Only now does it occur to me... HEART LIKE A WHEEL (1983)

Only now does it occur to me... that I've found my new favorite alliterative way to refer to this movie, and that is a "Bonnie Bedelia/Beau Bridges boundary-breaker biopic."

The story of Shirley Muldowney (the first woman to become a champion top-fuel dragster), HEART LIKE A WHEEL is a solid studio programmer with a compelling lead performance by Bonnie Bedelia (DIE HARD, THEY SHOOT HORSES DON'T THEY?, THE BOY WHO COULD FLY, SALEM'S LOT). Most importantly, it allows me to make statements such as:

"Bonnie Bedelia and Beau Bridges are bitterly brooding at a bar––bring Beau a Bacardi" and

"Bonnie Bedelia and Beau Bridges' Byzantine bond becomes a burden at this Baton Rogue B&B"

 

Directed by Jonathan Kaplan (TRUCK TURNER, WHITE LINE FEVER, OVER THE EDGE, TV's ER), HEART LIKE A WHEEL is basically a rogue's gallery of Roger Corman veterans, including cinematography by Tak Fujimoto (DEATH RACE 2000, CAGED HEAT), a bit part by Dick Miller (A BUCKET OF BLOOD, THE TERROR), 

Because this is "a movie," that means Dick Miller is in it

 

supporting roles from Leo Rossi (GRAND THEFT AUTO) and Bill McKinney (CANNONBALL!), as well as a wonderful Paul Bartel (HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD, ROCK N' ROLL HIGH SCHOOL) cameo as a sexist French chef (playing the character, "Chef Paul").

We've also got baby Anthony Edwards (with hair!) as Bonnie Bedelia's teenage son 

and a variety of other interesting players, like THE OFFICE's Creed Bratton and musician Hoyt Axton.

Only now does it occur to me... CRAZY MAMA (1975)

Only now does it occur to me... that I never thought I'd live to see Cloris Leachman scream aloud the word "fartknocker" and go on a wild crime spree.

Allow me to contextualize. CRAZY MAMA is a Roger Corman-produced, Jonathan Demme-directed (the second feature from the man who would bring us THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, STOP MAKING SENSE, and A MASTER BUILDER) nostalgia-crime flick that feels like a less-competent John Waters version of GREASE fused with BONNIE AND CLYDE. Set in the late 1950s, it features Ann Sothern (THE WHALES OF AUGUST, A LETTER TO THREE WIVES):

and Cloris Leachman (THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW, THE LAST PICTURE SHOW):

as a mother-daughter duo whose beauty parlor is foreclosed upon by a dunderheaded Jim Backus. This leads to the aforementioned "fartknocker" (screamed by Leachman at a repo man) and a crime spree that sees Cloris and her gang taking out banks, dirt bike races, and even a wedding (!).

As is the New World Pictures Way, there are many scenes of parades and truck stops and racetracks that seem to exist not because the script calls for it, but because the crew wandered past and began filming without a permit.


Imagery worthy of Malick, I say

Of note: the bit parts and cameos are more than worthy of a Demme-Corman flick of this caliber. The legendary Dick Miller shows up as a cuckolding highway patrolman:

We're looking at less than a minute of screentime

 Writer/director and noted gun enthusiast John Milius (RED DAWN, CONAN THE BARBARIAN, EXTREME PREJUDICE)

plays a state cop who lines up the perfect shot but is run off the road by an unbridled Cloris Leachman:


Will Sampson (THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALES, "Chief" in ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST) plays a roadside entrepreneur feigning interest in this movie:


And Bill Paxton plays a blink-and-you'll-miss-him cop in his first film role, ever:


Spectacularly, the whole crime spree (which indeed amasses a body count) is relatively consequence-free for Ms. Leachman, who, in the course of this film, murders, robs, speeds, and even vandalizes her daddy's grave.

How ya like that, remnants of the production code?

I'm concerned that in describing this film I've made it seem more appealing than it actually is––it's definitely a mess and occasionally a chore, but for the completist, it is an effective delivery system of Cloris Leachman crazyface in a variety of low-rent 1950s tableaux.

R.I.P., Dick Miller

It saddens me to report the death of the Bronx's own Dick Miller, one of the most beloved and recognizable character actors in American film history, and one who was as seemingly ubiquitous in 20th Century B-movies as car chases, rubbery monsters, or karate chops. From his star-making turn in Roger Corman's A BUCKET OF BLOOD (1959) to his cranky gun salesman in THE TERMINATOR to an "animal trainer" in Sam Fuller's WHITE DOG to roles in blaxploitation classics like TRUCK TURNER and DARKTOWN STRUTTERS to his appearances in seemingly every single Joe Dante film through 2014's BURYING THE EX, he contrasted his gruff, cantankerous, and occasionally sleazy exterior with a lovable inner life. This was a man who could lend profound, nuanced grace notes to an under-five role as a heckler, a pizza deliveryman, "man in bed," or a thankless security guard.

He had several roles that were so iconic he reprised them: BUCKET OF BLOOD's "Walter Paisley" ends up in CHOPPING MALL, THE TWILIGHT ZONE: THE MOVIE, SHAKE, RATTLE, AND ROCK, THE HOWLING, and HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD. His role in GREMLINS, "Murray Futterman," even manages to cheat death for a triumphant return in GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH!

We've seen him corrupt Mark Hamill, play David Carradine's brother in a movie that already had Carradine's real-life brother in it, put down riots begun by P.J. Soles and the Ramones, play a crabby trucker who name-drops Joe Dante, swig hobo wine and share a scene with a demonic Billy Zane-as-Hunter S. Thompson, and shill for a fictionalized William Castle––he truly did it all. In his 90 years on this planet, he was in so many films (almost 200!) that there was something inherently reassuring about his presence. This was only intensified by the fact that he, like Harry Dean Stanton, seemed to remain the same age (around 50?) for nearly sixty years. Well, here's to you, Mr. Miller, and all the joy and drama and absurdity and comfort that you gave your audiences across the decades.

Film Review: MATINEE (1993, Joe Dante)

Stars: 5 of 5.
Running Time: 99 minutes.
Tag-line: "Lawrence Woolsey presents the end of civilization as we know it. Make that... Proudly Presents!"
Notable Cast or Crew: John Goodman (C.H.U.D., THE BIG LEBOWSKI), Cathy Moriarty (RAGING BULL, COP LAND), Simon Fenton (THE POWER OF ONE, A KNIGHT IN CAMELOT), Omri Katz (EERIE INDIANA, HOCUS POCUS), Lisa Jakub (INDEPENDENCE DAY, MRS. DOUBTFIRE), Kellie Martin (TROOP BEVERLY HILLS, ER), Robert Picardo (TOTAL RECALL, GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH), Dick Miller (GREMLINS, THE TERMINATOR, A BUCKET OF BLOOD, CORVETTE SUMMER), John Sayles (novelist and director, LONE STAR, THE BROTHER FROM ANOTHER PLANET), Kevin McCarthy (INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS, THE TWILIGHT ZONE: THE MOVIE), William Schallert (THE PATTY DUKE SHOW, THE TWILIGHT ZONE), Naomi Watts (MULHOLLAND DR., KING KONG '05).  Music by Jerry Goldsmith (ALIEN, POLTERGEIST, GREMLINS).  Makeup effects by Rick Baker & Co. (VIDEODROME, THE HOWLING, STAR WARS, AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON).  Written by Jerico Stone (MY STEPMOTHER IS AN ALIEN) and Charles S. Haas (OVER THE EDGE, GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH,
Best One-liner: "Young lady, human/insect mutation is far from an exact science!"

Ah, MATINEE...  I saw this film for the first time back when it came out in '93, and despite having no idea at the time who William Castle was, I was immediately drawn to the film's layered nostalgia and infectious sense of harmless fun; it's a paean to dedicated showmanship in a scary world.  Probably not before or since has a movie so thoroughly and tenderly explored the life-affirming thrill and ultimate social value of horror cinema––it's about taking yourself (and perhaps a date) to the Lovecraftian brink and back again in a safe, controlled environment; to forget, even for eighty minutes, the considerably less exhilarating, quotidian terrors that linger beyond the limits of the screen.

Equal parts fan service and a sincere coming-of-age, MATINEE is for every lonely kid who grew up on B-movies, late-night TV spook shows, and monster magazines; the socially awkward ones who imagined that Vincent Price, King Kong, and Dracula were sort of their friends.  It'd make a fine double feature with FRIGHT NIGHT, I must say.

Castle's career lived primarily in the shadow––or is that silhouette?––of Hitchcock.  Castle believed they were equals; personally, I tend to wonder if Hitchcock even knew who he was.

Set in Florida during the Cuban Missile Crisis, MATINEE follows movie producer/director Lawrence Woolsey (John Goodman, playing a not-even-thinly-disguised version of the manic, cigar-chomping, creature-feature ringmaster and gimmick-king William Castle) as he brings his new film "MANT" to Key West, forever changing the lives of a few teenagers who are making the transition to adulthood beneath the (anticipatory) shadow of a mushroom cloud.

And God bless William Castle––John Waters has said he'd rather have sat on his lap than Santa Claus' when he was a child––and damned if Castle isn't essentially the halfway point between Santa and P.T. Barnum. Here was a man who playfully threatened to kill audience members in his promotional materials, pioneered the Illusion-O Ghost-Viewer and Ghost-Remover, shoehorned contest winners into bit parts, handed out plastic coins in an attempt to energize cinema-goers, let the audience vote on killing off a character via a "Punishment Poll",  marketed a film (sucessfully) to children about kids who must murder their uncle before he murders them, stuck vibrators on seat-backs and called it "Percepto," used fake life insurance policies to hype in-movie scares, and handed out cardboard axes for a movie where a fifty-nine year old Joan Crawford plays a twenty-year-old (in a flashback).

What Castle called "barnstorming" (following your film cross-country to promote it in person, maximizing the asses in seats like a carnival barker) is Woolsey's bread and butter, and he'll employ every trick in the book to make sure his audience has a once-in-a-lifetime film experience, combining all the joys of live theater, the haunted house, and a boardwalk magic show.

This is all handled expertly by Joe Dante, who infuses the proceedings with equal doses of nostalgia, silliness, and a genuine humanity (that feels as well-earned as anything from masters like Renoir or Altman).  It's pretty damned great.

Without further ado, I'd like to delve into my eight favorite elements of MATINEE:

#8.  The authenticity in storytelling and art direction.  Not being a child of the 50s, I may be way off base, but there's a definite eye for detail in Steven Legler's production design,

and I appreciate little details, like burgeoning teens listening to a Lenny Bruce record

and hurriedly shutting it off when Mom pulls in the driveway.

#7.  And whaddya know––Omri Katz!  The kid in the striped shirt in the above screencap is none other than the star of Dante's EERIE, INDIANA, one of my favorite (albeit short-lived) TV shows as a child.  He's effortlessly likable, and it's a shame he hasn't done much acting since the early 90s.

#6. The in-jokes.  There are more obvious nods, like references to Castle's "rivalry" with Hitchcock; but there are deeper cuts, too––posters for everything from CONFESSIONS OF AN OPIUM EATER to THE DEADLY MANTIS appear frequently in the background, and a fictionalized version of Samuel Z. Arkoff (of American International Pictures) even shows up to the MANT screening!

#5. Cathy Moriarty as the washed-up starlet turned horror vixen; basically she's Joan Crawford in STRAIGHT-JACKET or Barbara Stanwyck in THE NIGHT WALKER.  She gives fewer shits than Bob Mitchum and has her most fantastic bit as the lobby "Nurse" in a nod to MACABRE's mock insurance policies.

She very nearly steals this movie away from John Goodman and a giant "Mant" prosthetic, which is, at the end of the day, quite an achievement.

#4. Dante crony and "that guy!" legend Dick Miller and novelist/director John Sayles as Woolsey's shills:

out-of-work actors pretending to protest MANT in order to amplify the word of mouth (any press is good press, eh?).  It's a classic technique, and one that I imagine the real Bill Castle must have employed at one time or another.  In between the whimsy, however, Dante manages to sneak in a sobering aside about the Hollywood Blacklist.

#3. Robert Picardo as the scaredy cat/wet blanket theater manager, who happens to have a personal fallout shelter in the basement.

Picardo's twitchy demeanor and knack for physical comedy make the character especially vivid, but even as you laugh at his panicked clowning, Dante never lets you fully forget that the man has some valid concerns (it's October '62, after all!) about nuclear annihilation.  (It's the same humanism that allows Dante to give real pathos to character deaths in something like GREMLINS, even though the methods of murder are borrowed straight from the Looney Tunes.)

#2.  The film-within-a-film, Lawrence Woolsey's MANT.

Tonally, it's spot-on––a hilarious mashup of THE TINGLER, PANIC IN YEAR ZERO!, THEM, and THE FLY with perfectly stylized imagery and dialogue.  It certainly helps that he's packed it with B-movie actors from the era, including INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS' Kevin McCarthy

and THE TWILIGHT ZONE's William Schallert (both of whom also appeared in Dante's segment of THE TWILIGHT ZONE: THE MOVIE).

It lives up to the (Castle-styled) hype and is one of the most memorable 'film-within-a-films' I can think of.

#1.  A second film-within-a-film, "THE SHOOK-UP SHOPPING CART" has a shorter, though no less memorable appearance.


Intended to be a spoof of eye-rolling, "safe" live-action children's fare of the era, like THE ABSENT-MINDED PROFESSOR, CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG, or THE LOVE BUG, it features a sentient, crime-fighting shopping cart and a young Naomi Watts.  Even the film stock and color correction are spot-on––it's clear that every aspect of this production was a labor of love. 

Five stars.  Perhaps one day, some inspired filmmaker will tell a thinly-veiled story of the effect the consummate showman Joe Dante's films had on their childhood!

––Sean Gill

P.S. I also recommend you check out J.D. of Radiator Heaven's nuanced take on the film here!

Only now does it occur to me... BURYING THE EX

Only now does it occur to me... that I should probably offer, as a public service announcement, the casual advice to avoid––even if you are a Joe Dante completist, like myself––his latest offering, BURYING THE EX, a lazy zombie-romantic-comedy that's easily his worst ever theatrical feature.  I don't have the patience to go in depth, but it is a failure of screenwriting, and I do find respite in knowing that Dante has not lost his moxie––in the past ten years, HOMECOMING, THE SCREWFLY SOLUTION, and THE HOLE all are suffused with his lovely and manic energy, and, in particular, I'd put HOMECOMING up there with his finest work.

Additionally, I must rag on BURYING THE EX for deleting the legendary Mary Woronov's only scene and can only offer, as a consolation prize, a screen capture of the eighty-six year old Dick Miller as "Grumpy Cop," a character who gets all of forty-five seconds to mumble about how kids these days are all on meth.

It was good to see ya, Dick Miller––keep on truckin'!

In closing, if there is indeed a God, will you please, please, please let THE MAN WITH KALEIDOSCOPE EYES happen (an as-of-yet unproduced film that Dante has been kicking around for years, a behind-the-scenes biopic on the making of THE TRIP, with the characters of Roger Corman, Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper, and Peter Fonda experimenting with LSD while they try to make the movie).  That is all.

Film Review: X: THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES (1963, Roger Corman)

Stars: 4.5 of 5.

Running Time: 79 minutes.

Tag-line: "Suddenly, he could see through clothes, flesh, and walls!"

Notable Cast or Crew:  Ray Milland (DIAL M FOR MURDER, FROGS), Diana Van der Vlis (THE SWIMMER, THE INCIDENT), Harold J. Stone (SPARTACUS, THE WRONG MAN), John Hoyt (SPARTACUS, BLACKBOARD JUNGLE), Don Rickles (CASINO, TOY STORY), Dick Miller (THE TERMINATOR, GREMLINS).  Written by Ray Russell (William Castle's ZOTZ! and MR. SARDONICUS) and Robert Dillon (PRIME CUT, 99 AND 44/100% DEAD, Castle's 13 FRIGHTENED GIRLS!).  Produced by Corman, Samuel Z. Arkoff, and James H. Nicholson.

Best One-liner:  "The city... as if it were unborn. Rising into the sky with fingers of metal, limbs without flesh, girders without stone. Signs hanging without support. Wires dipping and swaying without poles. A city unborn. Flesh dissolved in an acid of light. A city of the dead."

A Corman B-Movie with a William Castle pedigree, Lovecraftian sensibilites, and TWILIGHT ZONE-y aspirations...  and it works!   This is legitimately a good movie.  Visually imaginative, incredibly ambitious, and bleakly existential, it fulfills every aspect of a successful lower budget Sci-Fi/Horror flick.  With this small bankroll (and a headlining Ray Milland!) you can't sate those A-List appetites, but, by God, you can show them something different.  And that's precisely what X: THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES ("X," for short) sets forth to do.  

Pictured: something different.

Much of X's power lies in its ability to surprise, if not shock; therefore, I'd prefer not to spell out or spoil  the wonderful enigmas in its plotting, or even the full dimension of what "X-Ray eyes" means in the context of this film.   Instead, I will share with you my five favorite elements of the picture:

#1. 1960s Doctors Being 1960s Doctors.

MAD MEN– eat yer heart out.  These 60s professionals are chain smoking in the lab (amid volatile chemicals)

and using syringes to measure out 10ccs of dry vermouth while mixing the perfect martini.

This is clearly fantastic.

#2.  Ray Milland Dance Mania.

Ray Milland is as stiff as his starched collars; he's the apotheosis of a "square."  I love this about him.  His character is a Serious man who does Serious things.  He'd wear a suit to the beach.  Is there any doubt that this character voted for Nixon in the '60 election?  None at all.  This is all very well highlighted by his attempts at dancing The Frug during a wild staff party.

I think even Tricky Dick let his hair down a little more convincingly during his appearance on LAUGH-IN.  I wholeheartedly approve.

#3.  When It Becomes a Carny Movie.

I won't divulge the circumstances, but X briefly transforms into a "Carny Movie" about mid-way through, though it doesn't last.  It does, however, grace us with Ray Milland-silk-Zodiac-kimono action:

and nobody can ever take that away from us.  Nobody.

We also have Don Rickles as a shady carnival barker in a non-comedic role:

Don Rickles' face: Huggable or slappable?  You decide.

#4.  Dick Miller.

There can apparently never be enough Dick Miller.  The man pops up everywhere.  Here, he's an uncredited "heckler" and he gives the bit part a little more depth than you'd expect.  He's a three-dimensional heckler, if you will.  His heckling is rooted in lost love and self-hatred and fear.  He's a heckler with a backstory, dammit.

#5.  The bold imagery.

I love these 60s colors, the trippy effects, the madness, the sadness, the kaleidoscope of beauty and pain and forbidden knowledge.  It's a dark and cosmic film, and I stand by it.  Four and a half stars.

–Sean Gill

2014 HALLOWEEN COUNTDOWN– OVERFLOW!

1.  FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 2: TEXAS BLOOD MONEY (1999, Scott Spiegel)

2.  MARK OF THE VAMPIRE (1935, Tod Browning)

3.  FULL MOON HIGH (1981, Larry Cohen)

4.  EIGHT-LEGGED FREAKS (2002, Ellory Elkayem)

5.  MASTERS OF HORROR: WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM (2007, Tom Holland)

6.  STEPHEN KING ON SONS OF ANARCHY (2010, Bill Gierhart)

7.  THE INITIATION (1984, Larry Stewart)

8.  MUTANTS (2008, Amir Valinia)

9.  JAWS 2 (1978, Jeannot Szwarc)

10.  THE PREMATURE BURIAL (1962, Roger Corman)

11.  DRACULA 3D (2012, Dario Argento)

12.  HALLOWEEN (1978, John Carpenter)

13. ...

Only now does it occur to me... THE PREMATURE BURIAL

Only now does it occur to me... that while the clear centerpiece of Roger Corman's THE PREMATURE BURIAL is the ridiculous scene where the gleefully nutty Ray Milland shows off his custom-made precautions against being buried alive in his extensively pimped-out tomb:

The 'ole "tools in the collapsible coffin."


The 'ole "hidden foodstuffs and secret passsageways."


The 'ole "surprise rope ladder and self-congratulatory raised eyebrow."

the hidden gem of the film is a small bit whereupon Milland imagines that a gravedigger, played by a young Dick Miller, has come to bury him alive!

Somehow, young Dick Miller looks exactly like old Dick Miller.

As someone who grew up watching Miller in stuff like THE TERMINATOR, EERIE INDIANA, GREMLINS, and every other Joe Dante movie under the sun, it's a joy to return to his Roger Corman roots and see the 'ole back catalogue.  

As for the movie– it's decent.  Not nearly as good as the other (Vincent Price)/Edgar Allan Poe films that came out of American International, but a fine spooky time.  I do, however, highly recommend the Milland/Corman collaboration X: THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES, which will hopefully be the subject of a forthcoming review!

2014 HALLOWEEN COUNTDOWN

1.  FROM DUSK TILL DAWN 2: TEXAS BLOOD MONEY (1999, Scott Spiegel)

2.  MARK OF THE VAMPIRE (1935, Tod Browning)

3.  FULL MOON HIGH (1981, Larry Cohen)

4.  EIGHT-LEGGED FREAKS (2002, Ellory Elkayem)

5.  MASTERS OF HORROR: WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM (2007, Tom Holland)

6.  STEPHEN KING ON SONS OF ANARCHY (2010, Bill Gierhart)

7.  THE INITIATION (1984, Larry Stewart)
8.  MUTANTS (2008, Amir Valinia)
9.  JAWS 2 (1978, Jeannot Szwarc)
10. ...

Film Review: CORVETTE SUMMER (1978, Matthew Robbins)

Stars: 4 of 5.

Running Time: 105 minutes.

Tag-line: "Mark Hamill who you loved in STAR WARS... Annie Potts who you'll never forget!"

Notable Cast or Crew:   Directed by Matthew Robbins (THE LEGEND OF BILLIE JEAN, DRAGONSLAYER).  Written by Robbins and Hal Barwood (THE SUGARLAND EXPRESS, the video game INDIANA JONES AND THE FATE OF ATLANTIS).  Starring Mark Hamill (STAR WARS, BODY BAGS), Annie Potts (GHOSTBUSTERS, FLATBED ANNIE AND SWEETIEPIE), Eugene Roche (SLAUGHTER-HOUSE FIVE, FOUL PLAY), Danny Bonaduce (THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY), Brion James (BLADE RUNNER, THE FIFTH ELEMENT), T.K. Carter (THE THING, RUNAWAY TRAIN), Dick Miller (CANNONBALL!, GREMLINS).  Music by Craig Safan (CHEERS, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 4: THE DREAM MASTER).

Best One-liner:  "I DIDN'T WANT NO COKES!"

In a familiar, darkened alleyway:

–"What are we lookin' at here?"
"CORVETTE SUMMER."
–"Ugh.  Teenybopper trash.  A watered-down coming of age tale.  Luke Skywalker, reduced to an unwitting shill for Tiger Beat magazine.  No, thank you."

Note: disco ball font.

"Have you seen the movie?"
–"I don't need to see it, cause I already know what it is."
"Do you?  Do you really?"
–"I'm sure you're going to tell me, so why don't you just go ahead and get it over with."
"Here goes:  it might have seemed like fluff at the time, but CORVETTE SUMMER is a teen sex/car comedy packed with surprisingly potent life lessons.  It's got an off-the-chain young Mark Hamill performance that skates wildly between Brando-esque Angry Young Man and Lorenzo Lamas-esque unintentional hilarity."
–"'Potent life lessons?'  Surely you jest."
"Well it's the story of a D-average high school student (Hamill) whose only passion in life is cars.  He devotes his senior year to the auto shop, building and perfecting a candy apple red metal flake Corvette Stingray glitter-flame Dragon Wagon!"

–"That's a mouthful.  And holy cow, wouldja look at that thing!"
"Exactly.  You've seen Luke Skywalker tool around in a landspeeder before, but I'm guessing you've never seen anything like this!"
–"You may have won me over.  I could probably watch that car for 105 minutes."
"Just you wait.  Events take a turn for the dramatic when Danny Bonaduce takes it out to a fast food joint to grab some Cokes and it's stolen."
–"WHAAAT?!"

"He just went out for some Cokes in a top hat and left the car unattended on the side of the road, even though there was a drive-thru.  It could happen to anybody."
–"How does Hamill take it?"
"Not well.  He starts getting that crazy, conflicted look in his eye, like Al Pacino does in THE GODFATHER right before he guns down Sterling Hayden and the other guy in that Italian restaurant.

Then he lets the beast out:

'I DIDN'T WANT NO COKES!'

and leaps onto Bonaduce!  Cokes go flying everywhere!  It's brutal.  A well-deserved beat-down ensues."

–"That looks intense!"
"It is.  Now he's got nothin' to live for except that car.  And like Pee-Wee Herman in PEE-WEE'S BIG ADVENTURE, he begins to hunt down the vehicle-of-his-affections with dogged and unwavering intensity.

'ATTICA!  ATTICA!!'  (Whoops, wrong movie.)

It's something to behold.  I mean, sure, he spends parts of the movie lookin' like a prettyboy and blowing his own wind-tousled hair with the aid of an air compressor:

but the other half of the time he's giving crazy-eye like the best of 'em, like Bolo Yeung in BLOODSPORT or Mel Gibson in LETHAL WEAPON or Brion James in almost anything.  I'll come back to this.

Anyway, he tracks the car all the way to Vegas and, broke and busted, has a chance encounter with career gambler Dick Miller who gives him his 'lucky $2 bill.'

Dick Miller's only in this thing for a few minutes, but he plays it with crusty élan, like a man who'd gamble on anything if he was bored enough.  He could definitely be a character in Altman's CALIFORNIA SPLIT or anything by Bukowski.
So after getting a head-start on the car hunt, Hamill embarks on a series of shitty jobs to support himself and has a romance with aspirant van-based hooker Annie Potts."
–"Whu-whu--whutttttt?!"

"Yeah.  She's got this amazing, sleazy-chic disco van with a waterbed in the back, where she says things like 'how do you like that ocean motion' and can be found after hours making cocktails in her mouth.

Sips of Sunny-D alternated with sips of a bottom-shelf vodka whose name you can't pronounce= the only kind of Screwdriver you're gonna get in the back of Annie Potts' sleazy-chic disco van.

Eventually, Hamill loses his virginity, resulting in mania:

and dazed melancholy:

–"Luke Skywalker gettin' laid.  Ohhh yah."
"Shut it.  So he's working at a shitty car wash with THE THING's T.K. Carter:

when he sees none other than Brion James (most widely known for telling Harrison Ford 'Wake up, time to die' in BLADE RUNNER)

driving his beloved, stolen Stingray.  After cruelly taunting him with the line 'Bye-bye little buddy,' James peels out, leaving Hamill fuming."
–"What's a poor Hamill to do?"
"This is where it gets amazing.  He hides behind a mailbox and ambushes an unassuming cyclist:

forcing a collision that easily could have resulted in paralysis for either party:


Then he steals the poor sap's bike and takes after Brion James."
–"What chance does a bicycle have against a Stingray?"
"Not much at all.  That is, unless the cyclist is using The Force."


–"You gotta be shittin' me."
"Indeed I am not.  And this happens only partway through the film.  I don't want to give too much away, but there's totally a portion of the movie when Luke– I mean Mark Hamill– turns to The Dark Side."

–"Wow, that's exactly what a 'Dark Jedi in a Shopping Montage' should look like."
"Yeah, and I haven't even touched on Dark Side Hamill objectifying Annie Potts when her character's at her most vulnerable."

–"Now you're starting to ruin my childhood, pal!"
"Well, in closing I'll say this: CORVETTE SUMMER isn't your typical teen sex comedy, not by a long shot.  Hamill's character has an absentee father (and even his surrogate father figure betrays him), a possible prostitute mother (further complicating his relationship with sex worker Potts) who doesn't care a whit about him, and his 'whacky summer' is beset by shitty jobs, grifter schemes, apathy, violence, and injustice. Potts' character is at one point beaten by potential johns, and throughout undergoes the ups and downs of being valued as a human being and then as a sexual commodity.  It's a true blue-collar teen movie, which is to say, it's about a crooked world full of disappointment, crushing disappointment."
–"Now I'm just depressed."
"Well, there's a lot of fun stuff in there, too.  CORVETTE SUMMER refuses to be defined by a single mood or sensation.  Not unlike real life."
–"Deep, man."
"Yup."

–Sean Gill