I WAS A TEENAGE WEREWOLF

I Was A Teenage Werewolf just barely makes it onto this page since there is only one song in the movie - "Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Mo" sung by Ken Miller and written by Jerry Blaine. Ken Miller not only sings the song, but also has a little dance number during the instrumental break. A nice little number that doesn't rock, but does swing. If you check youtube you can see the performance.

I Was A Teenage Werewolf stars Michael Landon as a troubled teen who angers too quickly and lashes out in violence. To help control these outbursts, Landon is steered to a psychiatrist/scientist for help. Unbeknownst to Landon the good doctor is actually performing an experiment on him to regress him back to earliest man, which for some reason makes Landon a werewolf.

I Was A Teenage Werewolf was a top moneymaker at the time for American International Pictures, and besides being a story that appealed to teens, I think Michael Landon, in his breakout role as the titular character, might have had something to do with its popularity. He definitely had on-screen charisma and while some of his acting comes off as James Dean lite, for the most part his acting ability was as good or better than the adult actors in the film.

My favorite lines of dialogue from the movie: 

Landon "People bug me." 

Police Detective "That's right, hide behind jive talk."

ONE TRICK PONY

 

One Trick Pony stars Paul Simon (who also wrote the film) as a musician with one hit song behind him (thus the title) and his struggles as a working musician coping with a divorce, his life on the road, and trying to get another hit record (with Lou Reed as his producer). A huge majority of the movie is taken up with Paul Simon and his band either performing on stage or with Simon driving or walking somewhere while one of his songs plays in the background.

The B-52's appear in an early scene doing "Rock Lobster". They're the headliners with Simon and his band as their opening act. Later in One Trick Pony, Simon is appearing in a salute to the 60s concert which includes Sam and Dave performing "Soul Man" and what I thought was a real treat, the original Lovin' Spoonful reunited and singing "Do You Believe In Magic?". Also, Tiny Tim appears backstage warming up for the show.

If you like Paul Simon, you're really going to enjoy this movie, if you don't like Simon, you'll find One Trick Pony excruciating. However, since I neither like nor dislike Simon, I'm sort of middle of the road on this one. Everyone's acting was okay, even Paul Simon's. The story, what there was of it, was okay; and Simon's music was okay. And that pretty much sums up the whole movie for me, it was just okay. If you do decide to watch One Trick Pony, be on the lookout for two odd appearances: Daniel Stern as a Hare Krishna and  Mare Winningham in a nude scene.

CANDY MOUNTAIN

Candy Mountain is your basic road movie with the extra added attraction of famous musicians in the cast. While that might not sound good, in this case, all of the musicians in Candy Mountain do a good job, even better than some the other actors in the film. Directed by Robert Frank (Cocksucker Blues) as a slow unfolding story written by Rudy Wurlitzer (Two Lane Blacktop), the movie was able to hold my attention from start to finish.

Kevin J. O'Connor plays a wanna-be rock star, who is better at growing sideburns than actually playing the guitar. At the first of the movie he quits his carpentry job and goes to retrieve his guitar from a couple of his friends, played by Joe Strummer and Arto Lindsay. They refuse to give him his guitar, but set him up to jam with a famous musician (David Johansen). O'Connor's guitar playing is so bad, he's kicked out of the band; but when he hears Johansen and some others in the music business talking about the great guitars of Elmore Silk, he bluffs his way into getting an advance to go find the reclusive Silk. 

Along the way he meets Silk's brother (Tom Waits), Silk's brother-in-law (Dr. John) and a dubious law enforcement father and son (Leon Redbone) team. All three of these musicians do a great job in their roles and it's hard to pick any one of them as being the best: Tom Waits with his garish golfer outfits, Dr. John as the wheelchair bound cranky brother-in-law or Leon Redbone as the backwoods lawman.

These three musicians really made the film for me and perhaps if they weren't in Candy Mountain, I might not have found it quite as entertaining. There's also a cameo appearance by the late Canadian singer Rita MacNeil. If you're a fan of any of these artists or just like a good road movie, you'll probably enjoy watching Candy Mountain.

THE COMMITTEE

 

One of the best things about The Committee is that it is mercifully short (55 minutes). One of the worst things about The Committee is that at 55 minutes it is still too long and a slough to sit through.  

The Committee stars Paul Jones (Manfred Mann's lead vocalist) as a man who commits a murder...well sort of... since after he cuts the guy's head off, he sews it back on and the victim continues to live. Paul Jones is then called to a meeting of The Committee (sort of like being called for jury duty).  It seems The Committee is actually meeting about him, in order to get him back into the norm of society and not commit murders. 

There's a long boring  sequence (actually there's a lot of long boring sequences in this film) where Paul Jones and the leader of The Committee (who looks amazingly like the door guard at our local K-Mart, who we call Moe) walk and talk and walk and talk and walk and talk....well you get the picture. After this scene, since Paul Jones has got his head right, the movie ends on a strange note (you had to read/listen to the intro to the film to understand the end). 

Maybe in 1968, when the film was made, all of the "heaviness" of the message played better. However, in 2013 The Committee plays like a poorly produced, poorly directed, self-important pile of crap. For fans of Pink Floyd, The Committee holds some interest since they did part of the soundtrack. The best part of The Committee is an appearance by Arthur Brown performing "Nightmare" (not "Fire" as the back of the DVD box states; although, he does first appear in the movie with fire on his head). Since you can see that performance on YouTube, there's really no reason to watch this film.

SURF PARTY

I was really excited when I saw Fox Movie Channel was going to show this rare "beach party" movie, since it has never been officially released. I think I should have saved my excitement for something else, since Surf Party should have been titled Dull Party. 

Surf Party was the first release by another studio trying to compete with American International Pictures' much superior Beach Party which, in my opinion, was the weakest entry in the AIP series anyway, but  was still a masterpiece compared to Surf Party. I could even get over the fact Surf Party was shot in black and white, IF the movie had been entertaining. Surf Party has more in common with 1960's "Where The Boys Are" than it does with AIP's "Beach Party", since it involves a trio of girls (much like the four girls in "Where The Boys Are") looking and finding love at the beach. Surfing just happens to be a subplot of the movie. I guess you could classify Surf Party as "The Chick Flick of Beach Party Movies".

I won't rehash the plot, but if you're interested CLICK HERE for a summation of the story. One of the reasons for watching Surf Party was to check out the musical acts. Jackie DeShannon, one of my favorite female singers,  not only sings two songs in the movie,"Glory Wave" and “Never Comin' Back", but also stars as one of the three girls looking for love. Unfortunately, Ms. DeShannon was sorely lacking in the acting department and the two songs given to her were nothing special and not worthy of her talent.

Bobby Vinton, the leading male star of the movie, comes off a little better with his song," If I Were An Artist", since it's suitable to his style of crooning. As a side note, Vinton got cast in Surf Party, because his agent wanted him to have the part Frankie Avalon got in Beach Party. It's hard to imagine Vinton could have handled that part with the light touch Avalon brought to his role in AIP's Beach Party Series.That's not to say his acting ability wasn't good, since in Surf Party he was as good and better than a lot of the other actors. I read somewhere he got paid a flat $750 for his part in the movie which is a real shame.

Patricia Morrow (Peyton Place) sings "That's What Love Is", The Routers perform "Crack Up" and Ken Miller sings "Pearly Shells".  The Astronauts (a surf band originally from Colorado!) perform the theme song over the credits and play "Fire Water" in the movie, both are great surf music songs. Their performance of "Fire Water" is probably the highlight of Surf Party. So unless you're like me and just have to see every "Beach Party" movie ever made or you're just a big fan of Vinton's or DeShannon's, I would pass on this movie and look elsewhere for your evening's entertainment.

LONELY STREET

Lonely Street, the novel by Steve Brewer is a pretty good read. Lonely Street, the movie starring Jay Mohr is a pretty bad movie and not bad in a "so bad it's good" way, just bad in a suck-ass way. The author has stated he pictured Nic Cage in the lead role and while that would certainly have helped the movie tremendously, the direction and writing of Lonely Street is so terrible I don't think even Cage could have saved this film from being a stinker. 

I knew going into Lonely Street that the movie, as is the usual case, would not be as good as the book. However, first time writer/director Peter Ettinger changed the whole concept of the book making Lonely Street almost unrecognizable from its source material. The book is about private eye Bubba Mabry being hired to work security for a Mr. Aaron (Elvis) who is being tracked by tabloid magazines. Elvis wants to remain out of the public eye and needs to know who is watching him. The movie has Elvis ready for his big comeback, but on his own terms.

There's an abundance of bad jokes and bad acting, to go along with the bad writing and directing of Lonely Street, making really only one reason to watch this film - Robert Patrick (Terminator 2, The X-Files, etc) as Elvis. With some prosthetics added, his portrayal of what Elvis would look and act like at the age of 72 is uncanny.  He was so good, I thought I had been watching an Elvis impersonator until the credits rolled at the end. In a side note, Robert Patrick also starred as Elvis' father Vernon in the TV movie Elvis, so maybe he has a gift for playing elderly Presleys.

I can't imagine who would enjoy this movie, unless it's fans of Jay Mohr, and even then, they may just come away being embarrassed for him. My recommendation for Lonely Street is, if you want to see a good movie about an aged Elvis, then you should watch Bubba Ho-Tep 

THE BEACH BOYS and the SATAN

The Beach Boys and the Satan is a 1997 German documentary which definitely DOES NOT deliver on the title. The title leads you to believe it's going to be one of those Christian type exposes' of the evils of rock music. Instead the film is a recap of The Beach Boys career centering around Brian Wilson. Finally, at about 2/3 of the way into the movie the filmmakers discuss Dennis Wilson's brief association with Charles Manson. Then the film continues on with the history of The Beach Boys. Near the end of the documentary, the movie goes back to Manson and his followers. The Beach Boys and the Satan includes interviews with Brian Wilson, Kim Fowley, and Don Was. While the Brian Wilson interviews are fairly interesting, the Manson material is mostly a rehash of well known facts and I believe was only included so the title might peak viewers interest.