The Dawn Of Cinematic Greatness..."The Kentucky Fried Movie"

Kentucky Fried Movie (1977)

Starring Bill Bixby, George Lazenby, a whole host of others!

Directed by John Landis

The Story:

Movie trailers. The news. Commercials. All of that, and more, are about to get put through the comedy wringer in a movie-unlike you've ever seen before!

Well, that only took me 39 years to get around to finally seeing.

Odds are, if you rented movies in the 80s, you saw this poster on the wall, or at least saw the box as you browsed through the comedy section.

Was it worth the wait?

Hardly.

Basically it takes an episode of Saturday Night Live, then only 2 years old, and brings the format of rapid-fire sketch comedy to the big screen.

Bigger budget!
Badder language!!
Less wardrobe!!!

However, it works as a great time capsule that shows the beginnings of the creative genesis of David Zucker, Jim Abrahams, and Jerry Zucker.

Yes, this is the very first feature film from the trio of minds that would launch Airplane and Police Squad! at the beginning of the 80s.

It's also the 2nd feature directed by John Landis.

His next 4 films?

Animal House, The Blues Brothers, An American Werewolf in London and Trading Places. 

Like all good (and not-so-good) sketch comedy, some jokes/skits work better than others.

That is totally on display here as well.

The biggest misfire for me, was the "feature length" A Fistful of Yen in the center of the movie. It was too long, and too unfunny. Perhaps if I was a bigger Enter the Dragon fan, I would enjoy it more.

Currently streaming on Amazon Prime as of this writing.

Final Grade:  C

Their Impact On Pop Culture Cannot Be Denied..."National Lampoon: Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead"

National Lampoon: Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead  (2015)

Unrated

Directed by Douglas Tirola

The Story:

The rise and fall of the National Lampoon magazine, and the impact that magazine had on American pop culture.

Ooo.

That's actually rather profound, and also quite true.

What started out as a satirical magazine that poked holes in the establishment in the late 60s/early 70s, grew into an influential comedy machine in the mid to late 70s that established much of the humor that continues in movies and television today.

The brainchild of Doug Kenney, Henry Beard and Robert Hoffman, they created a little magazine that started slowly and then slowly built into a sales juggernaut. Parody and satire were the name of the game, and they enlisted a slew of talented writers to make the pages of the magazine must read material.

It proved so popular, they started a radio show and brought in even more comedic talent to make their skits take life. The majority of the original cast of Saturday Night Live passed through National Lampoon on their way to bigger things. Many from Lampoon were targeted by NBC to help create Saturday Night Live.

Then came the movies.

Animal House & Vacation.

So too could Caddyshack be added to the mix, as it was Lampoon in every way except billing.

While nearly everything else to bear the label of National Lampoon has been of variable quality, those two were the gold standards which made all of the others seem pale in comparison.

If it's any consolation, most movies that came after Vacation often licensed the National Lampoon name for an attempt to cash in with a built in audience.

So, while it wasn't National Lampoon being less funny, it was them being increasingly greedy. :)

The documentary does an excellent job of talking to just about everyone that was there and is still around and it's filled with lots of archival footage of the stage shows, radio shows, magazine and movie clips.

A very enjoyable documentary that is well worth your time.


Final Grade: B+

Not Nearly As Funny As I Hoped ... "Puddle Cruiser"

Puddle Cruiser (1996)

Rated R

Starring Jay Chandrasekhar, Kevin Heffernan, Steve Lemme, Paul Soter, Erik Stolhanske,

Written and Directed by Jay Chandrasekhar

The Story:

Felix (Lemme) is in love. Grogan and Matt (Heffernan and Soter) are facing charges for breaking into the college cafeteria and eating food.  The rest of Broken Lizard will revolve around the storyline offering gags and humor as possible.

Club Dread was a pretty good horror-comedy.

Super Troopers is a cult classic.

Puddle Cruiser is their first movie.

Yeah, that's really all the praise I can give this one.

The pieces are there, and there are a few gags that are more amusing than others, but otherwise...

If you want to see Broken Lizard at their best, check out any of their films after this one.

Sorry.


If you want a funny comedy about college, check out Animal House for starters.


Final Grade: C

Rewatchability/Purchase Factor: The pieces were being put into place, but this one wasn't that great.

R.I.P. Harold Ramis 1944-2014

The world became a much less amusing place Monday with the passing of Harold Ramis.

He was a triple threat in Hollywood: Writer. Director. Actor.

Of the 3, he was probably most famous, and will be remembered for his acting role(s), most notably as Dr. Egon Spengler from Ghostbusters.

However, it was likely his writing that won over most of us as fans in the first place.

Animal House, 1978

  "Ladies and gentlemen, I'll be brief. The issue here is not whether we broke a few rules, or took a few liberties with our female party guests - we did.

But you can't hold a whole fraternity responsible for the behavior of a few, sick twisted individuals. For if you do, then shouldn't we blame the whole fraternity system?

And if the whole fraternity system is guilty, then isn't this an indictment of our educational institutions in general?

I put it to you, Greg - isn't this an indictment of our entire American society?

Well, you can do whatever you want to us, but we're not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth the United States of America.

Gentlemen!"

Harold Ramis' first writing assignment for the big screen: Animal House.

If he had done nothing further with his writing career, that would be pretty impressive.

But Ramis wasn't done yet...

Meatballs, 1979

 "And even if we win, if we win, HAH! Even if we win! Even if we play so far above our heads that our noses bleed for a week to ten days; even if God in Heaven above comes down and points his hand at our side of the field; even if every man woman and child held hands together and prayed for us to win, it just wouldn't matter because all the really good looking girls would still go out with the guys from Mohawk because they've got all the money! It just doesn't matter if we win or we lose. IT JUST DOESN'T MATTER"

In 1979, Meatballs was released.  Again, Ramis was one of the writers, and he worked with Bill Murray and director Ivan Reitman for the first time.

This is an underrated classic in my opinion, and I watched this movie countless times on tv growing up.

However, sandwiched between Animal House and his next film, Meatballs often gets overlooked.

Caddyshack, 1980

  "License to kill gophers by the government of the United Nations. Man, free to kill gophers at will. To kill, you must know your enemy, and in this case my enemy is a varmint. And a varmint will never quit - ever. They're like the Viet Cong - Varmint Cong. So you have to fall back on superior intelligence and superior firepower. And that's all she wrote."

Once again, a film written by Harold Ramis, but also for the first time, he sits behind the director's chair.

How did he do?

It's in the hole!

This is the undeniable sports classic when it comes to golf, Caddyshack will live forever.

It was 1981 when I became aware of Harold Ramis, the actor...

Stripes, 1981

 "Army Training, Sir!"

10 years old, and I went to the movies with my parents and we saw Stripes.

Yes, I have awesome parents.

While much of the movie may have soared over my head at the time, the premise of the story was straightforward enough, and the acting and writing were, and still are, hilarious.

This was the 2nd time that Ramis, Murray and Reitman worked together.

Even more successful than their first outing, but nothing would prepare them for what came next when they all worked together.

However, it was time for Ramis to direct his 2nd feature film before that happened...

National Lampoon's Vacation, 1983

No Bill Murray this time, but he did call upon a Caddyshack alumni to lead as Clark Griswold.  This movie still holds up well after all these years, and is only overshadowed by Christmas Vacation thanks to the annual replayability during the holidays.


Then, the phenomenon happened, and thanks to the title song, lives to this day thanks to 80s radio airplay...

Ghostbusters, 1984

"We're ready to believe you!"

Once again, Ramis writes for Murray and directed by Reitman.

Easily the biggest hit of their careers, and a movie that is still great, 30 years later.

Sadly, the much rumored Part 3 won't happen now.

Fast forward to 1993, and Ramis and Murray teamed together one last time, and created a masterpiece...

Groundhog Day, 1993

"This is pitiful. A thousand people freezing their butts off waiting to worship a rat. What a hype. Groundhog Day used to mean something in this town. They used to pull the hog out, and they used to eat it. You're hypocrites, all of you!"

Written and directed by Ramis, and starring Bill Murray, this was their last collaboration together.

The movie is cinematic genius, partly due to Murray's delivery, but Ramis' direction is effortless and his writing is as crisp and sharp as it ever was.

I will cap off Ramis' career with one last film (even though it had a sequel...)

Analyze This, 1999

"I wasn't really gonna whack you."

"Paul..."

"Okay, I was gonna whack you. But I was real conflicted about it."

Harold Ramis wrote and directed Analyze This starring Billy Crystal and Robert DeNiro.

It's brave enough to write a comedy and have it star Billy Crystal, who is already hilarious.

But they took DeNiro and gave him a sense of humor.

And it worked!


The low points to Harold Ramis' career are really inconsequential.

He left us with a legacy of work that, at least for me, makes him one of unquestioned great cinematic comic minds of the late 20th Century.

I will miss his further contributions to film.

I will cherish those memories he gave us.


R.I.P.

Was it Over When the Germans Bombed Pearl Harbor? "National Lampoon's Animal House"

Toga! Toga! Toga!

The Story:

The Fraternity that everyone wanted to be a part of, Delta House.  The students, and I use that term loosely, are bent on having a good time.  As they initiate their newest pledges, Larry (Tom Hulce) and Kent (Stephen Furst) the Deltas, led by Boone, Eric and Bluto  (Peter Riegert, Tim Matheson and John Belushi) are going to show them everything not to do in college, in comparison to the uptight fraternity nearby, including the likes of Neidermeyer (Mark Metcalf) and Greg (James Daughton).  Little do the Deltas know they are on double-secret probation from Dean Wormer (John Vernon) and he is out to expel the whole lot of them.

The results ensure that people will attend college for generations, just in the hopes that any part of this movie is real.

: )

So where do you begin?  Harold Ramis' first movie that he wrote.  Check.

John Belushi's first big screen role? Check.

John Landis' first big-budget feature film? Check.

First or early appearances for most of the cast? Check.

The name National Lampoon actually meant something? Check.

Welcome to lightning in a bottle.  It doesn't happen with every movie, but when it does, it's often magical.

Don't believe me?

Consider that this movie is now...drumroll.... 35 years old.

And it's still as awesome as when it first came out.

Perhaps it's that perfect synergy of all those new people working  and not knowing what they could and couldn't do, so they threw it all out there and hoped it would find an audience.

It did.

And it continues to find a new audience with every passing generation.

It's crude. It's crass.

It's a classic.

Final Grade: A

Rewatchability/Purchase Factor: I do own a copy, and it doesn't see much replay in the house because much of it is not intended for the demographic in my household. ; )  I'll probably have to show it to the older kids someday to warn them how NOT to do college.  : )

The Older You Get, The More Juvenile You Become... "21 and Over"

Party Time!

The Story:

Miller (Miles Teller) and Casey (Skylar Astin) come to celebrate the 21st birthday of their pal Jeff Chang (Justin Chon).  The only  problem, Jeff Chang has a very important medical interview in the morning that Jeff Chang's dad (Francois Chau) is in town to ensure Jeff Chang does not miss this important meeting.  The pals promise Jeff Chang that they'll take good care of him... what could possibly go wrong?

Famous. Last. Words.

First, Jeff Chang is the only character with a first and last name in the film.  In fact, he is referred to as Jeff Chang throughout the entire movie, never just Jeff, so I feel the need to continue the reference in the review.

This movie is brought to you by the guys that wrote The Hangover, and they are striking out on their own as directors.

For a first effort, it's not that bad.  You've seen these gags before, sometimes executed better, sometimes worse.  We've got The Hangover, Weekend with Bernie, Animal House...heck you name it, there's probably nothing new. 

Unless you count what they do with that stuffed animal... : /

The movie takes place during the longest night of the year apparently, as these guys pack more into a 12 hour span than anyone else in the world ever could.

It's not nearly as raunchy as it could be, which again, sometimes it's a nice dial back when you don't go to total extremes in a film like this.

The cast is extremely likeable and they have a lot of fun with the movie.

It's silly. It's stupid.  But I'll admit, I laughed...several times. : )  If you like this type of movie, you'll probably enjoy watching this one at least once.

Final Grade: C+...B- area.

Rewatchability/Purchase Factor: Low in my house. : )