Friday, September 04, 2020

Film Flashback September 4, 1982

The material for this week's Film Flashback comes from the September 3, 1982 Daily News Journal Friday edition as there was no Saturday paper in those days. Let's see what was happening in Murfreesboro, Tennessee before you check out the movies. It was Labor Day weekend with everyone looking forward to being off work...unless your job was one where you had to work anyways.

Governor Lamar Alexander was coming to town on September 4th so maybe before you see a movie you could "come work and come walk" with him.


If your plans were to attend the World's Fair in Knoxville on September 4, 1982 here's what you could have seen on that day. Up With People performing for 5 hours!! 


Labor Day was right around the corner

Since Labor Day was the coming Monday that meant the Jerry Lewis Telethon was on its way so local stores like Dodge's would be taking donations. The BUD MAN and the BUD Balloon, Blatz beer, and a free game of Pac Man or Centipede with each Dodger Dog purchased! Dodge's would have been hopping.


Perhaps you came into some money and bought an Osborne computer. Perhaps you'd get so caught up in it you'd forget about the governor, the World's Fair, Dodge's, or even the movies. 


Now for what was playing at the movies on this date in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Jason was becoming a movie franchise with the hit Friday The 13th Part 3 in 3D into its 4th big week at the Martin Twin. This is the film in which Jason finds the iconic hockey mask during his usual night of crazy killing. I did not see this at the movies as it was rated R and I was just 15, but I did see it on cable a few years later. It was after midnight when I viewed it over at my cousin Freddy's trailer which set just off Old Nashville Highway with a woods behind it. It was quite creepy even if the 3D effects came across quite goofy in 2D. 

Harrison Ford's name is just as big as the movie title Blade Runner. Blade Runner is a science fiction masterpiece based on Philip K. Dick's book Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. Rutger Hauer and Sean Young also play roles in the Ridley Scott directed film. It was set in the dystopian future year of 2019 which is funny now since it is now 2020. I don't believe there are replicants running around, but you never know. There are many different cuts of this movie available and a sequel too. I didn't see it until many years after it was available on VHS and I enjoyed it.


Director Steve Miner also directed Soul Man

Deckard. B26354.

If you couldn't get enough Harrison Ford Star Wars was back in town, again playing at its usual home of Cinema_One. I'm sure lots of people used their Labor Day weekend time to see it again. It was pretty shrewd business to re-release the original 9 months or so before the third installment in the series was scheduled to premiere. 


the original trailer

The Marbro Drive-In was running an all night exploitation movie fare since it was a holiday weekend. I bet those were marathons for the people who worked there. Poor White Trash II was just a rebranded 1974 release originally titled Scum of the Earth. The S.F. Brownrigg movie is considered a classic of hicksploitation. The Troma release Squeeze Play is making a return visit to the Marbro. It had played back in March of 1982 and I covered it in the March 20, 2020 post. Pick-Up Summer would later be rebranded as Pinball Summer and its a standard teen party sexploitation film. There are YouTube clips up, but you can check those out on your own as I don't want the Moral Majority coming after this blog. The other movie is Kinky Coaches and the Pom-Pom Pussycats which starred John Vernon and Norman Fell. It would later be retitled Heartbreak High. I couldn't even find a clip of this one, but a kinky Norman Fell doesn't sound like fun to me. 


I'm gonna' put a hex on you.

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