Rejected By Rod(!): Part Fifteen - Pandemonium

Not everything I've written for FLICK ATTACK has made it to the show. Mr. Lott insists that these rapidly aging reviews will be posted eventually, but until then I'm just going to assume that they have been:

Exciting news! This latest Rejected By Rod post features the series' first actual honest-to-goodness rejection! This past weekend I got this message from Rod through the electronic mail:

"The Rapture" will be running this week on FA. However, I did run across one of your reviews from the pool I actually do hafta reject, and that's "Pandemonium." Not because it's badly written (it ain't, of course), but because it's more about referring to a previous review you wrote rather than the movie. I tried to work around it, but couldn't figure out how without it being maybe 1/4 of its length. Sorry!

Why does Rod hate meta-reviews? I don't know! Go to Flick Attack and ask him! It doesn't matter to me, since all it means is switching the usual (?) to a (!)!

Rejected By Rod(!)

Pandemonium

(1982)

As many perks as there are to being a big fat know-it-all, there is also at least one major drawback. Sometimes—albeit rarely—evidence is produced that at some point you said or wrote something that was actually *gulp* wrong. I say this because back in January of 2011 I wrote the following in my review of a terrible film called National Lampoon’s Class Reunion: “…there is nothing worse than a bad slasher movie parody and…no such thing as a good slasher movie parody.”

It’s a statement I made with some confidence, thinking at the time of such terrible films as Student Bodies, Slaughter High and Pandemonium, all of which I had seen before reviewing Class Reunion. Thing is, though, it had been a looooong time since I last saw Pandemonium and I was judging it on the basis of the retarded opinion of a pretentious 16 year-old asshole.

For that reason I decided to take another look at it 19 years later, as a much older, wiser and more relaxed 35 year-old asshole. Turns out I really liked it. Quite a lot, actually. Which means the statement I quoted up above simply isn’t true—there is at least one good slasher movie parody (two if you count Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon, which you probably should).

So, mea culpa.

The last film of Alice Sweet Alice helmer Alfred Sole (he went on to become a production designer), Pandemonium possesses the same anarchic sweetness as Rock and Roll High School, which isn’t a coincidence since both films share Richard Whitley in their screenwriting credits.

Set at a summer cheerleader camp (six years before Cheerleader Camp) held on a college campus where every cheerleader has been murdered for the past 20 years, the film largely eschews character and plot for a series of sometimes sophisticated, sometimes scatological, but mostly funny jokes.

The cast includes a blond Judge Reinhold, a Sissy Spacek-imitating Carol Kane, Jimmy Olson from Superman, Tom Smothers as a Mountie(!), Tab Hunter (once again mocking his 60s All-American image), pretty much everyone who appeared in the original stage version of The Pee Wee Herman Show (even Phil Hartman), and a genuinely adorable actress named Teri Landrum, whose appeal is much bigger than her six meager credits on IMDb would suggest.

So, yeah, I was wrong that one time. Don’t get used to it.

Rejected By Rod(?): Part Fourteen - Head of the Family

Not everything I've written for FLICK ATTACK has made it to the show. Mr. Lott insists that these rapidly aging reviews will be posted eventually, but until then I'm just going to assume that they have been:

Rejected By Rod(?)

Head of the Family

(1996)

There are two kinds of low-budget movie fans: Those who are ambivalent about Charles Band’s Full Moon films and those who HATE them. Count me among the former, if only because in the same way a broken clock is able to tell the right time two minutes each day, Band—for all his many faults—did manage to deliver Head of the Family, a strange little film that somehow transcends the usual Full Moon limitations (see also Dark Angel, which Band didn’t direct).

The titular family in question is the Stackpools, a group of mutant misfits whose deficiencies are each offset by a significant attribute. Wheeler (James Jones) has heightened senses, Otis (Russ Meyer vet Bob Schott) is a mass of muscle, Ernestina (adult actress Alexandra Quinn, whose porn star body seems especially ridiculous in a non-porn context) is pure sexuality and Myron (J.W. Pera) is the brain of the group, so much so that his tiny body is unable to support the weight of his giant head. Up to no good, their evil schemes are uncovered by the no-account owner of the local diner (Blake Adams), who makes the mistake of trying to blackmail them.

Short, dark and often surreally funny (at one point Myron has a group of lobotomized prisoners perform an amateur production of Shaw’s Saint Joan), Head of the Family also benefits from being sleazy in all the right sorts of ways, especially thanks to a stand out performance by frequent (-ly naked) Full Moon actress Jacqueline Lovell as Adam’s white trash mistress.

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Sixteen

"Ultimatum"

“But what the holy heck did I do to get sent to Hell, Duke? I lived a mostly good life. I went to church. I tolerated my mother. Sure I was tangentially connected to a dozen or so “accidental” deaths, but no charges were ever made.”

“Everyone’s innocent down here, pardner.”

“But I don’t want to go to Hell! There must be something I can do to stay away from here if that ambulance makes it to the hospital in time.”

“There is, Drake. You’d have to give up being a stuntman.”

“Done!”

“And sleeping with teenage girls.”

“Fuck you!”

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Fifteen

"Revelation"

“If I die, Duke, does that mean I have to spend the rest of eternity in this beautiful fiery Heaven?”

“This is Hell, Drake.”

“Yeah, right. Good one, Duke.”

“Do you see that guy with that moustache over there?”

“You mean, the one who looks like Hitler?”

“That’s Hitler, Drake.”

“Why would Hitler get to go to Heaven? That‘s messed up.”

“This is Hell, Drake.”

“You’re hilarious, Duke. Don’t ever change.”

“Do you see that woman talking to Hitler?”

“The one who looks like Joan Crawford?”

“That is Joan Crawford, Drake.”

“Oh my god! This is Hell! What the fuck?!?!?”

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Fourteen

"Race Against Time"

“What’s going on, Duke. Am I dead?”

“That depends, Drake.”

“On what?”

“How fast the ambulance you’re in gets to the damn hospital. Every second counts.”

“Wait, so my life is in the hands of some random ambulance hack?”

“That’s just it, Drake. The people in charge of these things are real cocksuckers when it comes to irony.”

“Don’t tell me. I slept with the driver’s daughter.”

“Nope.”

“What then?”

“Do you remember working on Moonshine County Express?”

“Wait! You don’t mean—“

“—Yep.”

“I really should have said something when I noticed she had an Adam’s apple.”

“Yep.”

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Thirteen

"Duke"

“Howdy, Slick.”

“Who are you? Where am I?”

“Don’t you recognize me, Drake? You doubled for me on McQ in seventy-four.”

“Duke? Is that you? But you died 2 years ago. I know ‘cause I got thrown out of your memorial service for hitting on Tatum O’Neal. I mean, how was I supposed to know she was only 15?”

“It’s me, Drake.”

“Then does that mean what I think it means?”

“That depends on what you think it means.”

“Am I in Heaven?”

“Turn around and you tell me, pardner. What do you see?”

“Fire. Lots and lots of fire.”

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Twelve

"Going Apeshit"

“Hey Jerry, have you seen Drake?”

“Hi Eddie. He’s up there with Bill and Bill on the scaffold waiting for the go ahead.”

“You put him with Bill? Is that a good idea?”

“Probably not.”

“You don’t look too concerned.”

“You may not know this, but I have a daughter too.”

“Gotcha. But, still, couldn’t you have waited? This production already has one death on the books.”

“And whose fault is that?”

“Guilty, but it’s not going to make promoting this flick any easier.”

“People love those monkeys. They don’t care about dead stuntmen.”

“From your lips to God’s ears.”

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Eleven

"Not What You Thought It Was"

“Bill?”

“Yes, Drake?”

“I feel like you’re angry with me.”

“You could say that, Drake.”

“I didn’t know she was your daughter. I thought she was Bill’s daughter, and I knew he wouldn’t have a problem with it. Would you have, Bill?”

“I’m sorry, Drake, I wasn’t paying attention. What were you two talking about?”

“The time I took Bill’s daughter to that church service.”

“Are you still pissed about that, Bill?”

“She joined that cult!”

“The Catholic church is many things, Bill, but it isn’t a cult.”

“Shut up, Bill! This is between me and Drake! Goddamn pope-lover.”

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Ten

“Bill Problems”

“So what’s the gag this morning, Jerry?”

“You, Bill and Bill are going to drop off that dangling scaffold.”

“Which Bills? Couch and Madden?”

“No, Madden and McIntosh.”

“And what are we doing this afternoon?”

“The shot where you guys land in the pool, but Bill has a prior commitment, so Bill will be filling in for him.”

 “Gotcha. I think Bill has it in for me.”

“Can you blame him?”

“I didn’t know she was his daughter.”

“Yes you did. I specifically told you, ‘That’s Bill’s daughter.’”

 “I thought you meant the other Bill.”

“Oh, that would explain it.”

The Adventures of Drake Wantsum, Hollywood Stuntman

Part Nine

"Arrested Development"

“Hello Drake.”

“Jessica! Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes. I haven’t seen you since that TV movie in ’74.”

“It has been a long time.”

“Are you just here for a day part?”

“No, I’m playing Stacey’s mom.”

“Bullshit! You’re too young to play her mom! What are you, forty-five?”

“Forty.”

“And you could easily pass for thirty-nine!”

“Thanks….I think. So, were you here when the accident happened?”

“Uh-huh.”

“What went wrong?”

“Oh, you know, same-old, same-old.”

“Eddie sabotaged it because you fucked one of his girlfriends?”

“Yep.”

“Just like Mannix and Ironsides all over again.”

“Yep.”