Pink Motel

My review was written in June 1983 after a Times Square screening.

"Pink Motel" is an interminably dull attempt at sexploitation situation comedy. Filmed last year under the title "Motel", film's opening credits actually read only "Motel", but in pink lettering, indicating the distributor didn't bother to make the title change on the prints.

Cheap about sums up this annoying, unfunny picture. Slim Pickens and Phyllis Diller portray the owner-managers of a small California motel. The film recounts the brief stays one night of five couples, using sluggish cross-cutting between them in a vain attempt to hold the viewer's interest. Format and content resemble the 1970 tv series "Love -American Style", but production values are inferior to most hardcore porn films.

The attractive cast of familiar thesps is okay, but burdened with unplayable cliched roles: a massive fullback who is still a virgin, bedding down a hooker; adulterous lovers quibbling over the chintziness of the motel; a conceited young stud who could give even porn star Jack Wrangler lessons in smug, ham acting.

Writer M. James Kouf Jr. Has delivered a nonstop stream of banalities in his talky script, directed by Mike MacFarland in static, extended shots or catatonic series of reverse-shot choker closeups. Though there is a modicum of nudity, "Motel"'s few sight gags don't come off and it lacks the raunchiness which has allowed many schlock comedies recently to ride the box office coattails of "Porky's".

Tech credits are unimpressive, with murky color.

Dismal, unfunny "comedy" about the goings on at a flea bag, by-the-hour hotel. HOT_L BALTIMORE it ain't.

Starring Slim Pickens and Phyllis Diller, who seem ashamed to be part of the proceedings. Sadly, this was Slim's last movie.

Whether you want to seriously waste 90 minutes of your life on this mess, or perhaps are having trouble to sleep; you run the risk of needing therapy afterwards. Tom Bodett will not leave the light on for you at this place. You have been warned.

NOT RECOMMENDED.

I like Pink Motel and remembered it from the 80s (MY decade). I can quote several lines and have watched it more times than I care to admit. I found it on VHS at a street fair and treasure it because as far as I know it isn't out on DVD...I hope one day..please!

Phillis Diller hates the idea that her husband (Slim Pickens) sank their money into a motel and likes to nag and insult him. Slim: "These pink outfits, our pink motif" Phyllis: Yea, "we get all the drunks because they think they are checking into a bottle of Pepto Bismol". "I'm still not convinced the money isn't in fried chicken". Slim: "what we have here is a gold mine". Phyllis: "the only gold here is in our teeth".

One by one people check in from different walks of life. Each persons story gets more detailed as to why they are there and why they picked that motel.

To top it off, the movie actually has its own catchy theme song "pink motel, nobody kiss and tell, rendezvous, room for me and you at the pink motel, American tradition, keeps you in condition..."

Yes the movie is cheesy, but it is quality cheese and I highly recommend it to anyone who loves the fun eighties like I do.

"Pink Motel" is about a motel that four different couples use to have sex.

Sample dialogue: "Do you think the romance has gone out of our affair? We're the only people who smoke BEFORE we have sex."

One couple features a football player who triumphantly describes a touchdown he scored to his date, who strips as he goes, as uninterested in his tale as he, apparently, is in her body. This scene just goes on and on, and then the movie cuts back to it later, with a close-up of the girl's impassive countenance, if we hadn't yet gotten the point of the scene. It is then revealed that she is a prostitute. The football jock (character actor Tony Longo) wants to "get to know" the girl before they do it. She, as a working girl, isn't interested in this.

It is revealed that the jock is a virgin, and hence uncomfortable about sex.

In another scene, a rat-faced yuppie type feels a woman's breast and guesses its size. She feels his groin and does the same. Earlier, there was a strange scene where the yuppie seems to be threatening and physically dominating the woman, holding her up against a wall, but the scene seems to be played for laughs.

The dialogue is a little smarter than I expected, but I doubt I'll remember anything about this movie once it is over.

The couple who provided the dialogue at the beginning of this review are revisited, but their problems don't change and aren't developed. She thinks he isn't making enough of an effort.

Neither were the screenwriters. These couples are introduced, and some of even register as distinct from the others, but then the movie does nothing with it.

The rat-faced yuppie guy is only notable because, when he strips off, he wears leopard print briefs. The other guys in the movie wear striped boxers.

There is yet another couple, with a guy who reminded me of a third-rate Michael J. Fox. This one doesn't register either, there's nothing to say about it, and nothing to set it apart.

When the cheating guy asks, "Is it over?" I was hoping his mistress would answer, "Yes," and we would be done with their storyline. Predictably, it went on and on, with more dialogue that did nothing but show the actors could handle a sitcom.

I thought it might be a plus that some of the characters in this movie actually stand out from the others, ie. the virgin jock, the cheating husband and his disaffected mistress. The trouble is that they are not developed at all and quickly become tedious, and I started to dread seeing them on screen.

Three of the four women involved in these four couplings appear topless, but typically, there's not a hint of pubic hair. Why was that considered beyond the pale?

Oh, and the elderly man and woman who own the hotel are played by Phyllis Diller and Slim Pickens. You'd think the screenwriters would have given these two showbiz legends something to do.

Eight o'clock on a Friday evening several couples rock up at the cheap, but welcoming Pink Motel, with one thing on mind. You got two teenagers looking to further development their relationship, a couple whose affair seems to be wailing, a star running back of a local university football team enlisting the help of a hooker to overcome his virginity and two supposed studs looking for a one-night-stand.

Some films seem to come and go without making much of a scene. Usually there might be circumstances surrounding it. "Pink Motel" is one of those films that are never talked about. Coming out around that period when teen sex comedies were the in thing. I guess "Pink Motel" just didn't cut it for most and I can see probably why? It's a sex comedy that's more concerned about telling a story, focusing on its characters and thoughtful narrative arrangement with the sex shenanigans becoming seconds to the every growing drama that's developing. Sure it can be silly, but I found amusing. Characters come and go with the action being limited to the hotel rooms. For some it could be too talky, but I found the writing to be clever and the dialogues sharp and punchy. It's not all that daring or raunchy, but consisting of a sweet charm. The cast are mainly no-names with the likes of Phyllis Diller and Slim Pickens (who share are great rapport as the hotel owners and this would be Pickens final film) being the headliners, but they're not in it all that much. The rest of the cast give acceptable performances with the busty Kathi Sawyer-Young being the pick of the lot. What's going on behind these doors differ and the circumstances surrounding them bring their own unique laughs.