Showing posts with label Slutty. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Slutty. Show all posts

Friday, June 22, 2012

Just the Way You Are

On New Year's Eve 2010 before I settled in to watch recent comedies THE HANGOVER and BRĂ¼NO, I decided to watch a little something called JUST THE WAY YOU ARE (1984, directed by Edouard Molinaro), which tells the age-old story of a woman who has to travel across the globe just to find herself. Kinda.

Susan Berlanger (played by the spunky Kristy McNichol of WHITE DOG) is a professional flautist. Despite her slightly butch appearance, this gal is 100% straight and seemingly always on the prowl.

In fact Susan has to practically beat guys off a stick. You see Susan's engaged to wealthy and handsome Frank (pre-WINGS Tim Daly) and being stalked by a horny answering service operator named Jack (Lance Guest). Her best friend Lisa (Kaki Hunter) is a serious dancer and another horny dude named Sam (Robert Carradine) is after them both. After she Lisa compare notes on their disastrous relationships, we see that Susan is wearing a leg brace! What? She plays the flute so beautifully...how can she be disabled???

Turns out that Susan has been handicapped since a childhood bout with viral encephalitis, but she's so well-adjusted that she even jokes about wearing "Polio by Ralph Lauren" (insert sitcom "wha-wha"). After Jack and her have a almost blind lunch date, his subplot is quickly discarded and Susan hooks up with Sam (that's still Robert Carradine, if you're having trouble keeping track)–who isn't turned off by her bum leg. In fact I think he's turned on by her limp! Things seem to be going along swimmingly but suddenly Richie Rich, I mean Frank, walks in on them! Frank doesn't seem to be alarmed, and still wants to marry her because it's okay if she wants to sleep with other guys, because he does too! Yup, Frank's gay and their pending marriage would have been one of convenience so he could inherit his family's vast fortunes. Susan encourages him to be honest and maybe they'll accept him "just the way you are". Awwww...

So, after the broken engagement, Susan wants to see if total strangers would treat her differently if they didn't know she was handicapped, so she dumps Sam and accepts the offer to travel to Europe on a concert tour. So, while in France, she convinces a French doctor to put a cast on her bad leg, and then she heads off to the French Alps and a ski resort! When her room at the inn is double-booked, she quickly and eagerly makes friends with a slutty French woman named Nicole (Catherine Salviat) who instantly becomes her roommate! Nicole is having an affair with a married man, who never shows. Awww...

Soon Susan befriends skier Steve (Patrick Cassidy) and tries to jump his bones, but discovers he has to abstain from sex because it might interfere with his performance on the slopes. Enter Peter Nichols (MAKING LOVE's Michael Ontkean), a handsome and incredibly patient photographer there on assignment and his one-dimensional girlfriend Bobbie (Alexandra Paul). Before you know it, Susan and Peter fall in love, and so Peter dumps tantrum-prone Bobbie for Susan.

But can Susan tell him the truth about her damn leg? You'll just have to watch it to find out! This film is kinda odd. On one hand it's a cheesy 80s romantic comedy, on the other hand it's a "message movie" about how superficial people are.

McNichol makes snarky Susan likable in spite of man-eating ways. In fact if a lesser actress were cast in the lead role of a man-hungry, flippant and smooth operator such as Susan, the viewer might actually loathe her. But lovable Kristy just makes you wanna be on her side. The rest of the cast shows up and does their work, and some of the scenery is quite lovely.

The Billy Joel-less synthesized 80s soundtrack seems a bit too serious and heavy-handed in contrast to the airy romantics goings on, but it's always fun to hear Frida's awesome I Know There's Something Go On. Overall I'd give this Warner Archives gem a 7 outta 10 just because it's premise is so ridiculous, and yet it somehow works. As for Kristy, we'll always love her just the way she is!

Saturday, February 18, 2012

DEGRASSI Anonymous, Part 2: SCHOOL'S OUT!

From 2009: My disappointment over the shit heap known as DEGRASSI GOES HOLLYWOOD led me back to my DEGRASSI HIGH box set to watch the 1992 TV-movie called SCHOOL'S OUT! I missed this 90-minute special when it first aired because the geniuses at WNET in New York chose to air it only once– on Gay Pride Day 1992 – at a time when attending such events was important to me, being a young gay and all.So now, 17 years later (in 2009), with the bad taste of DEGRASSI GOES HOLLYWOOD still in my mouth, I decided to give SCHOOL'S OUT a shot.It all starts out in true Degrassi fashion as class valedictorian Lucy Fernandez (Anais Granofsky) delivers a farewell address to the graduating class. Among the students is Caitlin Ryan (Stacie Mistysyn), who has skipped ahead one year to graduate before her boyfriend Joey Jeremiah (Pat Mastroianni), who has been left back. At Lucy's graduation party we learn that Lucy and Caitlin will be college roommates. At the party, we actually see Degrassi students drinking beer and smoking weed - with no judgements. Even some of the good students are getting high. Miss Goody Two Shoes Tessa Campanelli (Kirsten Bourne) thinks that her friends are "so boring" when they are stoned. Meanwhile, Joey presents Caitlin with a friendship ring that he's saved all his pennies for. He implies that it could also serve as an engagement ring, but Caitlin is not ready for that kind of commitment. She also isn't ready to have sex with him!Joey is crushed and runs out of the party and into Tessa, and he agrees to give her a "ride home". Before he drops her off, he plants a kiss on Tessa's lips. They later make a date and Joey gets to second base with her. Luckily he works in the pharmacy and has easy access to Shields brand condoms! So virginal Joey may finally get laid this summer, with our without Caitlin. Later Joey's pals gawky Snake (Stefan Brogren) and lesbian-lookalike Wheels (the late Neil Hope) discuss all matter of sexual hi jinks as they work on Wheel's crappy car. Snake is still a virgin too, but hopes his summer gig as a lifeguard will change all that.
So Joey and Tessa have sex...lots of it...so much for Tessa being Miss Goody Two Shoes! Weed=boring, sex=not so boring! While her and Joey continue to do the nasty, Caitlin goes back and forth on whether she wants to still go away to University with Lucy or stay local and be engaged to Joey. Lucy tries to convince to her choose college, but it looks like Caitlin might be giving it a second thought.Then Caitlin decides that she will give Joey what he wants for his 19th birthday, prompting Lucy shows her how to put a rubber on a banana (which she calls "Joey"). Then Caitlin puts her hair up and a condom in her purse and before you know it - they've had sex too. After the momentous event, Caitlin cries and Joey gets out of bed...
I'm sure my readers would like to see that again...(Click to enlarge even more!)
Anyways, after the sobbing and the amazing butt shot, Joey climbs into his grampa's boxers.
Meanwhile, Tessa pays a visit to the local Women's Health Clinic. Guess what? She's totally preggers - so she orders up one abortion - to go!!! Later, the whole gang is getting together one last time by the lake...and tensions are growing between Wheels and Snake. Snake is all pissy cause Wheels spent his whole summer drinking beer and working on his shitty car. Their argument includes some un-Degrassi-like words such as "shit" and "asshole." They actually come to blows, and Lucy takes Wheels outside for some air.
Things go from bad to worse when Snake accuses Joey of "fucking" Tessa while dating Caitlin...just as Caitlin walks in! What happens next is the best Degrassi line ever...
"Tessa Campanelli? You were fucking Tessa Campanelli?" CLASSIC!
Things continue to spiral outta control when Snake has to put his lifeguard training to the test to rescue Allison Hunter (Sarah Holmes) from drowning just as Wheels puts his drunk driving to the test - killing a small child and putting Lucy in critical condition! Holly shit!
Wheels winds up in prison for vehicular manslaughter and Lucy ends up blind in one eye and walking with a cane (as witnessed in the premiere episode of DEGRASSI: THE NEXT GENERATION). The whole story winds up months later at the wedding of Alexa Pappadopoulos (Irene Courakos) to Simon Dexter (Michael Carry). Not attending are Wheels, Lucy and a few others. Snake shows up at the wedding with his new girlfriend, Pam.

At the reception, Snake's future-wife Spike (Amando Steptoe) mentions to Caitlin that her daughter Emma is now in pre-kindergarden (setting the stage for Emma to become one of the central characters in DEGRASSI: THE NEXT GENERATION in 2001). The film ends with Joey asking Caitlin to dance. Awww... What a totally enjoyable and satisfying conclusion to the series and the perfect bridge to the next series. I cannot recommend this highly enough to Degrassi fans everywhere. And if I need to remind you why, there's always this...
The End.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Golden Globe winner...BUTTERFLY

In honor of the Golden Globes, I recently watched the very likable Pia Zadora in a little indie flick called BUTTERFLY (1982, directed by Matteo Ottaviano). This notorious potboiler is an adaptation of the classic James M. Cain pulp novel. Set in the late 1930s, Zadora plays a dirty little sex kitten named Kady, who has been jilted by the father of her bastard child. Stacy Keach plays Jess Tyler, a loner who has spent way too many years guarding an old abandoned silver mine in Nevada. You see, Kady is Jess's full-grown daughter who he has not seen since she was an infant. Kady's wicked little plan is to use her sexy ways to actually sexually arouse her horny old daddy and get him to reopen the silver mine.
So she decides to walk around naked...
and lets him bathe her in possibly one of the most uncomfortable scenes I've ever watched, and I've seen some of 2 GIRLS 1 CUP.Before you know it old Jess has a full house when his other daughter Janey, his TB-infected wife Belle (Lois Nettleton), her lover Moke Blue (James Franciscus) and Kady's son all show up. Complicating things further, Wash Gillespie (Edward Albert), the bastard's child, proposes marriage to Kady.After some more incest, a lot of bad dialogue, worse acting and cameos by Ed McMahon, June Lockhart and Orson Welles we learn the dark secret about Kady's birth. You'll just have to watch it to find out what it is!The accompanying documentary reveals that the film was financed by Pia Zadora's husband, multimillionaire Meshulam Riklis - who met Pia when she was just out of her teens. He apparently thought she was 10 years old and fell in love at first sight. I swear, he actually says this.
The doc also covers the Golden Globe scandal. Pia won "Best Female Newcomer" at the Golden Globes for the film that year, beating out Elizabeth McGovern and Kathleen Turner. Rumor had it that Riklis wined and dined some Hollywood Foreign Press Association members in Vegas and the resulting accusations were that the award had been "bought". Pia's heartfelt revelation that she was mortified by the whole ordeal shows a rare, intimate side of the woman and makes you want to like her even more.

Pia also won "Worst Actress" and "Worst New Star", and Ed McMahon took home "Worst Supporting Actor" in the Golden Raspberry Awards. I'd give this one a 6 outta 10. You'll want to use your fast-forward button quite a bit.