It was a Saturday night in Murfreesboro on March 20, 1982 and if you wanted to go to the movies the genres on offer were very limited. This Film Flashback is a teen sex comedy bonanza alongside a couple of the first films offered by Troma Team that could definitely be classified as sexploitation farces. The only serious film in the bunch is full of Oscar winners and is the only one of these movies I actually saw at the theater. What can I say....I was a 15 year old weirdo who wasn't allowed to go to R rated films.
First on the list is that revered cinematic masterpiece Porky's which was playing Cinema One. The director of A Christmas Story, Bob Clark, wrote and directed this hormone charged look back at a group of 1954 Florida high schoolers determined to get into a sleazy nightclub when they're not too busy peeping in the girl's showers at their school. I didn't see the movie until many years later and it is funny in a National Lampoon magazine sort of way. There are sex jokes galore and lots of T & A onscreen, but times were different back then. This low budget movie ending up becoming a hit which inspired 2 sequels.
If you found Porky's too much then you definitely would want to skip Private Lessons which is one of two films on offer at the Martin Twin in Jackson Heights Plaza. I have never seen this film so all I have to go by is the IMDB synopsis and the trailer, but the movie looks horrifying to be a comedy. Sylvia Kristel of the Emmanuelle films stars as an immigrant maid who seduces a 15 year old boy and then falls in love with him. There's also the strangeness of a blackmail scheme involving the maid faking her death. I often lament the loss of freedom that seems to have happened since the Seventies and Eighties and the rise of people much too sensitive about every least thing so I doubt this sort of movie would get made today and for once I am in agreement.
The one film I did go to see was On Golden Pond starring Katherine Hepburn, Henry Fonda, and his real life daughter Jane Fonda. Hepburn and Henry Fonda would both receive best actor Academy Awards. I didn't go see it just because it was the only PG movie playing. I really wanted to check it out since I had heard so much great press on the film. One of the two main dramatic arcs of the film is Henry Fonda's character Norman Thayer Jr. bonding with teenaged Billy, the son of Jane Fonda's character of Chelsea's boyfriend's son. The other main plot line is Chelsea learning to finally communicate with her father. There's a boat accident and there are loons. Katherine Hepburn is the best part for me. She was one brilliant actress.
Marbro Drive-In has a couple of the first movies ever made by Troma Team who would strike pay dirt later with such low budgets hits like The Toxic Avenger and The Class of Nuke 'Em High. The Troma Team story is interesting...did you know for instance that Troma provided production support for My Dinner With Andre....but this isn't the time for an in-depth look at the B-movie juggernaut. Let's just take a peek at what was on tap for Marbro Drive-In attendees. There's Squeeze Play which is like A League Of Their Own, but with lots more ball down the shirt gags. A group of young ladies get mad about how much time their boyfriends play softball so they form their own team to get even with them. It's a campy sex comedy with plenty of T & A from both sexes. I would link to a trailer, but it keeps getting knocked out when I try to link it so just use your imagination.
Troma Team really rolled out their promotion machine for this double bill as it got the biggest ad in the Daily News Journal on this day with Waitress! getting the major push. It's basically a gag film about employees at a New York City restaurant trying to break into show business. Based on both trailers I'd say the best bet on the night is Squeeze Play.
The world was certainly a much different place in 1982. Next week we're going to journey back to 1979. Hope to see you there.
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