out) and the choreography, by director/choreographer Patricia Birch, is literally all over the place.

Didi Conn (by then 30 and part of the Benson TV cast) returns as Frenchy, allegedly one of Stephanie's best friends but spending very little time with the current Pink Ladies.  She's mostly there as a confidante for Michael, who (although British) is Australian Sandy's cousin.  Other Grease vets collecting paychecks are the comedy team of Arden (in her last film) and Dody Goodman, the always welcome Eddie Deezen as Eugene (still at Rydell? well, if Frenchy can be...), Sid Caesar as Coach Calhoun, and Dick Patterson as mentally broken down Mr. Spears (Mr. Rudie before).  Dennis Stewart this time is called Balmudo, but it's the same pimply rival gang-leader character.  (Leo Balmudo?)  Newbie teachers are Connie Stevens, still lovely at 43, and equally well preserved 50-year-old Tab Hunter.  I mean, not only do they look good for their ages, but they look like they did twenty years earlier.

The USC Trojan Marching Band, who were also in The Gong Show Movie, show us why, in Arden's words, it's better to play with a group than with yourself.

Other than the Stigwood stalwarts (listed under G1), the supporting cast is probably most notable for '80s television.  Travolta wannabe Adrian Zmed, 28 then, would later be best known for T.J. Hooker, although I like him on Bosom Buddies in a guest shot as Tom Hanks's old buddy turned rock star.  The Sagal twins, Jean and Liz, would get a sitcom called Double Trouble a couple years later.  (They're the younger sisters of Married with Children's Katey.)  And Tom Villard, who is the guy pretending to vomit during the "Reproduction" scene, shortly went on to the infamously bad We Got It Made sitcom, and came out as gay before dying of AIDS-related pneumonia.

Pamela Segall, then 15 but looking 12 or 13, plays Dolores, Paulette's little sister, presumably a freshman.  She would become a popular voice actress under her married name of Pamela Adlon, but I'll always remember her for this scene-stealing part and her title role in Something Special (AKA Willy/Milly).

Ken Finkleman would go on to write Madonna's Who's That Girl.  Patricia Birch not surprisingly did not go on to direct anything else.

Super Fuzz

Super Fuzz AKA Poliziotto superpiù AKA Super Snooper
October 2, 1981
El Pico S.A./ TVI/ Transcinema
Comedy/Action/Sci-Fi
VHS
B

This is an Italian production made in America, but that doesn't entirely explain why it's so strange.  In some ways, it's a so-bad-it's-goodie, but it also seems hip to itself in a way that, for instance, Can't Stop the Music isn't.  Let me talk about a sequence that's late in the movie because it's extreme but hardly unique in this movie:

• Officer Dave Speed (Terence Hill) is on Death Row for the alleged murderer of his cranky but good-hearted pal and superior, Sarge (Ernest Borgnine).
• Speed has super-powers but his kryptonite is the color red.
• Film star Rosy Labouche, who's also Sarge's crush, sneaks red roses into Speed's presence.
• Speed asks for gum, which he'll have "later," even though he's about to be electrocuted.
• He gets the flowers out of the room.
• He uses his super powers to divert the electrocution to the witnesses.
• He busts out of the room and into the ocean.
• He rescues Sarge from a sunken boat, using the gum, which inflates to look like a small yellow balloon.
• The gum becomes a huge yellow balloon, big enough for both men to ride, many feet off the ground.
• Speed jumps down on to a plane where Labouche and her boyfriend Torpedo are escaping, with Speed's girlfriend/ Sarge's niece Evelyn as a hostage.
• Speed manipulates the plane until the villains have to land.
• Meanwhile Sarge is still on the gum-balloon, so he tells Dave to catch him.
• As Sarge plummets to the earth, Dave runs to get in place, although Rosy's red boa is caught around his foot.
• He loses the boa right before he catches Sarge, but they still sink deep into the earth.
• Their boss starts to deliver a eulogy, only to be interrupted by a phone call, from Dave and Sarge, in China!
• Dave has Evelyn get on the phone so he can propose to her.
• The last scene is of their wedding, where he lifts her veil, only to find she's dyed her hair red!

This is a lot of suspension of disbelief for only a few minutes of viewing.  And I don't think we're meant to take any of it seriously.  There are other absurd touches to the movie, like the recurring rather disco-ish "Super Snooper" theme song, and the visual pun with a John Wayne poster, as well as the way Speed sounds both sincere and wisecracking.  They don't make 'em like this anymore, but then they seldom did.

Julian Voloshin, who's the old man in fishing boat (at age 71), was Prof. Nep in Birds Do It, which also took place in Florida.  And Jack McDermott was a hit man in that movie.  Marc Lawrence, who plays mob boss Torpedo, was Stiltskin in Foul Play and Webster in Goin' Coconuts, so you could say he's typecast.

Lunch Wagon

Lunch Wagon
September 1981
Seymour Borde & Associates
Comedy, Musical
VHS
B-

Unless you're bothered by fat jokes, this is a surprisingly amiable sex comedy.  Since my copy is off TV, I haven't actually seen any of the nudity, although it's very clear that the four main women are bra-less most of the time.  And yet, I'd sort of describe the movie as feminist.  I mean, it does pass the Bechdel Test, and it does show the power of female friendship, as well as show two young women recovering from being fired by their under-paying sexually harassing boss and starting a successful business with another friend.  Yes, they dress skimpily with their "Love Bites" wagon, which was given to them by Dick Van Patten.  (His character inherits a fortune and disappears from the movie, although sons Nels and particularly James show up to keep the Van-Pattenness flowing.)  But considering the genre, the plot is actually progressive.

That fourth main woman is the cheerful bimbo girlfriend of the main villain, and even her character isn't what you'd normally expect.  Nor is her boyfriend Al Schmeckler (Rick Podell), who talks like a stand-up comic all the time, answering the phone with greetings like "Roy Rogers Home for Unwed Boys."  The actual stand-up comic character, host of a talent week, is named Danny Death and he adds to the offbeat wisecracks.  And then there's Missing Persons as a popular local New Wave band, playing "Mental Hopscotch" three times.  And Chuck McCann as the unaffiliated-with-Schmeckler crook called The Turtle.  His sidekick Ralph is played by Vic Dunlop, who would be Rene in Meatballs Part II.  As in Super Fuzz, the criminals dress like it's still the '30s.  (At least Johnny Dangerously would actually be set in the '30s.)  This movie is very much a time capsule of the early '80s, cocaine jokes and all, but it also feels like a throwback in some ways.

Rose Marie breaks the longevity record of her International House (1933) co-star George Burns by appearing here as Mrs. Schmeckler.  (And since she's still alive at 91, it's not impossible she may show up in another of my movies.)  Michael Tucci (Sonny in Grease) is cast as a "little guy in glasses" that the body-building Wagoneer likes.  George Memmoli, who plays fat, harrassing ex-boss Andy, was Pinky Fun in Americathon.  Missing's Terry Bozzio would perform "Wipe Out" in Back to the Beach.  Peter Marc (Jacobson), who has a small role, is Fran Drescher's ex-husband and still creative partner.

Fun, friendship, and fashion.

Zorro: The Gay Blade

Zorro: The Gay Blade
July 17, 1981
Fox
Comedy, Romance, Historical
VHS
C

This is a slow-moving, innocuous movie with stereotypes, gay and otherwise, as well as virtually a one-man show for George Hamilton as twin brothers with multiple identities, and costumes.  Like The Pirate Movie the following year, the film has many false starts and almost-endings, but with Pirate M that only adds to the insanity, while here it prevents maintaining momentum.  There are mildly funny moments, like the "Don Jose from San Bernardino" scene, but the movie never really goes anywhere.  Also, it doesn't seem to know if it wants to be a parody, a political satire, a romance, or what.  There are worse ways to kill time, but there are definitely better ones, including other movies from '81.

Whipping master Norman Blankenship was "Man Beating Woman" in The Gong Show Movie.  Paco Morayta, Ramirez here, was Flok in Caveman.  Donovan Scott, who plays Paco, was Castor Oyl in Popeye.  Narrator Frank Welker would provide voices for both Schnoodle and Hootie in Heidi's Song.  Dick Balduzzi, 53 in the role of Old Man here, was a truck driver in Foul Play and would be a prisoner in Johnny Dangerously.

Only George Hamilton could steal scenes from himself.

Caveman

Caveman
April 17, 1981
United Artists
Comedy, Historical
VHS
B-

This silly comedy starring 40-year-old Ringo Starr as the title character has troubling sexual politics, so I want to address that before talking about what I like about the movie.  I know, it's about cavepeople and it parodies that prehistoric genre.  But the men are a diverse bunch that includes a midget, a gay couple, an old blind man (Jack Gilford), a black man, and an "Asian" man who speaks English and has a pet iguana.  There are only two women with memorable roles: busty brunette 33-year-old Barbara Bach as Lana the sexpot and leggy blonde 31-year-old Shelley Long as "nice girl" Tala.  The latter is willing to zug-zug and she's sneaky and vengeful, so she's not entirely "nice," but this is basically Veronica & Betty One Zillion B.C.  Starr as Atouk ultimately chooses Tala, but in real life he married Bach ten days after this movie was released, and they're still together.

As for our "nice guy" hero, he drugs Lana and her mate, macho Tonda, in order to literally sleep with her, and then later, with the help of his best pal (or bobo) Lar, played by 27-year-old Dennis Quaid, attempts to kidnap Lana!  Yes, Tonda and his tribe later kidnap all the women of the misfit tribe Atouk leads, but I think there should've been a greater moral distinction than this.  In fact, Atouk and his bobos invent weapons in order to conquer the physically stronger tribe.  And this is never addressed, even comedically.  In contrast, the two men who hold hands are accepted by Atouk and Lar with smiles, so it's not like the movie wasn't smart enough to put a spin on the treatment of women and violence in such movies.

That's the thing.  Although this movie has been described as brainless, and it's certainly a lot less intellectual than its contemporary Quest for Fire, it's clear some thought went into it, as seen in the way it's set specifically on October 9th (Starr's tribute to his recently slain former bandmate, as this was John Lennon's birthday).  Every dinosaur (or macha) is individualized (yes, more than the cavewomen), looking just real enough in stop-action animation but with touches like googly-eyes or a tendency to howl at the moon.  The primitive made-up language is simple and clear but flexible enough to cover every situation.  The Mexican scenery is stark but inviting.  And the trope of the caveperson or group inventing everything (played straight in the Clan of the Cave Bear, the book of which was released the previous year) is done well, especially the inventions of fried eggs and music.  The movie is sometimes funny and it's certainly watching once or twice (or more) but don't expect anything spectacular.

This time Avery Schreiber is Ock. Paco Morayta, who's Flok here, would shortly be Ramirez in Zorro: The Gay Blade.  Cowriter Rudy De Luca would also cowrite the equally silly Million Dollar Mystery.

Going Ape!

Going Ape!

April 10, 1981

Paramount

Comedy

VHS

C

In some ways, this is like a low-rent late-release '70s Disney movie, smashed up police cars and all, with the additions of the orangutans and writer/director of Every Way But Loose and Any Which Way You Can.  (The exclamation point in the title seems more like a '60s throwback.)  But the movie also has a lot of profanity, as well as one of the "apes" flipping people off, not to mention the two female leads being kissed while dressed as nuns, so I'm not really sure who the audience is.  I don't think the movie even works as a dumb comedy.  It's just sort of there, not painful but pretty forgettable, even with odd moments like a mother-daughter swordfight (40-year-old Jessica Walter vs. 21-year-old Stacey Nelkin), and 36-year-old Danny DeVito as Lazlo, the bearded Gypsy (I think) in a French maid's uniform.  Then almost 30-year-old Tony Danza is the main character (named Foster, rather than Tony), who's inherited the three simians and has to keep them alive for two years in order to get the bulk of his father's estate.  Mild hijinks ensue.  This was in the middle of Taxi's run, so it's interesting to see Danza and DeVito interact as different characters.  And Danza has a scene where he's shirtless, so there's beefcake.  I don't recommend the movie but you know, shrug.

Leon Askin, who's the landlord Zebrewski here, was the chief eunuch in John Goldfarb.  Ruth Gillette, who's Marianne here, was the Song Chairman [sic] in The Shaggy D.A.  Of the actresses playing Danza's sisters, Poppy Lagos was a reporter in I Wanna Hold Your Hand; Marji Martin was Kay in Scavenger Hunt; D. J. Sullivan was Mrs. Williams in Attack of the Killer Tomatoes (and apparently did several of the sequels).  Luke Andreas, who plays Carter, was Police Officer in Alley in I Wanna Hold Your Hand.

Nine to Five

Nine to Five
December 19, 1980
Fox
Comedy
DVD
A-

I vaguely remember seeing The Nude Bomb at the time.  I definitely saw Popeye.  And I was among many who saw this movie, which was a smash hit that remains popular.  Changes in the office (technologically and otherwise) aside, this is still a joy to watch, from the sassy title theme by Dolly Parton, where even the metronomes bounce along, to the cheeky Where Are They Nows after the red-white-and-blue garbed heroines toast their success.

It's hard to know where to begin, so let's start with costumes.  When we first see mousy Judy Bernly (Jane Fonda), it's emerging from a crowd, looking not unlike Dustin Hoffman would in a similar scene in Tootsie a couple years later.  Lily Tomlin as no-nonsense Violet Newstead ad-libs a little later that they'll need a special locker for that hat.  The costumes, including hair and make-up, help tell the story, including Judy's dramatic evolution (with a fantasy sequence of her as a big-game hunter), but also, more subtly the ways that Parton, as the based-on-Dolly Doralee Rhodes, also becomes more assertive.  The supporting characters also look just right, like Elizabeth Wilson (Benjamin's mother in The Graduate) with her straight gray hair in the role of the spying Roz Keith, one of the many exaggerated but believable office types.  The best costume of all is of course the Snow-White fantasy dress for Violet (with its Skinny & Sweet/ Rid-o-Rat color-schemed skirt).

Those fantasies (and Doralee's "sexual harassment" revenge) work as humor but also are examples of how carefully crafted the script by director Colin Higgins and 27-year-old Patricia Resnick is.  Details resonate throughout the film.  The scarf that boss Franklin Hart (Dabney Coleman in the first of what would become his signature roles as likable assholes) makes Violet buy on her lunch hour, supposedly for his naive wife, is the gift that he gives to Doralee in his long failing attempt to seduce her (while spreading rumors in the office that she's his mistress), and Doralee rejects, only to have it be, well, a running gag that the women use to silence him more than once.  The film is full of Chekhov's guns turned into a shooting gallery, and it definitely works on later viewings.

Another thing to watch if you've seen it before is the reactions of those who aren't speaking.  Tomlin has the least cartoony role (despite her fantasy) so you may miss some of the subtle acting she does in this, one of her earliest big-screen roles.  There are moments when she's dealing with Hart and Roz where you know what she's thinking, but she's able to hide it from them.  Parton, in her very first movie, is just adorable, sweet but tough (the "wranglers" line and of course her infamous "rooster to a hen" line), and whimsical enough to throw in a Groucho impression.  Hart says that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, which in this case is Jane Fonda, but when your weakest link is a two-time Oscar-winner, then you've got a very strong movie.  The three women have wonderful chemistry together (and remain good friends in real life), balancing each other so well.  If I have to pick one moment, it's the way Doralee calmly asks "Judy" and "Violet honey" to come take a look at the "wrong" corpse in the car trunk.

The humor ranges from verbal humor (like Violet's "murderess" line) to, no pun intended, broad physical humor, like Hart swinging from the ceiling not once, but twice.  It's actually funnier the second time, because Judy's helpfully named ex-husband Dick is downstairs, hoping to reconcile with her, until he finds out about the kinky "M & Ms" she practices.  The music plays up the comedy, and I could see that annoying people, but you just have to go with this movie.

You don't have to be a feminist and/or a woman and/or an office worker to enjoy this film.  The theme of taking down The Man is something that almost anyone can relate to.  I like the touch that Hart isn't just a jerk to these three; he's a jerk to everyone, from other employees (including men) to his doting wife to the male doctor who looks at his concussion.  And yet, there's a moment very late in the movie when Violet says she "almost felt sorry for him."  Coleman gets the character just right, so that you like seeing him punished but you do feel a smidgen of sympathy for him.  It's also cool how, although he's not as smart as the trio, he's sneakier and he does come close to outsmarting them.  My favorite moment with him is when he tells Judy, after she's untied him, "I lied," and he picks up the phone to call the police, forgetting that Doralee has unplugged the phone.  The way the cord swings adds to the humor.

Higgins does a fine job of directing here, probably his best work, as the script is also his best.  Sadly, he would die of AIDS in '88, at age 47.  I'm thankful that he lived long enough to make this as well as Harold and Maude  and Foul Play.  I don't know if his being gay helped him relate to women better, but he certainly helped to bring such topics as sexual harassment and equal pay further into the mainstream, in a non-didactic way.  Progressive companies now offer on-site child care, flex time, substance abuse counseling*, and some of the other then utopian innovations that Violet, Judy, and Doralee manage (in six weeks!), but back in 1980, and throughout the decade, this film seemed awfully optimistic.

Helen Heigh gets a special Longevity Award, since she was the Hat Shop Owner in Easter Parade 32 years before playing Charlotte here.  A nice touch in casting is Henry Jones from Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? as Hart's immediate boss.  Extras Elisabeth Fraser and Berniece Janssen were "Second Lady" in The Graduate and "2nd Wife" in The Love God? respectively.  Richard Stahl has a small but recognizable role as Meade.  Man at St. Ambrose Hospital Raymond O'Keefe was Bronco in Rabbit Test.  Ray Vitte was DJ Bobby Speed in Thank God It's Friday and he's Eddie Smith here.

Policeman Terrence McNally would be a Soap Opera Doctor in Earth Girls Are Easy.  Doctor Peter Hobbs was Dr. Dean in Sleeper and would be a veterinarian in Hot to Trot.


*I should talk about the "pot party" scene a bit.  Pot here is presented as benignly, if not more so, as alcohol.  Lulu got Jack stoned in Can't Stop the Music, but it was just for the sake of a sight gag when the Policeman village person showed up.  Here pot fuels the women's fantasies and bonding.  It is a sequence that is integral to the film, and yet it would've been unimaginable three or four years later in a mainstream hit movie, with the "Just Say No" movement, as well as John Belushi's 1982 overdose that shook up Hollywood, including Robin Williams.

Popeye

Popeye
December 12, 1980
Paramount
Comedy, Musical, Action, Romance, Fantasy
DVD
B-

When Robin Williams died last month, one of my first thoughts was of this movie.  Although this was not a full-out critical and commercial flop as some think, it didn't live up to expectations, and yet it's grown a fandom in the intervening three decades.  I find it simultaneously comforting, funny, and symbolic that the "Popeye Village" that was built from scratch on a Maltese island has become a tourist attraction, with all the drab Depression-era houses now brightly colored.

The movie is still an oddity though.  As I mentioned in my review of the behind-the-scenes pre-movie-release tie-in book, http://rereadingeverybookiown.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-popeye-story.html, the film is odd and off-putting.  There are some genuinely heart-warming moments, especially with Popeye and the unquestionably adorable but quirky Swee'Pea, but there is a dark, depressing undertone, as exemplified in the "Sweet Haven Anthem."  Additionally, you've got circus performers and other physical comedians acting like cartoon/comic-strip characters but there's also the Robert-Altman quasi-documentary touch in the look of the film and the way things keep happening in the margins.  Williams adds ad-libs on top of the Jules Feiffer script, from the brilliant reply to Swee'Pea's "I'm a baby" to his muttered line about catching "a venerable disease."  Some of this I got at 12 (not the "you expects a cervix" one though), and some I've figured out later.

It's not just Williams's death that made me appreciate his performance here.  It really is great, mixing humor, wistfulness, and of course toughness.  Duvall, as everyone notes, is perfectly cast as Olive Oyl.  Some of the others, like Paul Dooley as Wimpy, don't seem quite right but they're giving it their best shot anyway.  Ray Walston shows up late in the movie and has to do a quick turn-around from villain to good guy and succeeds less than Gary Oldman would as Sirius Black in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, but he has some funny exchanges with his film son.  Mostly though, I'd recommend this movie for Williams, as I'd recommend Little Darlings for Kristy McNichol.

This film doesn't quite come together (it really does fit all those genres I've listed and maybe Western and Sci-Fi for all I know), and I can see why it has gotten such extreme reactions, then and now, but I've enjoyed it every time I've seen it and it certainly hasn't gotten stale.

Williams's then wife, Valerie Velardi, has her only movie role, as Swee'pea's mother, Cindy the Drudge.  MacIntyre Dixon, who's Cole Oyl, was the bartender in Thank God It's Friday.  Donovan Scott, who plays Castor Oyl, would be the Sancho-Panza-like sidekick Paco in Zorro the Gay Blade.  Geoff Hoyle, Scoop the Reporter, would have a more substantial role in The Spirit of '76, as Heinz-57.  Allan Nicholls, who's Rough House here, would be "Cutting Edge Director" in Bob Roberts.

Then and now, my favorite visual gag, Bluto seeing red when his fiancee shows up with a stranger and a baby.

One-Trick Pony

One-Trick Pony
October 3, 1980
Warner Bros.
Drama, Musical
VHS
B-

Although this is a melancholy, relatively realistic movie, it is no more the biography of Paul Simon than Can't Stop the Music is the biography of the Village People.  Yes, Simon wrote the script; yes, his nine- or ten-year-old son Harper plays his character in the opening flashback; and, yes, members of his real band play the movie band.  But 39-year-old Simon wasn't 34-year-old Jonah Levin; he wasn't a one-trick pony, a one-hit wonder who'd done nothing popular since the '60s.  This is more like a parallel-universe Simon, if he were unsuccessful but still needed to perform, in this case mostly on the road, despite the strain on his family life.  (The scenes with son Matty are all good.)  The negative view of the music-business world may be Simon's though.  Certainly he was at a crossroads then, although his songs, the title track and others, are under-rated in his portfolio.  There's a moment when we see the new wave of New Wave sweeping away Simon's relatively simple sound, when his band gets a tepid response and then the crowd goes wild for the B-52s performing "Rock Lobster."  (Their "Dance This Mess Around" was in Roadie.)

It's hard to make an entertaining movie about a protagonist who's depressed, and it doesn't help that the dialogue wasn't recorded with the same care and attention as the music.  It was a relief when always articulate 36-year-old Harry Shearer made a welcome return to my movie collection (27 years after Abbott & Costello Go to Mars), as Bernie Wepner.  Simon wasn't this subdued in Annie Hall, he was mellow but he wasn't mumbling.  I couldn't even hear Blair Brown half the time, except when she yelled at him.

This is obviously one of the 1980 movies where the '60s are reassessed, and there's a scene whose dark humor has only increased with time: Jonah and the band listing dead rock & rollers. When Jonah says there must be someone English on the list, it's like CStM not knowing about AIDS; OTP doesn't know who'd be shot a couple months later.  (Simon's "The Late Great Johnny Ace" would pay tribute to John Lennon, leading to a strange moment in the reunion concert with Art Garfunkel, which I'll discuss when we get there.)

Besides the B-52s, other musicians appear as themselves.  And Merv Griffin is one of the a cappella singers.

Can't Stop the Music

Can't Stop the Music
June 20, 1980
EMI
Comedy, Musical, Romance
VHS
B

While this doesn't consistently hit the OMG heights/depths of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, it is a fine example of a so-bad-it's-delightful musical of the (in this case very late) disco era.  The two big moments, musically and visually, are the "YMCA" number that adds nudity to the subtext of the "Ain't There Anyone Here for Love" number of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, and the wow! "Milkshake" number that supposedly is a commercial, but begins with Valerie Perrine playing mom to preteen versions of the Village People and then explodes into several minutes of silvery whiteness: white sets, white costumes, white everything!  It's also the catchiest number, and I'm right there with Valerie when she cries, "One more time!"

She's playing the recently retired supermodel of the '70s, but as she notes two or three times, these are the '80s and times are different now.  That the '80s, for Perrine, the Village People, and all of us, did not at all resemble this shiny, cartoony world is a sad loss, but that makes this movie all the more fun to revisit.  That the movie is teetering on the edge of the closet the whole time-- no mention of the G word or the H word or the Q word, but tons of hints-- adds a certain poignancy, considering how rough the '80s would be for gay men, with AIDS and the accompanying homophobia.  But CStM doesn't know that.  It can put Bruce Jenner in a crop-top and Daisy Dukes and just keep going.

He's a terrible actor.  Not that anyone is giving a great thespian performance here, but he is the bottom of the barrel.  There's a sort of triangle with him (at the age of 31) as an uptight but loosening tax lawyer romancing 36-year-old Perrine, who's platonic roomies with 21-year-old Steve Guttenberg, who clearly has a crush on her.  She's the muse for what's probably the weakest song on the soundtrack, "Samantha."  As Jack Morell, Guttenberg is a thinly disguised version of Jacques Morali.  You see, this is pretending to be a biography of the VP, although it has almost no bearing on reality, from the Guttenberg-roller-skating credits onward.

The movie was a flop, except oddly enough in Australia.  Alan Carr and Bronte Woodard had co-written the screenplay for Grease, but that was based on a successful stage play and didn't have lines like "Housework is like bad sex.  Every time I do it, I swear I never will again, until the next time company comes" and Perrine's recital of song titles as she makes a graceful exit from the office of her ex, played by Paul Sand.  Still, this has long been the more enjoyable movie of the two, and surprisingly amiable considering the mean-spiritedness of Grease.  I could go on and on about it but I know others have on the Internet and elsewhere.  And besides, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Marilyn Sokol plays the best friend of the heroine, as she did in Foul Play, although this time she's man-hungry rather than man-bashing, spending much of the movie hitting on the indulgent VP.  Jack Weston, not looking much older than he did in Please Don't Eat the Daisies twenty years earlier, turns up in a small role as the lecherous owner of the local disco.

The Village People had a couple songs on the Thank God It's Friday soundtrack.  Dancer Wade Collings was Jennifer's partner in that movie.  "Young Disco Dancer" Daniel Selby was Boy in Airport in Goin' Coconuts.  Ventriloquist Jerry Layne was also in Americathon.  Selma Archerd, Mrs. Williams here, was a Telethon Phone Celebrity in that movie, as well as a passenger in The Big Bus.

Dick Patterson plays the boss at the record store, and he was Mr. Rudie in Grease and would be Mr. Spears in Grease 2.  Stick-up Lady Paula Trueman was one of the old ladies in Annie Hall and would also appear in Zelig.  Blackie Lawless (great name!) is "Metal guy with leash at audition" and would be Commercial Headbanger in This Is Spinal Tap.  

One more time!

Roadie

Roadie
June 13, 1980
United Artists
Comedy, Romance, Musical
VHS
C-

The general idea for this movie isn't bad: Meat Loaf (as Travis W. Redfish) has inherited his father Art Carney's mechanical aptitude (the Redfish house is full of all kinds of gizmos, like a moving phone booth) and thus becomes, despite his reluctance, the greatest roadie in the world.  Unfortunately, the movie is too meandering and there's a very annoying leading lady, Kaki Hunter as Lola Bouillabase.  Also, the various musicians aren't given much to do other than show up, although Deborah Harry has a moment when she's eating with Mr. Loaf that shows what the movie would've been like if she'd been the love interest.  (She'd have a more interesting role in Hairspray, much later in the decade.)  Another performer who makes a slight impression is Soul Train's Don Cornelius, as concert-promoter Mohammed Johnson, who late in the movie decides to try to become the first black President.  It's a throw-away line, without follow-up, like much of the movie, except for Lola's tedious plans to lose her virginity to a seemingly indifferent Alice Cooper.  The only musicians who redeem themselves are Cheap Trick, twice singing the song with the Redfish motto, "Everything Works If You Let It."

Alice Cooper's wife Sheryl appears as herself, and she was in Sgt. Pepper as a dancer.  Hank Williams, Jr. also appeared in that movie.  Lenore Woodward would play a little old lady again, in Hamburger-- The Motion Picture.  Richard Portnow, who's First New York Wino, would be Sy in Radio Days.  This time Hamilton Camp plays Grady.

The Gong Show Movie

The Gong Show Movie
May 23, 1980
Universal
Comedy, Musical
VHS
C+

This is sort of what it says on the package, a behind-the-scenes look at the odd '70s "talent" show that I watched regularly and even saw in person.*  But it's also a cynical look at show business, co-written by Robert Downey, Sr.  It doesn't really work, especially with Chuck Barris playing himself as worn out and mumbling.  (It was the year for that, as we'll see with Paul Simon in One-Trick Pony.)  But the movie is marginally entertaining, especially the songs.  My favorite is the group song, "Don't Get Up for Me," even though no one except Mabel King, as Mabel, can sing.  (She's not quite playing herself, but Chuck does greet her with "What's happening?")  Barris's then real-life wife Robin plays his girlfriend Red, with many people, from Tony Randall and 17-year-old daughter Della Barris to of course The Unknown Comic and Gene Gene the Dancing Machine, appearing as themselves.

Milton Delugg is best known for the Gong Show, and for the music in Santa Claus Conquers the Martians.  Tourist lady Nora "Dodo" Denney is best known as Mrs. Teevee in Willy Wonka.  Gary Mule Deer, who plays Gary, was a man at the health food restaurant in Annie Hall.  Pat Cranshaw, the old man who dies in the elevator (as Chuck and Red are oblivious), was the Western Union messenger in Sgt. Pepper.

Stand-up comic Taylor Negron is "Blond-Haired Man Auditioning," and he'd turn up as a delivery man in Johnny Dangerously.  Cynthia Szigeti, Diner Doll Sophie here, would also be in Dangerously, as Mrs. Capone, and she was a passenger in The Big Bus.

Betsy Lynn and Carol Gwynn Thompson of the Siamese Connection would be in The Fab 400 in Hamburger-- The Motion Picture.  (They were also responsible for my best friend Carla laughing incredibly hard at the trailer for Midnight Madness, which was 1980's answer to Scavenger Hunt.  I never saw the movie but I still remember the fat disco-dancing twins.)

Band member Dana Glover would contribute "The Way" to the Two Weeks Notice soundtrack.  Danny DeVito allegedly is a performer here, although I didn't spot him.


*Growing up in Southern California, I got to be part of a lot of live studio audiences, and I was there for the misery of the all-"Feelings" episode in '76.  On the bright side, at the end of the day, Arte Johnson gave me one of the balloons that came down from the ceiling.

The Nude Bomb

The Nude Bomb (AKA The Return of Maxwell Smart)
May 9, 1980
Universal (obviously)
Comedy, Action
VHS
C-

And sometimes retaking stock of the '60s looks like this.  A big-screen sort of sequel to the once very popular 1965-70 TV spycom, this flopped on initial release, and it's not hard to see why.  Not that I agree with those who emphasize the "bomb" in the title, but it is a misfire.  To put it bluntly, it is just not that funny.  The only part that works is the last fifteen minutes or so, where the blend of comedy and action is finally well done.  (And the then-edgy topic of cloning ends up being less dated than expected.)  Don Adams, wearing platform shoes and flared pants that look more '74 than '80, does his best in his old role, but it's just not the same without most of his supporting cast.  Andrea Howard, as earnest as in Thank God It's Friday, also does her best, but yes, she's no Barbara "99" Feldon.  The movie is actually most interesting for its plug for its own studio and the famous tour (which as a Southern Californian kid I went on multiple times, usually with out-of-state relatives).  Also, dawn-of-'80s note, there are two young computer genius siblings, but the super-computer still fills most of the room.

Don Adams's cousin Robert Karvelas reprises his role as Larrabee and he was the diner customer that Annabel vents to in Freaky Friday.  Landlady Ceil Cabot was also in Freaky Friday, as Miss McGuirk.  Hospital patient Leslie Hoffman was in I Wanna Hold Your Hand.  Hap Lawrence, a sergeant major here, was a soldier in Rabbit Test.  Adam Anderson was not only the sobbing sailor in Rabbit Test, but he was a policeman in Scavenger Hunt, and he's one of the many pilots here.

Byron Webster was the restroom attendant in Scavenger Hunt and he's the English delegate here.  This time Vito Scotti plays the Italian delegate.  The American delegate, Walter Brooke, was Mr. Ames in The Big Bus.  The German delegate, Richard Sanders, is instantly recognizable as WKRP's Les Nessman, and he'd have a small but funny role in Valley Girl as the Drivers' Ed teacher.

Supply your own caption with one of the famous catchphrases.

Little Darlings

Little Darlings
March 21, 1980
Paramount
Comedy, Drama
VHS
B-

Yes, I'm back.  I moved and didn't have Internet at home for three weeks.  I'd planned to take a little break after the '70s ended, but nothing like this.

So, yeah, welcome to the '80s.  I've already watched most of my movies for 1980 and I'll try to blog at least one a day, and then it'll be a movie every two or three days, since I have a full-time job now.  This is in some ways an odd movie to start with, but there's something odd/off about all of my movies from that year.  I don't think it's just that I turned 12 that year, went from grade school to junior high.  When some decades start (1960 and '70 are other good examples) there's this feeling that people don't know where things are going to land.  In the case of 1980, the deeper I go into the year the more I feel like not only was there a taking stock of the '70s but also a retaking stock of the '60s.  This plays out in different ways in different movies of course.

In this case, what we've got here is what would be a popular teen-movie plot not only throughout the '80s but into the American Pie era: a contest to lose virginity first.  What's different here of course is that, in a script co-written by two women, the contestants are 15-year-old girls.  And even nearly 35 years later, there's a lot of discomfort and hypocrisy surrounding female and/or teen sexuality.  So we've got an R-rated movie in which there's no onscreen sex, or anything shown beyond kissing.  (Even the male nudity is at a distance, through binoculars.)

The two contestants are 16-year-old Tatum O'Neal as Ferris and 17-year-old Kristy McNichol as Angel.  "Don't let the name fool you," she advises also ironically named Randy (Matt Dillon in a very early role), and the tagline for the movie was "Don't let the title fool you."  I was aware of the movie and its tagline but I was too young to be part of the original audience.  (As for what movies I saw that year, we'll get to that.)  I think it would've been an uncomfortable movie for me at 12 (out to myself for years already as bisexual), especially with its dyke-baiting lines.  And I can remember that "virgin" was indeed an insult then, yes, even for younger adolescents.  Not that you were supposed to be having sex of course!  (It was the same sort of logic that got 10-year-old boys called "fags" if they had female friends.)

Even now, in middle age, it's a disquietening movie to watch.  On the one hand, it wants to be a zany summer-camp movie, like Meatballs, with racy moments like the condom-machine theft.  But on the other, it's also this cuts-to-the-bone drama with a very good performance by McNichol as the tough but sensitive Angel.  She not only plays the dramatic scenes well, but she has an absolutely infectious smile, as if she's indulgently amused at the world.  (Oscar-winner O'Neal is relatively forgettable in her more shallow role of the rich girl.)  McNichol's performance, combined with a instant-nostalgia soundtrack, almost raised this to a B, but the movie is too conflicted, and some of the characters barely rise to the level of cartoon.  (Two girls are named Carrots and Chubby, and other than one being red-haired and the other plump, I couldn't tell you anything else about them.)  I recommend the movie, especially if you're old enough to remember the early '80s (or are curious about them), but don't expect a great film.

Marianne Gordon, who plays Mrs. Whitney (showing up in a flashback that looks and sounds like a feminine hygiene commercial of the era), was Chickie in How to Stuff a Wild Bikini.  Laura Whyte, who plays Dana's mother, would be Laura's mother in High Fidelity.  And Cynthia Nixon would go from hippie girl Sunshine to cynical Miranda on Sex in the City.