Issue #8: So Timely

Hey, gang.

Even the early '80s weren't safe from exploitative parody films made by people who didn't understand what it took to sustain feature-length satire.

My assumption is that the money people -- e.g. Vito "Champagne" Roccaforte of the Secaucus, New Jersey sanitation industry -- saw Airplane! and figured, "Ey, dat's not so hard... it's just a bunch of fuckin' gags! And look at the MACARONI those [enter racial slur of your choosing] made off dat PASTA FAGIOLE! MARONE!"

 Now let's talk about this movie!

Wait, starring Richard Benjamin and Paula Prentiss? Jackpot, guys!

Saturday the 14th  was directed by Howard R. Cohen (the ladies' choice) and produced by Roger Corman's shrewd wife, Julie Corman. She was best known for producing a series of T&A flicks from the early '70s involving night call nurses, young nurses, student nurses, and/or candy stripe nurses.

So many nurses.

Hey, Jeffrey Tambor played a vampire in this movie, which is dope.


Roberta Collins, the best-looking B-actress who ever lived [see site banner], was in it, too -- but barely. Which is stupid and wasteful. Did you people think she was going to make movies forever? Selfish, gang.

Selfish.

Oh, and the eldest daughter from TV's "Gimme a Break!" did this:

There's actually a pretty drawn-out "gettin' naked" sequence leading up to that bubble bath, and I didn't know what to make of it, as the actress (Kari Michaelsen) looked like she was about thirteen years-old. And while child concubines might be legal (encouraged) in the frozen wastelands of Canada, it's definitely frowned-upon here in the States.

Thankfully, Michaelsen was, like, nineteen at the time of filming -- so that's a crisis averted for both New World Pictures and my ambivalent pee-pee.

By the way, Saturday the 14th is a parodical horror movie about a cursed book that magically makes rubbery monsters appear and cause TRUBBA for a suburban family who've just moved to a creepy new house.

Guys like this:

I really like The Creature from the Black Lagoon. Some might say too much. But I don't really know what to do with this (charmingly) ghetto hydrocephaloid clone: THE CREATURE FROM THE WACK LAGOON, HAH-HAH.

Right, kids?

Then there's this little guy, too:

He's really familiar, and I can't place it. I want to say he was in that one Billy Ocean video.

(I hear he's hard to work with. The monster, I mean. Not Billy Ocean.)

Also, my brain draws some parallel between that suit and Reese's Pieces. And it has nothing to do with E.T.

Or maybe it has everything to do with E.T. That's the logical conclusion.

That or an aggressive brain tumor.

See, the thing is, Jeffrey Tambor and his vampiric wife want the cursed book for themselves, because... that's what monsters do, I guess... and there's this flabby Dr. Van Helsing who thwarts them, but then it's revealed that...

OK,  I don't want to talk about the very spoofy (laff!), very cheap Saturday the 14th anymore -- and I have no exit strategy -- so here's another picture of Kari Michaelsen in the tub!

Lucky duck. HA-HA, I'm a joker, you guys!

And jokers are WILD.


See you soon!