Fantasy Island (1977)

          If only because his company also made The Love Boat, the campy dramatic series Fantasy Island cannot be deemed the worst television show for which producer Aaron Spelling was responsible. That faint praise being offered, the massive success of the show—which ran for 152 episodes from 1977 to 1984—underscores that much of Spelling’s career was spent manufacturing the audiovisual equivalent of junk food. From week to week, Fantasy Island served up C-list actors in ridiculous scenarios against the backdrop of a semi-supernatural vacation destination. Sentimentality, superficiality, and sexuality powered the show, together with the odd coupling of series stars Ricardo Montalban, as godlike host Mr. Rourke, and Hervé Villechaize, as Mr. Rourke’s diminutive assistant, Tattoo. Throughout its run, Fantasy Island presented escapism about escapism. That’s why it’s amusing to revisit the TV movie that served as the series’ pilot episode, because the first installment of Fantasy Island is quite dark.

          Naturally, the picture begins with Tattoo climbing to the bell tower of the main building on Fantasy Island and yelling in his French-accented English, “Ze plane! Ze plane!” Once the seaplane to which Tattoo referred lands at the main dock, Rourke gives introductory voiceover to explain the wishes of new guests to Tattoo (and the audience). In the pilot, businessman Eunice Baines (Eleanor Parker) fakes her own funeral to determine which of her associates she can trust; World War II veteran Arnold Greenwood (Bill Bixby) revisits wartime France so he can see a lost love once again; and big-game hunter Paul Henley (Hugh O’Brian) asks to be hunted, ostensibly to test his virility. The Eunice storyline generates only bland soap opera, but the Arnold and Paul storylines are grim. It turns out that Arnold suffers from PTSD because he killed his wartime lover in a jealous rage, and that Paul is suicidal. As for Rourke, he’s like a capricious deity manipulating people’s lives for amusement. After casually describing his guests as being “so mortal” (implying that he’s the opposite), Rourke later proclaims: “There are no rules on Fantasy Island except as I make them!” In addition to magically re-creating Arnold’s horrific murder scenario, Rourke hires a shapely hooker named Michelle (Victoria Principal) to sleep with Paul, and then he handcuffs Michelle to Paul so she’ll share his fate. At one point, Rourke callously dismisses a husband’s rage at being cuckolded: “Your wife was used many times by many men.” Ouch.

          Fantasy Island has all the hallmarks of a typical Spelling production, such as shallow storytelling and tacky production values (in most of the scenes, Burbank subs for the tropics), but the nastiness of the piece is striking. Things got more family-friendly once Fantasy Island went to series—notwithstanding the strange episodes in which Rourke duels with Satan, played by Roddy McDowall--so it’s possible to watch the pilot as a glimpse at an alternate version of the series that could have been. In fact, something akin to that alternate version materialized when Fantasy Island was briefly revived, with Malcolm McDowell as Mr. Rourke, in 1998. Produced by feature-film guy Barry Sonnenfeld, the ‘90s Fantasy Island went for paranormal black comedy and fizzled after just 13 episodes.

Fantasy Island: FUNKY

I Will, I Will . . . for Now (1976)

          More or less watchable because if its charismatic leading actors, but otherwise quite rotten thanks to limp comedy and primitive gender attitudes, I Will, I Will . . . for Now attempts to paint a raucous picture of marriage in the ’70s. Elliot Gould and Diane Keaton play estranged spouses who attempt reconciliation by commissioning a detailed legal contract that spells out their respective responsibilities, and their scheme gets sidetracked because both spouses pursue relationships outside the marriage. Cue lots of remarks from Gould’s character about why it’s okay that he flirts with the sexy neighbor who lives downstairs, and lots of shrewish whining from Keaton’s character about why her husband needs to spend more time talking about his feelings. As cowritten and directed by old-school comedy pro Norman Panama, once a gag writer for Bob Hope’s radio shows, I Will, I Will . . . for Now gives voice to ideologies that must have seemed positively regressive when the movie was originally released; watched today, the picture’s not quite cringe-inducing, but it’s close.

         Les Bingham (Gould) is financially successful but romantically frustrated, because he’s still in love with his wife, Katie (Keaton). Alas, she’s moved on to someone new, whom Les doesn’t realize is Les’ best friend and lawyer, Lou Springer (Paul Sorvino). When Les and Katie attend an offbeat commitment ceremony together, they both react to the nation of partners laying out expectations through a contract rather than simply mouthing old-fashioned marriage vows. Les persuades Katie to give their romance another shot, at which point the believability and logic of the story utterly disappears. Literally the instant that Katie moves back into Les’ building, his eyes nearly pop out of his head while he ogles Jackie Martin (Victoria Principal), a onetime Playboy centerfold who lives a few floors below Les. Then, despite a few interludes of romantic outings and sexual bliss, Les resumes bad habits—ignoring Katie, smoking smelly cigars, watching sports incessantly, etc. He also spends time in Jackie’s apartment, even accepting a copy of The Joy of Sex from her. This is Les’ idea of reconciliation?

          Panama weakly mimics the manner in which Billy Wilder used actors including Jack Lemmon to make his sex-farce stories sing, for example throwing in a running joke about Les’ bad back, and the movie revolves around the idea that women can’t resist men who behave like Neanderthals. By the time the movie culminates in an elaborate sequence at a sex-therapy retreat, Panama has succumbed to male wish fulfillment, creating a scenario by which Les can romp around a bedroom with Jackie free of guilt—while still preserving a chance of keeping Katie. Oy. Gould does what he can, faring best in the film’s loosest scenes, while Keaton seems adrift without the benefit of a real role to play. Principal is merely ornamental, but Sorvino does well, even spicing some scenes with opera singing.

I Will, I Will . . . for Now: FUNKY

The Naked Ape (1973)

          Based on a nonfiction book about the development of human behavior as compared to that of other primates, this wildly uneven pastiche uses animated vignettes, dream sequences, narrative scenes, and supposedly comedic sketches to illustrate the absurdity and beauty of the human experience. In particular, the movie is preoccupied with sexuality, which should come as no surprise seeing as how Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Films produced the picture. Yet the promise of naughty content is slightly misleading. Although both of the leading actors display their bodies and participate in sex scenes, the movie also gets heavily into war. Additionally, much of the sex stuff is conveyed via cartoons or dialogue, so The Naked Ape is a relatively serious-minded endeavor that simply contains a few discreetly filmed physical encounters. Alas, the picture’s half-hearted approach to sex is indicative of other problems. One gets the sense that writer-director Donald Driver wanted The Naked Ape to be about something important and meaningful. Because he failed to shape a distinctive aesthetic, however, he simply made a freeform mess reflecting hip counterculture attitudes—with nothing of substance behind the posturing.

          The movie opens in a silly way. Wearing a business suit, Lee (Johnny Crawford) walks through a museum exhibit looking at cases that contain life-sized figures representing the different stages of man’s evolution. Upon reaching the last case, which is empty, Lee strips off his closes and enters the case, thereby representing modern man. The camera then studies his body in detail while credits are superimposed over the images. This scene has a certain perversity to it because leading man Crawford initially found fame as a child actor on the 1958-1963 TV series The Rifleman. Publicity for The Naked Ape made a big fuss over the fact that this young man showed his rifle, as it were. Similarly, leading lady Victoria Principal, who plays Lee’s girlfriend, did a nude layout in Playboy to promote the movie—another indicator of the low intentions dragging the piece down.

          Even though it’s only 85 minutes, The Naked Ape feels much longer, since it’s episodic and uneven. One animated sequence about the evolution of clothes has Gilliam-esque style and wit, but most of the ’toons are tepid, and the live-action scenes aren’t much better. Occasionally, Driver simply runs out of gas, as when he burns several minutes on pointless footage of gymnasts giving an exhibition. While Crawford and Principal are both attractive specimens, neither contributes anything memorable in terms of performance. And although the behind-the-scenes participation of the great songwriter Jimmy Webb is noteworthy, since he’s only composed scores for a handful of films, he doesn’t excel here, either, though the music he contributes to a war montage is powerful.

The Naked Ape: LAME

Earthquake (1974)

          Pure junk that nonetheless provides abundant guilty pleasure, Earthquake was a pinnacle of sorts for the disaster-movie genre. Executive producer Jennings Lang was recruited by Universal Pictures to copy the formula that Poseidon Adventure mastermind Irwin Allen had perfected at rival studio 20th-Century Fox, so Lang commissioned a thrill-a-minute script (co-written by Mario Puzo) and hired a large ensemble of mid-level actors. The resulting movie, as produced and directed by fading studio-era helmer Mark Robson, is a cheesefest replete with bad acting, horrible clothes, and ridiculous storylines. However, since those are exactly the kitschy qualities that fans of the disaster genre dig, Earthquake became a major hit, earning nearly $80 million despite costing only $7 million. Therefore, Earthquake represents the disaster genre in full bloom.

          While there’s not much point in discussing the actual plot—there’s a giant earthquake in L.A., in case you haven’t guessed—listing a few of the characters should give the flavor of the piece. Leading man Charlton Heston plays Stewart Graff, a businessman whose rich father-in-law, Sam Royce (Lorne Greene), offers him a company presidency in exchange for staying married to shrewish Remy Royce-Graff (Ava Gardner); meanwhile, Stewart is screwing around with a younger woman, Denise Marshall (Geneviève Bujold). Bullish police offer Lou Slade (George Kennedy, of course) spends most of the movie watching out for Rosa (Victoria Principal), a busty young woman who wears her hair in some sort of Latina Afro, because she’s mixed up with a motorcycle-riding daredevil (Richard Roundtree) and a psychotic stalker (Marjoe Gortner). Oh, and Walter Matthau plays a bizarre cameo as a drunk dressed in head-to-toe polyester, complete with a flaming-red pimp hat.

          Virtually every melodramatic cliché from ’70s cinema is represented somewhere in Earthquake, which treats seismic activity as a cosmic metaphor for the uncertainty of life. And by “metaphor,” I really mean “narrative contrivance,” because the script for Earthquake exists far below the level of literary aspiration; this movie’s idea of storytelling is stirring up trite conflict before adding tremors that kill people in exciting ways. However, some of the big-budget effects scenes are enjoyable in a tacky sort of way, and the histrionic nature of Heston’s and Kennedy’s acting keeps their scenes jacked up to an appropriately goofy level of intensity. Plus, during its most outrageous scenes—picture Roundtree performing Evel Knievel-style motorcycle stunts as Principal cheers him while wearing an undersized T-shirt that displays his logo across her ample bosom—Earthquake embraces its low nature by providing shameless distraction.

Earthquake: FUNKY

The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972)

          Screenwriter John Milius crafted this outlandish narrative from the real-life exploits of Old West eccentric Judge Roy Bean, integrating a series of impossibly colorful episodes featuring an albino gunslinger, a lascivious priest, a beer-drinking bear, a legendary stage actress, and frontiersman Grizzly Adams. As directed by the venerable John Huston, The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean isn’t remotely believable, but rather so enthusiastically weird that it’s fascinating to realize the movie was released by a major studio.

          Paul Newman stars as Bean, a fanciful drifter who wanders into a bar in the wilds of Texas only to get bushwhacked by unsavory locals. After being nursed back to health by a sweet senorita (Victoria Principal), he returns to the bar and slaughters everyone inside, then establishes the bar as the headquarters of his Wild West fiefdom. Bean declares himself a judge (literally draping himself in the U.S. flag at one point), and makes it a hanging offence for those under his “jurisdiction” to do things like besmirch the good name of Lily Langtry, the actress whom Bean worships from afar. He also attracts a cadre of loyal followers, including pistol-packing “marshals” who enrich themselves by stealing loot from the myriad unlucky souls Bean executes.

          The story eventually becomes a battle of wills between Bean and an ambitious lawyer (Roddy McDowall) who wants to seize the judge’s holdings, but the film mostly comprises a string of strange vignettes. Stacy Keach plays the aforementioned albino gunslinger, strutting around in pasty makeup, an Edgar Winter fright wig, and a spangled cowboy outfit worthy of the Village People. Appearing onscreen as well as directing, Huston plays Adams as a grumpy wanderer who complains the law won’t allow him to die wherever he wants. And so it goes. Huston lets actors run amok with the absurd material, and they look like they’re having a blast; Newman in particular seems thrilled to play a grizzled old coot with a silver tongue and a colossally bad attitude.

          The cast is filled with interesting people, from assorted varmint types (Ned Beatty, Bill McKinney) to those playing random small roles (Jacqueline Bisset, Anthony Zerbe). But the real star of this unique show is Milius’ outrageous dialogue, like this rant from Bean after he insults a group of fallen women: “I understand you have taken exception to my calling you whores. I'm sorry. I apologize. I ask you to note that I did not call you callous-ass strumpets, fornicatresses, or low-born gutter sluts. But I did say ‘whores.’ No escaping that. And for that slip of the tongue, I apologize.”

The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean: GROOVY

Vigilante Force (1976)

          Way before making the ’90s cult faves Grosse Pointe Blank and Miami Blues, George Armitage wrote and directed this odd exploitation flick, which boasts an eclectic cast, an insane storyline, and weird flourishes like happy banjo music accompanying scenes of bloody mayhem. Vigilante Force is so disconnected from recognizable reality that it’s like a drive-in flick viewed through the prism of an irreverent absurdist. And, yes, that’s a compliment: Vigilante Force is disorganized, illogical, and strange, but it’s also compulsively watchable.
          The outrageous story takes place in a small California oil town called Elk Hills, which has been overrun by itinerant workers. Blissfully eschewing restraint, Armitage depicts the interlopers as hordes of brawling rednecks; these faceless savages seem to be controlled by sociopathic groupthink. In the first 10 minutes alone, criminals trash a saloon, murder cops in broad daylight, and literally shoot a car to death. Given the many whimsical touches that follow, one can only imagine that Armitage envisioned his film’s opening act as a spoof of other movies about random violence, but then again, his storytelling is so capricious throughout Vigilante Force it’s hard to parse narrative intention.
          Anyway, the leading moral force in Elk Hills is Ben Arnold (Jan-Michael Vincent), a salt-of-the-earth widower who wants to protect the small town where he lives with his young daughter. At the urging of his neighbors, Ben tracks down his wayward Vietnam-vet brother Aaron (Kris Kristofferson), and then hires Aaron to form a peacekeeping militia. Initially, the scheme works, because Aaron and his rough-and-tumble buddies crack down on street crime. However, it soon becomes apparent that Aaron is even more dangerous than the thugs he was recruited to fight. Enlisting secret operatives to shake down local business owners and gleefully using murder to intimidate opponents, Aaron quickly gets Elk Hills under his militaristic thumb. Among other things, Aaron’s rampage features some of the most blasé murders ever shown in movies; the comic-book universe Armitage creates is almost entirely devoid of visible emotional consequences, a bizarre tonal choice accentuated by across-the-board understated performances.
          While all this is going on, the movie tracks Ben’s romance with a saintly schoolteacher (Victoria Principal) and Aaron’s thorny involvement with a cynical barroom singer (Bernadette Peters). While future Dallas star Principal is mostly relegated to stand-by-her-man ornamentation, Peters gets to show off her comedy chops through sly running gags. Plus, both women are blazingly sexy, so even though Vigilante Force is chaste by exploitation-movie standards, there’s plenty of eye candy—and since Kristofferson spends about half the movie shirtless, Armitage ensures there’s something for everyone to ogle. Furthermore, the supporting cast features several familiar faces, including Charlie’s Angels sidekick David Doyle, Breakfast Club villain Paul Gleason, and, in tiny roles, WKRP in Cincinnati bombshell Loni Anderson and B-movie icon Dick Miller.
          After meandering through a confusing but entertaining second act, Vigilante Force sticks the landing with an incredibly colorful finale: Aaron’s crew masquerades as a marching band in order to rob the Elk Hills bank, and Ben forms a militia of his own comprising local geezers and youths. Thus, the climax features Kristofferson blasting away with an M-16 while dressed in a cherry-red marching-band outfit and standing atop a giant oil tank. From its surreal opening to its even more surreal denouement, Vigilante Force maintains a breakneck pace that precludes questions about the nutty narrative until it’s all over. As a result, Vigilante Force is among the most uniquely entertaining schlock movies of its era. (Available as part of the MGM Limited Collection on Amazon.com)


Vigilante Force: FREAKY