December 21, 1979
Hanna-Barbera/American International
Children's, Comedy, Sci-Fi, Action
VHS
B-
I'm closing out the 1970s with two very '70s movies. (I'll get to Scavenger Hunt in a few days, but I'll mention now that it came out on the same day as this one.) This is also, probably because of the Hanna-Barbera production, a very televisiony movie, with writing, music, and sound effects straight out of any of their cartoons. (The frequently recurring theme combines "charge," disco, and action music, while being very bouncy.) Also, look at this cast: 28-year-old Wesley Land of the Lost Eure and 19-year-old Valerie One Day at a Time Bertinelli play an inventor and his girlfriend, while her father and his employer is Conrad Diff'rent Strokes Bain, and Jim Backus is the head of a rival security company. Furthermore, the two bumbling crooks are played by Red Buttons and Chuck McCann. The only signs of AIP-casting are Hermione Baddeley (who was one of the servants in Mary Poppins) as the dotty neighbor Mrs. Flower (a role not unlike Elsa Lanchester's Aunt Wendy in Pajama Party), and, as Merkle, Robert Q. Lewis, who was Mr. Pevney, the poor man that Frankie Avalon and Dwayne Hickman drive insane in Ski Party.
There are not really any of the odd, subversive touches of AIP movies of the '60s (and '50s), no breaking fourth walls, and every cliche is played straight. The movie is entertaining enough, but not quite cheesy enough to be memorable. I will note that the whole concept of the Canine HOMe Protection System doesn't seem so amazing, thirty-five years later, but the film might be worth a look for how it presents two elements that would become more significant in the '80s: technology, and fear of crime.
This time, Regis Toomey (then 81, but living on till 1991) plays the chief of police. African-American actor James Reynolds, who plays a reporter here, was Officer Wilson in The Magic of Lassie.* Engineer William Flatley was a truck driver in that movie, and Don Chaffey was the director. Phil Adams, who's one of the "hoods" here, was Tarzan in Thank God It's Friday.
*There are a relatively high number of black men in the movie, with three in one scene. I know that doesn't sound like a lot, but it is compared to some of my other movies, even from the '70s. To balance that, I couldn't decide if the mean, swearing dog Monster being black was significant (he does say "turkey" at one point), but I think it's just an example of the two-dimensionality of the script. All of the criminals are white.
