Goddess of Love

Truly when it comes to film, the marriage of the words "TV" and "Movie" are a match rarely to be made in Heaven. While the occasional historical work or a Dennis Potter play may arouse interest, in 99% of cases the television movie attracts the sort of disdain normally reserved for the close proximity of the word "Police" with "Academy".

Goddess of Love is no different. To be honest, I only looked in on this one to see Little Richard as the camp cameo Alphonso. What unravels is a story where a hairdresser, Ted (David Naughton) has to choose between his fiancé, Cathy (Amanda Bearse, the neighbour from Married... With Children) and the goddess of love herself, Venus. Of course, it doesn't help matters that Venus is woefully wooden in the hands of Vanna White, or that Ted's best friend Jimmy is also lacking in the tv actordom of David Leisure. Yet there's something endearingly awful about this film. It knows it's a worthless piece of junk made on a budget of 5 cents to fill an afternoon's schedule. There's a real sense of earnest desperation as everyone involved knows what a low-grade movie they're involved in, and are determined to overact in order to be noticed.

Astonishingly, Leisure was noticed, and went on to appear in many films, including 10 Things I Hate About You, Dogmatic and The Brady Bunch Movie. The best performance comes from Philip Baker Hall as Detective Charles. Much too good for this sort of thing, Hall has appeared in 60 films to date, including high-profiles excursions like Midnight Run, Boogie Nights, The Truman Show and Enemy of the State. The decision to cast non-actors in roles is brave, in fairness. White was, I understand, a co-host on the American version of "Wheel of Fortune". Though while she does okay-ish for a quiz host, Little Richard shames 90% of the "actors" here with a great turn as Alphonso. In fact, you can't help but feel if he'd had a bigger role the movie might have been more watchable. His effeminate tone and utterly unique phrasing of words virtually steals the show. Mind you, if he had stole such a lame film, I'm sure he'd have given it back afterwards. His performance leaves just one unanswered question: what happened to him? We see a vengeful Venus take him angrily in a room threatening to do terrible things to his person. Yet that's the last we see of him. I think we should at least be told, with Goddess of Love 2: The Alphonso Story. He deserves it.

Vanna White plays Aphrodite (or Venus, as she prefers), the goddess of love, who is banished by Zeus from Mount Olympus until she can make a man love her without killing him. So she spends centuries as a statue until hairdresser David Naughton accidentally frees her. She insists he's in love with her, despite his being engaged to another woman, and won't take no for an answer. There are also two bumbling thieves straight out of a '70s Disney movie.

Vanna is gorgeous but she's the worst actress you'll ever see. She's so wooden and awkward in her line delivery. Pretty much every word out of her mouth will have you laughing for the wrong reasons. David Naughton is likable and delivers his corny dialogue like a pro. David Leisure plays Naughton's horndog friend, similar to his Empty Nest character. Amanda Bearse plays the fiancée. Little Richard, John Rhys-Davies, Philip Baker Hall, and Betsy Palmer also appear. It's obviously not a very original plot, bearing strong similarities to films like One Touch of Venus and Mannequin, among many others. I will say the ending was somewhat surprising, but not really in a good way. There is an enjoyable amount of cheese, to say nothing of the oddity of seeing the Wheel of Fortune chick trying to act. Worth a look if you like corny made-for-TV junk.

GODDESS OF LOVE opens with synthesizer music that could only have come from the 1980's. Taken to Mount Olympus, we are there as Zeus (John Ryes-Davies) turns his daughter, Venus (Vanna White) into a statue. She's no longer allowed on the mountain until a human male falls in love with her... and survives.

Enter Ted Beckman (David Naughton), who is busy getting ready to marry his fiancee. Through mishap and happenstance, Ted winds up reinvigorating Venus, who has somehow wound up in a museum. Unfortunately, the way in which this occurs makes Ted the object of her divine desire! Complicating matters, Ted's fiancee is back in town.

Preposterous and impossibly corny, this is fairly typical made-for-TV fluff of the period. Ms. White is indeed beautiful, and her role isn't bad.

Harmless, enjoyable viewing...

I remember watching this on TV when it first aired. I remembered quite enjoying it, so I was thrilled to finally find it for a free streaming. I couldn't understand what I thought were the mean reviews here. Oh, boy! Maybe I watched this during one of my bad panic attacks and this was a welcome diversion?

As I type this, the show clocks in at a mere 3.2/10, from 273 votes. I no longer resent that. But I'll say this: Vanna White's performance isn't wooden, nor "laughable". She made the right acting choice for her mythological character. This is corroborated when at 1hr 15 mn and 38 secs in, the detective asks Ted: "does she always talk like that?" and his reply is: "she belongs to a little theater group!" I haven't seen any other acting by Vanna White, the perennial letter-turner throughout the ages, so I can't compare to anything. But for this film? Talking theatrically is what the script required her to do, and she delivered. Wooden she is not: she is also a statue, so even if you think she is wooden, that would be how statues (re)act.

This is a throwback to Mannequin with Kim Catrall. Vanna is equally as lovely, if not a lot more. Can you imagine being born with that kind of beauty? Vanna was sheer perfection: from her gorgeous chiseled face, to her perfect '80s body and natural tan, she looks equally beautiful in her toga as she does in her other getups. White, black or pink, all colors flatter her.

Yes, the movie is boring. There isn't that much of a plot. David Leisure plays his one annoying character as well as every other time I've seen him play it; the actor who plays Ted is alright; Detective Charles is played by a competent actor, etc. It's just that the script is as dreadful as the production values. The lighting, the camera angles, the filming are pretty terrible. There isn't any character that keeps me interested, and their story is flimsy at best. Amanda Bearse looks her best here, with her hair all moussed up '80s style, and she is drop dead in a belted black dress with oversized earrings. The men aren't much to look at, but you have the ladies beauty to at least elevate this from a dreadful 3 to a 4 or a 5.

The scene where Venus goes Rodeo Drive shopping made me wonder if Pretty Woman ripped it off from here, or if that was a 'thing' in the '80s. (I think there's plenty other era shows with such a shopping scene.)

All in all, this is painful to watch and I fell asleep trying to get through, as I kept pausing.and finding better things to do. Nevertheless, I have 15 more minutes to go and I intend to see it through. With a better script, a better cinematographer and a more creative director, this could have been fun fluff to watch on a rainy day. As it is, it's boring fluff, but gorgeous Vanna will save part of the show. Pity she spends most of the film in the toga. As flattering as it is on her, it would have been nice to see her wear other numbers more than just for a few secs, during the shopping sequence. Also her makeup wasn't that great, made her look kinda washed out, but even then, the woman was just a drop dead beauty. With a few acting classes to further her talent, she could have done something more than being Miss Letter Turner-turned-letter-clicker. What could have been.

Watch it once, if you must, as long as you have a 2nd hobby on hand, like knitting or shaving your armpits or fixing your car's engine, to keep you occupied during the boring movie gaps...and those are many!

The movie sucked. Vanna's acting sucked. But I gotta give her props, She's living proof you don't need talent of any kind to become rich....She was at the right place at the right time when she landed flipping squares on TV....