Green Holidaze

 

Yes, folks it's yet another Christmas entry (And you say: "Bah! Humbug! It's not even Halloween yet!").

 

OK, I'll concede to the Scrooge-y outcry. You want Halloween, you say? Bet you weren't expecting this...

 

In 1977 the television animation studios at ABC presented the world with what amounts to a prequel to the classic 1966 Christmas tradition of How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Titled Halloween is Grinch Night, it was presented to the public on October 28 of that year, and quickly became a Halloween holiday tradition, much in the same way that it's predecessor did as a Christmas tradition.

 

What's that, you say? This never became a Halloween tradition? Hmm... What a shame! Maybe the ill sweet sour winds were blowing in the wrong direction. 

 

OK, I'll be honest. Although I was alive, and in my late teens, when this cartoon hit the airwaves, I don't recall having ever seen it. In fact, until I ran across a DVD collection called Dr. Suess's Holidays on the Loose, I wasn't even aware that it even existed. (Just a note: You never know what you'll find in those garage sales and resale barns. I paid $2 for this, but I would have never even thought to look for it...)

 

 

 

 

The DVD also includes another Grinch cartoon that I never heard of, this one brought out in 1982. It's called The Grinch Grinches the Cat in the Hat. But in the case of that one, I have an excuse for not even noticing it. It first aired in May of 1982. At that time I was in college and wouldn't have been caught dead watching a kiddie cartoon show.  Besides, at that time I had a job throwing a newspaper route, and was probably asleep so I could be prepared for my job at midnight.

 

Of course, nowadays I wouldn't be so dismissive of children's fare. Possibly because at my age I am looking back at a long life, and regretting that period of my life when I didn't have a childlike innocence and missed out on some fairly good stuff in retrospect. Just for instance: In my 20's, an animated film would have been the LAST choice I would make in picking my weekly theater experience. But just look at what I missed out on during that period: The Black Cauldron, Labyrinth, The Last Unicorn, The Never-Ending Story, The Secret of N.I.M.H., every Muppet movie until  The Muppet Christmas Carol (and I only went to that one because the Dickens story is one of my favorite stories). All of those I have since watched and found entertaining.

 

Dr. Suess had been around for decades prior to the first television cartoon adaptation of his work, the now famous How the Grinch Stole Christmas, but with the exception of a few Private Snafu animated shorts released in theaters during WWII, his work was hardly every translated to film. But after the Grinch a succession of Suess inspired cartoons were made for TV, including Horton Hears a Who, The Cat in the Hat and The Lorax. And you are probably already aware of the full length movies released in theaters in recent years that include the Jim Carrey version of the Grinch story and the Mike Myers version of the Cat in the Hat. (I'm still waiting for a film version of "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins", BTW, if anyone in Hollywood is checking out this blog...) 

 

Firstly, just to appease the Grinchier crowd who might be objecting to an early Christmas entry...

 

 

 

Halloween is Grinch Night (1977):

 

 

 

 

Things look pleasant in Whoville, But Josiah (Hal Smith; "Otis" from The Andy Griffith Show) smells a "sweet sour wind" in the air. He gets his wife, Mariah (Irene Tedrow; Mrs. Elkins on Dennis the Menace) to double check, and sure enough, the wind has that sweet sour smell.  That means the local Grunker's Pond will be disturbed, awakening the gree-grumps, who will begin to howl. That will make the hakken-krakks star to yowl.

 

 

 

That can only mean one thing. The villainous Grinch (Hans Conried), who lives on the nearby Mount Crumpit will be lurking about, because it is now Grinch night. The Whos in Whoville scurry inside and lock the doors and windows, and they won't go outside... not even for $1.50... The whole town keeps an ear to the radio for the coming on the Grinch, as posted by Sgt, MacPherson (Jack DeLeon; who was memorable as one of the first openly gay characters on TV, Marty in Barney Miller ), who acts a weather broadcaster, only in this case, the watchful eye of the ill wind of the Grinch.

 

 

 

The Grinch, on the other hand, is ecstatic because it's his night to howl. He loads up his wagon, puts his poor dog Max on the reigns, and begins his descent on Whoville where he plans to have a big party in the Whoville town hall.  He will be the guest attendee.  Really, he will be the ONLY attendee...

 

 

 

Poor Max bemoans the lost childhood he had and his fate at being a slave to the Grinch, but he really has no choice.   As the Grinch begins his ascent to Whoville, Euchariah (Gary Shapiro), the young son of Josiah and Mariah, suddenly realizes he needs to go to the "euphemism" (Really. That's what they call it. Cover your eyes, ye easily shocked readers, because it means he needs to go to the...  outhouse...)

 

 

 

The wind, however, is really strong, and despite his struggle to get there he is blown off course, and ends up om Mount Crumpit, the home of the Grinch.  Euchariah runs into the Grinch and bravely stands up to him, but the Grinch is dismissive of such a small foe. He gives Euchariah the discount store scare and figures that is that.

 

 

 

But Euchariah decides that the only way to save the town from the Grinch is by his own work.  He stands up to the Grinch and basically dares the Grinch to do his best at scaring him.  The Grinch, who is not one to back down from a challenge, proceeds to throw everything he can at young Euchariah. 

 

 

 

Unfortunately for the Grinch, young Euchariah is determined, and despite all the spooks and monsters the Grinch throws at him, he bravely endures. And just long enough, too, because the sweet sour wind of Grinch night dies down, which is basically the death knell on the Grinch's activities for the night. He turns his cart around to make the trek back up the mountain, promising he will be even worse on the next Grinch Night. But his dog, Max, deserts him and becomes the dog of his new master, Euchariah.

 

Hans Conried had to fill in for Boris Karloff as the voice of the Grinch, since Karloff had passed away by the time this prequel was made. He does a passable job of it, but it's not quite the sinister twang that the legendary icon put on the original. But hey, nobody lives forever. It was bound to happen. Fortunately the fantastic deep bass singer, Thurl Ravenscroft, was still around to do the musical parts of the Grinch story.  

 

Just one note here, story-wise: This is supposed to be taking place before the events of How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Yet in that later story the Grinch has Max back in his lair. Did the dog decide that life in Whoville was too sedate and return to the Grinch? Or maybe sometime in between the Grinch managed to rope in another dog...  

 

Halloween is Grinch Night won the 1978 Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Children's Program, beating out, among others, The Fat Albert Christmas Special. 

 

OK, you Ebenezers... happy now? 

 

What? Still not ready for cheer and eggnog? OK. I'll play along for now. The second feature on this DVD is:

 

 

 

 

The Grinch Grinches The Cat in the Hat (1982):

 

 

 

This piece (probably) comes after the transformation of the Grinch into a happy carefree figure he became at the end of How the Grinch Stole Christmas, because the sun rises and the Grinch (Bob Holt) is smiling and laughing. Even Max is a little wary, but apparently the afterglow of the events in How the Grinch Stole Christmas (see below) he is a new character.

 

The first thing that comes into play in this piece by the way is the fact that the narrator is none other than Mason Adams. (Adams may not have been a dynamic actor on screen (IMDb only credits him with 77 appearances), but as a voice actor, for me, it's always a treat to hear him. He did narration and voice over credits throughout his career.)  

 

But' in the Grinch's lair, his reflection in the mirror is not so ready and willing to accept this transformation. The mirror image reminds the Grinch of his venomous nature and makes him repeat the "Grinch Oath". With the Grinch apparently saved from a life of charity and goodwill, he leaves the house to find something dastardly to do to prove his Grinch-i-ness.

 

 

 

On the other side of town, the Cat in the Hat (also voiced by Mason Adams) has decided it's such a nice day he is going on a picnic. Unfortunately for him however, he fails to pull his car completely off the road. And the Grinch comes along and hits it.  Of course, the Grinch blames the Cat in the Hat and has a few choice words for him. But the Cat in the Hat, if anything, is accommodating and apologizes.

 

 

But the Grinch isn't going to let it go with just some wimpy apology. Can you say "road rage"? Eventually the Cat in the Hat arrives safely at his own home, but that's not the end of it. In a series of illustrations as to how letting it go and getting over it is the right way of reacting and an endless series of attempts to get revenge is the wrong way, the Grinch errs of the wrong side several times.

 

One way is he has developed a device which distorts sound within a radius, and pointing it at the Cat in the Hat and his surroundings causes confusion. In essence, whenever anyone or anything makes any kind of noise within it's radius, it comes out as gobbledygook. But it doesn't stop there. Because the Cat in the Hat is not turning into the raging antagonist that the Grinch seems to expect.

 

So the Grinch amps it up. He has a device he calls a "darkhouse". It's like a lighthouse, except in reverse.  It casts a shadow of darkness wherever it is pointed. 

 

 

 

This still isn't getting the results so the Grinch casts a pink glow which causes, among other things, to make food look really unappetizing.

 

The Cat in the Hat has an imaginary thought bubble psychiatric session with the Grinch, trying to figure out what makes him tick and why he's so mean-spirited. 

 

 

 

And during this imaginary session a thread of hope comes out. The Grinch really loves his mother, which eventually leads to the denouement. as patrons at the restaurant where the Cat in the Hat was dining when the Grinch used his pink ray all band together to go to the Grinch's house and serenade him with a song about Mom.

 

 

 

The Grinch becomes teary-eyed and sentimental once again. And when the mirror refection tries to entice him back to his Grinch side, Max points the noise disrupting ray at it and it starts spouting gobbledygook.

 

This production was also awarded a Primetime Emmy award, beating out not just one, but two each, of Charlie Brown and the Smurfs cartoon specials. 

 

OK. Now can I do my Christmas theme?  

 

 

How the Grinch Stole Christmas  (1966):

 

 

 

This is the one cartoon that I will make a point to watch every year. I was a wee lad, not even yet 5 when I first saw it. I probably watched it every year until I was well into my 20's, after which it was only if the broadcast was convenient for my work schedule, since I often had a night time job. But somewhere in my late 30's I was able to jump back on board with making it an annual tradition.

 

"Fa-who for-aze! Da-who dor-aze!  Welcome Christmas bring your light!

Fa-who for-aze! Da-who dor-aze!  Welcome in the cold, dark night!

Welcome Christmas, fa-who ra-mooze!  Welcome Christmas, da-who da-mooze!

Welcome Christmas, while we stand, heart to heart, and hand in hand!

Trim up the tree with Christmas stuff, like bingle balls and whofoo fluff!

Trim up the tree with goowho gums, and bizelbix and wums!

Trim every blessed window, and trim every blessed door!

Hang up who boo hoo bricks, then run out and get some more!

Hang pantookas on the ceiling. pile panfoolas on the floor!

Trim every blessed needle on the blessed Christmas tree!

Christmas comes tomorrow! Trim you! Trim me!

Trim up the tree with fuzzle fuzz and blipper bloos and wuzzle wuzz!

Trim up your uncle and your aunt with yards of who faunt flant!!!"

 

 

 

The Whos down in Whoville absolutely love Christmas. What joy! What fun! Singing an dancing and Christmas fun! And then there's the toys! All the kids get to enjoy their new found toys and make such noise!

 

Noise! Noise! Noise! That's the one thing that the Grinch, who lives just north of Whoville hates the most. (And just out of curiosity, what is it about the "north" that causes such animosity in these tales. It seems to me that every villainous sort of character in these tales happens to live in the north part of the region...)

 

 

 

Anyway, the Grinch hates all the goody good Whos down in Whoville and their overbearing happiness and good cheer. And most annoying is the Christmas season, when that "good nature attitude" comes out in waves of cheer and good will. But what can he do, it's just going to happen, and that's a part of life.

 

But maybe  not this year.  Maybe, just maybe, the Grinch can pull off a feat of such transcending evil that the Whos will transform from their happy-go-lucky selves into wailing and bemoaning spirits, and that would please the Grinch to no end. 

 

 

 

So what is his plan? He will dress up as Santa Claus and sneak into town while all the Whos in Whoville are asleep and steal every present, every tree, every decoration, and even all the Christmas dinner and just sit back and watch the fun as the Whos discover that there won't be a Christmas in Whoville this year after all.

 

 

 

"You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch, you really are a heel!
You're as cuddly as a cactus, you're as charming as an eel! 

Mr. Grinch!
You're a bad banana with a greasy black peel!

You're a monster, Mr. Grinch, your heart's an empty hole!
Your brain is full of spiders, you've got garlic in your soul! 

Mr. Grinch!
I wouldn't touch you with a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole!

You're a vile one, Mr. Grinch, you have termites in your smile!
You have all the tender sweetness of a seasick crocodile! 

Mr. Grinch!
Given the choice between the two of you, I'd take the seasick crocodile!

You're a foul one, Mr. Grinch, you're a nasty wasty skunk!
Your heart is full of unwashed socks, your soul is full of gunk!

Mr. Grinch.
The three words that best describe you are as follows, and I quote: "Stink! Stank! Stunk!"

You're a rotter, Mr. Grinch, you're the king of sinful sots!
Your heart's a dead tomato splotched with moldy purple spots!

Mr. Grinch.
Your soul is an appalling dump heap, overflowing with the most disgraceful assortment of deplorable rubbish imaginable... mangled up in tangled up knots!

You nauseate me, Mr. Grinch, with a nauseous super "naus!"
You're a crooked dirty jockey, and you drive a crooked hoss! 

Mr. Grinch!
You're a three decker sauerkraut and toadstool sandwich, with arsenic sauce!"

 

Note: I really don't understand why the Grinch had to dress up as Santa if he expected to be able to get in and out of Whoville undetected. Of course, as we will see, that Santa outfit did come in handy after all. For, while he is busy trying to stuff a Christmas tree up the chimney, a little who, Cindy Lou Who, who was no more than two, wakes up and catches him in the act, and he has to pretend he is Santa and that he is taking the tree back to his workshop to fix a glitch with the Christmas lights on it.

 

 

 

Once the Grinch succeeds in his nefarious plan he heads back to his cave on Mount Crumpit and deliciously anticipates the cries and wails of the lost season down in Whoville. But to his amazement the Whos come out singing and generally expressing joy. Without presents. Without decorations. Without even the Christmas feast. And the Grinch realizes that the Christmas spirit comes from somewhere else, not the things that can be had by the physical realm, but from somewhere deep in the heart. And the Grinch himself has a change of heart, and returns the gifts, and becomes the leader of all the good will that Whoville has to offer.

 

 

 

Outside of Boris Karloff as the narrator and the voice of the Grinch, no one received any credit for their role. Specifically, the classic "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" was actually sung by Thurl Ravenscroft, who's big claim to fame at the time was as the voice of Tony the Tiger in Frosted Flakes commercials. ("They're GREEEAT!") Also missing was the credit for the one vocal that was NOT Karloff, that of Cindy Lou Who, who was actually voiced by June Foray.

 

How the Grinch Stole Christmas is the only one of these three that was not in the running for an Emmy for children's program the following awards year. Just to clarify, a 1966 filming of the Jack in the Beanstalk was the winner, beating out, among others, It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. But in retrospect, in later years it has been awarded it's own heritage in standing. In 2004 a list by TV Guide named it #1 out of the 10 Best Holiday Specials.  (A Charlie Brown Christmas came in second.)

 

Rejoice, ye Ebenezers. It will be after Halloween before the next Christmas themed entry comes your way. Still before Thanksgiving, true, but you gotta take your pleasures where you can find them... (And since today is Halloween, theoretically the next one could be tomorrow...)

 

Quiggy 

 

 

 

 

  

Road Dogs

 

This is my entry in the Hit the Road Blogathon, hosted by yours truly.

 

If you weren't alive in the 70's, you will never know just how big the CB craze and the love affair with the trucker was.  The trucker was a standard fixture in country music for years. But with the recording of C. W. McCall's #1 hit Convoy, a veritable fad craze hit the country. And Convoy was #1 not only on country charts, but it held the #1 spot on American Top 40 radio for one week. It stayed in the Top 40 for 13 weeks, which is pretty impressive since most of the top 40 at that time was dominated by easy listening and disco.

Convoy triggered a smattering of follow-up CB and trucker songs in it's immediate aftermath. But unless you listened to country radio most of them probably would have escaped your notice. The White Knight, a favorite of mine by a guy who billed himself as Cleddus Maggard, would probably be the only song that music fans of the 70's would recognize (that one hitting #19 on AT40).

But the CB craze went far beyond top ten radio. For those of you not alive during that time, virtually EVERYONE had a CB radio at the time. It was such a popular thing that, when my Boy Scout troop looked to raise some funds, we raffled off a CB as the top prize.  And the craze even included the movies. Between 1975, when McCall first came on with his monster hit, until about 1980, when the CB craze and America's love affair with the "rebel" trucker was dying out, there were no less than about a dozen trucker movies to hit the big screen.

Besides today's two features, among others, there was also the first two Smokey and the Bandit films, Breaker! Breaker!, a Chuck Norris film, White Line Fever, High-Ballin' and Trucker's Woman. 

The American love affair with the trucker didn't stop with just feature films. There was also trucker TV shows and movies. Some of you may remember Movin' On, a short-lived TV series featuring Claude Akins and Frank Converse or B.J. and the Bear, another show featuring Greg Evigan and his more intelligent partner, "Bear", a chimpanzee riding the asphalt highway. 

I have a confession. For a brief period while still in high school I had  a flirtation with wanting to be a truck driver when I grew up. That only lasted as long as my first attempt at driving a stick shift car, however. I found out pretty quick that I had no aptitude for using a clutch.  But, damn, wouldn't it have been cool living the life of a long haul transportation executive...  

 

 

 

Convoy (1978):

A little background: As noted above, the song Convoy  was the inspiration of Bill Fries, who performed the song under the moniker of "C. W. McCall, and his writing partner, Chip Davis (who later created Mannheim Steamroller, a band you may have heard of due to their frequency on radio during the Christmas season).  The character of "C. W. McCall" came from a series of TV commercials for a bread company called Old Home Bread. In these commercials C. W. would tool into a roadside diner and flirt with the waitress, all the while with Fries' vocals delivering a trucker inspired voice over. Watching these old commercials is pretty interesting if you were a fan of the song that Fries eventually recorded. The style is the same as the song.

 

 

First things first. The original song Convoy had no real plot. It's just about a bunch of truckers and the ones they add along the way who are on a cross country trip from L.A. to the Jersey shore, dodging the various police along the way.  That's it.  Not enough there for even an episode on a half-hour sitcom. So the writers had to come up with a plot to flesh out a full-length  movie. You decide whether they did a decent job of it. For reference, here is the original song:

 

This entry is going to throw a lot of CB slang at you, but don't worry. For the uninitiated, I'll translate as I go. 

Arizona, noon, on the seventh of June

When they highballed over the pass.

Bulldog Mack with a can on the back

And a Jaguar haulin' ass.  

He's ten on the floor, strokin' a bore

Seat cover's startin' to gain.

Now, beaver, you truckin' with the Rubber Duck

And I'm about to pull the plug on your drain. 

 First verse of the title song (movie version)

 

OK. Here's your first lesson in CB slang:

"Bulldog Mack with a can on the back- a Mack truck semi with a tank that is hauling a liquid  (probably gasoline, but it conceivably be milk or some other liquid)

"Seat cover"and "beaver"- a female driver  

To set the scene. Big rig independent trucker, "Rubber Duck" (Kris Kristofferson) is hauling his rig across the Arizona desert. And note, while all these characters have real names, most of the time they are addressed by their CB handles (nicknames), which is fitting. Rubber Duck is minding his own business when a seat cover (good looking girl) passes him in a Jaguar. This is Melissa (Ali MacGraw). 

 

Melissa messes with Rubber Duck, because after she passes him, she slows down. Eventually the two get into a road race, which just happens to bring them into contact with a smokey (police officer) who pulls Duck over.  But Duck manages to get out of a ticket after he tells the smokey that the girl in the Jag isn't wearing any panties. Note: The immediate scene after the cop leaves to chase down Melissa has Rubber Duck giving a "smokey report" (letting fellow truckers know of a cop in the area). He says it is on "I-4-Oh", which would be 1-40, but if that's I-40, even in 1978, it's pretty run down...

 

Just down the way Rubber Duck hooks up with "Spider Mike" (Franklin Ajaye) and an old buddy "Love Machine" (Burt Young).  Because Love Machine's current cargo is a Bulldog (Mack truck) full of hogs, Mike suggests that the change Love Machine's handle to Pig Pen. Of course he isn't enamored with it.. (would you be...?)

The three end up in a bear trap (radar speed trap), caught speeding by the unscrupulous county mountie (police), Sheriff Lyle (or "Dirty Lyle", as he will be referred to by the truckers). Lyle having no moral compass, nicks the three for $70 each to avoid jail time and impounding of their trucks, which needless to say is going into Lyle's own pocket. Grumbling, the three pay the fine and leave.

After their run in the three decide to stop off at a truck stop to get something to eat. And guess who just so happens to be at the same truck stop... Melissa, who has sold the Jag and some other personal items to get enough money to get where she is going, ultimately Emerald City (Dallas). So she ends up hooking up with Duck.  But Duck and the boys are not through in town yet.  Who else comes in but Dirty Lyle. And we get to see just how unscrupulous as well as vindictive or villain is.  He tries to arrest Spider Mike for vagrancy, since Mike has no money after paying off his forced bribe to Lyle earlier.

 

The boys and Lyle go at each other, as well as some other cops who show up on the scene and ultimately Duck decides that their best bet is to get across the state line in to New Mexico, where they figure they will be safe since Lyle has no jurisdiction. But like Sheriff Buford T. Justice in Smokey and the Bandit, Lyle isn't going to let anything like jurisdiction prevent him from settling scores.

New Mexico, on I-four-oh

Like a Texas lizard on glass.

One thousand pedals was mashin' the metal

Them bears was a walkin' the grass.

We trucked all day and we trucked all night

Big Benny was improvin' our style.

We could tell by the smell we was headin' for Hell

And the Devil was Dirty Lyle. 

Second verse of title song 

Along the way, Duck and his pals keep picking up more trucks some long haired friends of Jesus in a microbus. (Hey! Wait one damn minute... that microbus is supposed to be chartreuse... )  The rest of the truckers who join the convoy seem to be joining just because it's an act of rebellion. But somewhere along the way, someone gets the idea that it is a protest of what was then a 55 MPH speed limit, which many people, especially truckers, did not like. The governor sends a representative to try to interview Duck and the other members of the convoy.

 

Meanwhile, Lyle is still on a one-man objective to bring down the Duck, or even to the point of killing him. When Spider Mike breaks off from the convoy to get to his final objective, that of being with his wife who is about to give birth to their child, Mike is arrested and beat up by the local police.  It is Lyle's intention to use Mike as bait to get Duck to come and rescue him. Duck heads off by himself at first, but when he gets to the town he has several other truckers with him and they demolish the town in order to rescue Mike.

Now Lyle was a creep, he was tacky and cheap

But he had him a badge and a gun.

He hated the Duck and he hated his truck

And he loved to bust truckers for fun.

So he followed the line and he bided his time

As he watched for his time to strike.

Then he picked on a trucker, a wiry old sucker

Yeah, the trucker they called Spider Mike.

Third verse of the title song. 

After the rescue, Duck and several others decide to head south of the border to Mexico, and finally, we get that old Peckinpah touch, a scene of needless violence as Lyle and about a thousand national guard and army guys try to prevent him from crossing the bridge. 

But the great Rubber Duck sorta run out of luck

When he crossed that final bridge.

There's choppers and rigs full of guns and pigs

They's wall to wall on the ridge.

He showed no fear as he grabbed his gear

And he stuck it in granddaddy low.

Them guns went boom and his ass went zoom

And the Mack took a terminal blow.

Fourth verse of the song  

 

 

 

Well, all seems at a bad end, because it looks like the Duck is dead and Dirty Lyle wins the day. But you know that just can't be how the movie ends. I will say this, the final three minutes are satisfying.

This movie made a decent showing, despite the fact that it was mostly panned by the critics.  At a budget of $12 million, it eventually drew in $45 million in receipts. What happened to the movie is an interesting story in itself.  

Sam Peckinpah, director of such classics as The Wild Bunch, Straw Dogs and The Getaway was the director of the film, and some elements ca still be seen as classic Peckinpah. But the original running time was way too long for the brass at the front office.  The original running time was 220 minutes (compared the 120 minutes in the final cut. Because Peckinpah seemed to be dragging his heels on cutting it down he was fired and the studios brought in an editor who, according to Peckinpah biographer Garner Simmons, :cut the life out of it". (I'd be interested in seeing a director's cut just to see what was culled from it.  This one is compact, but it is well put together, so I wonder what they left on the cutting room floor.) 

 

 

 

The Great Smokey Roadblock (1977): 

The scene opens with a poor old truck driver, Elegant John (Henry Fonda) stuck in a hospital (or maybe it's an old folks home), trying to figure out how to spring his beloved Eleanor, his truck, from the impound lot.  

It becomes revealed in the early part of the movie that John went into the hospital for a checkup.  But he is aging, 60 by his own admission, and he ends up having to stay in the hospital (and I still think it's an old folks home). His truck was repossessed by the finance company, so John basically has to steal the truck. A fellow hospital patient (inmate in the home) tells him if he steals the truck on a Friday night he may have a good three or four days before the authorities get wind of his theft.

 

 

In a roadside cafe, he has some words with a fellow trucker, Charlie (Gary Sandy of WKRP in Cincinatti TV fame), who tells John he won't get the load to drive because the truck is stolen, so apparently John hasn't quite gotten away with his subtle tactics.

 

John picks up a hitchhiker, Beebo (Robert Englund). Beebo is on his way to Florida, but since John is not going that far, Beebo may be out of luck. John carries a picture of Eleanor Roosevelt, the wife of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, which explains the name of the truck, and probably also indicates just how long John has been a truck driver.

 

Meanwhile, somewhere in Wyoming, a brothel being run by Miss Penelope (Eileen Brennan) and her crew of courtesans (which includes, among others, Susan Sarandon) is invaded by the authorities. They are given 48 hours to leave town. (Yeah, that's the same thing I thought...)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back at the truck, John and Beebo are headed across Wyoming (surprise, surprise). Beebo, ever the picky freeloader, complains to John they are headed the wrong way if they are to get to Florida.  But we find out that John's goal is to find a load to haul, and has a line on one in Laramie. Only when he gets there, the boss tells him he can't let John have the job because his truck is reported stolen.

Eventually John and Beebo end up at the "now in the process of being evacuated" brothel, where it turns out that John knows Miss Penelope, and her girls.  Miss Penelope hooks up with John and Beebo to go to South Carolina (eventually). Since John's main driving goal is to make one last haul in his truck, it might be a while before he gets either of his passengers to their destinations.  Especially since now the police are on the lookout for John and his stolen truck.

But the advantage of having a rolling brothel is not lost on Penelope, or John, (or for that matter, the audience...) When you have such a viable source of bringing in money, little things like the need for gas for the truck or food to feed a dozen hungry souls on the road becomes a little insignificant.

 

The sad part of all this is that John really is sick, not just an escaped old folks home resident. (So much for my thoughts...) He apparently is getting a little worse for wear as time passes.  Making this goal of one last hurrah at driving his rig cross country more than just an idle dream of living the life he once knew one last time. (Side note: at the time of this movie Fonda really was suffering from complications of his age. You probably already know Fonda passed away just a few years later after having received an Oscar for On Golden Pond.)

 It isn't long before every cop in the south, north, east and west is on the lookout for the stolen truck and escaped prostitutes. (Wait a minute, you might be thinking... weren't those hookers just told to vacate town? Why are the police after them, too? Well, you know how Hollywood doesn't really care about coherency of plot if there's potential money in the offing...)

But John has the misfortune of getting snagged by a backwoods sheriff and his bogus stop light.  Sheriff Harley (Dub Taylor) knows exactly what he's got. Think of Harley as a low rent version of Ernest Borgnine's sheriff from the first feature in this blog. He arrests his victims with the sole purpose of turning them in just to get his picture in the paper. Of course, the girls have a different plan,,, and John and the ladies escape.

 

 

In a bar somewhere they see themselves on the news broadcast where the newscaster (Sander Vanocur, playing himself) gives the basic story so far to his television audience (and I guess the movie audience, too, in case they fell asleep...) He wishes on the behalf of the public a Good luck" to John in his goals. The first indication that the public might be on the side of the lawbreakers.. (seems like a pattern is developing...)

 Up until this point, that "great smokey roadblock" seems to be non existent (and there's only 20 minutes left in the film...) But never worry. We still get the roadblock. All 4 minutes of it. Along with some hangers on who seem to have joined this "convoy" just because there was nothing else to do at the time. And with only about four police cruisers, not so "great" a roadblock... 

 

I won't say this film ends on an entirely positive note. Sure, the crew gets to their goal before the credits roll. At least almost all of the crew.

Henry Fonda is pretty damn good in this movie, and Robert Englund proves he can do more than just haunt your nightmares with razor sharp fingernails. (Yes, that's Freddie Kruger from the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise...) The film is billed as a comedy and there are indeed some comedic moments in the film, but the romantic relationship between John and Penelope will tear at your heart strings, too. Is this one a great movie? Not hardly. One review I read said the more appropriate title would be "The Great American Sex-Trafficking Trip". Personally, I think he or she is taking a way too modern PC attitude.

It's definitely not family friendly, although the endearing romantic relationship between Fonda and Brennan is pretty sweet. I wonder what Fonda thought of the final movie, however.  He had recently been relegated to just cameos and probably took on this role as a way to get back into the spotlight of his glory days as a headliner. You'll appreciate On Golden Pond even more as his final movie after seeing this one. So, no, it's not a great movie, but at least it wasn't his last hurrah after all. It's worth one watch, but I don't think I will seek it out again. 

One thing that cropped up in my research. The original title of this film was "The Last of the Cowboys" which makes better sense as a title, given that that titular "roadblock" only takes up 4 minutes of the running time. But, as Hollywood is often wont to do, they tried to cash in on the CB craze by changing the title, obviously to draw in the crowds who had seen Smokey and the Bandit. The unhinged demeanor that Burt Reynolds had in that movie is barely visible in Elegant John. Good thing, too, because who would have accepted an aging Henry Fonda as an all-out rebel? 

Well, folks, that sound you hear is not a big 18 ton big rig firing up. The old Plymouth just needs some new mufflers. Drive safely.

Quiggy

 

 

Unpretentious Beginnings

 

 

Some names are synonymous with the word "director" (as in film director). Look at a list of today's winners and nominees for the coveted Oscar, and almost all of them got their start in directing low budget films that may not even be known today except to the fans of those directors.  And, there were several of them who owe their start because a guy named Roger Corman saw something in their talent and gave them their big break.

The list of these directors, therefore, owes a debt to the "drive-in" genre of films, because Corman was the undisputed king of the B-movie drive-in film. Now, to be fair, some of those directors who got their start under Corman are still not familiar to the general public because they spent most of their lives churning out the kind of schlock that was the bread and butter of the drive-in. But at least a few of them went on to greater fame as box-office draws and even those coveted Oscars.

Some names with which most of you will be familiar: Peter Bogdanovich, whose first movie, Targets, had a Roger Corman hand in it. Francis Ford Coppola, who early on got a hand up by being given the helm for Dementia 13. Joe Dante and James Cameron both had a connection with Corman, Dante directing a movie called Piranha and Cameron getting the gig to direct the sequel to that movie, Piranha II: The Spawning.

Two more names that almost anyone is familiar with, Ron Howard and Martin Scorcese, also got a start directing low budget films under Corman and the American International Pictures banner.  Ron Howard's first chance at directing was for Grand Theft Auto (not to be confused with the video game by the same name), and Martin Scorcese's second film, Boxcar Bertha, were both a part of the heyday of drive-in movies.

Both of these movies would have fit in well with the Hit the Road Blogathon, a blogathon I am hosting later this month. Grand Theft Auto, obviously, makes extensive use of cars, and Boxcar Bertha and her crew get around mostly by trains. (And as of this writing, neither has been chosen by other entrants in the blogathon.) 

Both involve characters who are on the wrong side of the law, from a legal standpoint, but who are basically on the verge of being cultural heroes in the way they are presented.  Bertha (Barbara Hershey) and Sam (Ron Howard) are people you can cheer for, mainly because they are not really all that bad.

 

 

 

Grand Theft Auto (1977):

If you are looking for a mindless movie to while away about an hour and a half, I would say you can't go wrong with Grand Theft Auto. This movie is basically The Blues Brothers, without all those songs to get in the way. Not that I don't like The Blues Brothers soundtrack... It has some damn good music.  But basically the plot of The Blues Brothers  is just an excuse to smash up cars and have some general good old fashioned mayhem in a comedic form.

Grand Theft Auto does have a plot... of sorts. Paula Powers (Nancy Morgan) is the daughter of a well-to-do family (Barry Cahill and Elizabeth Rogers). Dad and Mom want their daughter to marry into more money, in the form of Collins Hedgeworth (Paul Linke). But Paula has other ideas.

See Paula is madly in love with Sam Freeman (Ron Howard). and she is adamantly opposed to marrying that dweeb Collins. (I mean really, who would want to marry a guy whose first name is "Collins" anyway?) Paula says she and Sam are going to elope and go marry in Las Vegas, but Daddy has other ideas.  He takes away her car keys. 

It;s Paula's car, bought with her own money (although, probably Daddy gave her the money anyway, so technically it is HIS not hers...) But Paula is determined if nothing else.  She hot wires Daddy's Rolls Royce and makes a run for it with Sam. Daddy tries to give chase in her sports car, but she sabotaged it before she left (and thus begins the unending demolition of cars that is at the heart of the movie.)

 

 

But Daddy is nothing if not resourceful.  He has intentions of running for governor and wants nothing to smear his campaign, so he hires a private eye named Ned Slinker (Rance Howard, the director's father) to track them down and bring them back without any publicity (and there's a private eye name if there ever was one... Ned Slinker...)

In the meantime Collins has found out about Paula's plans and decides to give chase himself. He wrecks his car in the process, but manages to steal another car. And, probably not with Daddy Powers' approval, Collins calls the local radio station where he tells the DJ, Curly Q ( Don Steele), that he is offering a $25,000 reward to whomever can stop and detain the two elopers.

 

 

(One of the best parts of this movie is when Steele is on screen. Don Steele was a real life DJ, who spun records under the moniker of "The Real Don Steele". He had a very brief run as an actor, most often playing a variation of himself, a radio DJ. Check him out as Junior Bruce in Death Race 2000, or as Screamin' Steve Stevens in Rock 'n' Roll High School.)

With the announcement that there is big money to be had, there are many who try to get in on the deal. Including a street preacher (Hoke Howell) who deserts his revival congregation to join the hunt, as well as couple of mechanics, Sparky (Peter Isacksen) and Ace (Clint Howard, the director's brother, and, boy! talk about nepotism...).  Also in the mix is Collins' mother, Vivian (Marion Ross), who has thrown in another $25,000 for the safe return of her son.

 

 

 

Throughout the film there are at least a hundred destroyed cars (I am including a rather unnecessary, but still hilarious scene where Paula and Sam and the Rolls end up in a demolition derby.) And nearly every time one of the characters gets their car smashed up, they steal another one, because everyone seems to get out of their cars and leave the keys in the ignition.  Thus the "Grand Theft Auto" part of the film is the other characters and their greed inspired attempts to catch Paula and Sam. Those two manage to make it almost to the end of the movie in the same Rolls Royce.

 

 

(BTW, as a side note, I am not entirely convinced that actually is a Rolls. They way those two put that thing through the wringer, including trying to drive it cross country (and mean literally cross country), I don't think a Rolls would have held up to the battering. It does have a Rolls body, however...) 

If you do like car smashups and pointless mayhem in your movies, this one is a hoot. As I said, before not much of a plot, but then nobody is coming to a movie called Grand Theft Auto  for a fascinating story line and well-crafted dramatic roles, are they?

I don't have the ambition to look at each movie individually to find out, but I'd pretty much bet that this is the most expensive movie Roger Corman ever produced, at $602,000. Fortunately for Corman that high price tag didn't break his record of making another box office winner By that I mean it made money, not that it was a resounding success. It cleared about $15 mil. 

Howard's involvement in this movie was the result of a deal he made with Corman. Corman wanted Howard to star in a film he was making, Eat My Dust!, and Howard and Corman came to an agreement; if Howard would agree to be the star of Eat My Dust!, Corman would back Howard in his transition from acting to directing.  (Note: I had originally planned to do the two as a double feature because I bought a DVD of the two, but I decided to do this instead. Hopefully Eat My Dust! will appear at The Midnite Drive-In soon, however...)

 

As far as it's reception, Grand Theft Auto got mostly negative reviews. But I like Roger Ebert's comment (who gave the movie 2 stars) that Howard and Morgan, the stars of the film, were "...the Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello of this generation, perfect for what the trade calls drive-in pictures..."

 

 

 

Boxcar Bertha (1972): 

Boxcar Bertha was based on a book by Ben Reitman, Sister of the Road: The Autobiography of Boxcar Bertha. The reality of the story behind the book is that "Boxcar Bertha" never truly existed. She was a fiction made up by Reitman as a composite of several real female outlaws from the 30's. Given that Reitman himself was an anarchist as well as a lover of Emma Goldman, one of the premier radicals of the late 1800's and early 1900's, it should be no surprise that Boxcar Bertha has at it's core a radical, and somewhat anarchist, political viewpoint.

At the center of this drama is Bertha Thompson (Barbara Hershey), a young girl who is apparently orphaned after her father, a crop duster, is killed in an airplane accident.  It is the Depression era, so her prospects are somewhat limited. She begins her journey by riding the hobo trail aboard boxcars. Eventually she ends up in a town where she meets a former friend, Big Bill Shelly (David Carradine).

 

Bill is a rabble rouse, anarchist and a pro union speaker, trying to raise a revolution amongst the railway workers in a rail yard.  After inciting a riot between them and the anti-union strike breakers and police present at the event, Bill and Bertha escape by boarding another train. Bill is marked because he is a prominent organizer and eventually gets arrested leaving Bertha to fend for herself.

She winds up rescuing a petty gambler named Rake Brown (Barry Primus) from a would-be shooting.  Seems he was trying to cheat his opponents and one of them didn't take to kindly to it. She and Rake become small time grifters until Bertha finally meets up with Bill who has escaped prison. Along with a black man who used to work for Bertha's father, Von (Bernie Casey), the four begin a systematic series of train robberies.

 

Although Bertha and Rake and Von are only in it to get money to survive, it quickly becomes apparent that Bill has a different objective; he wants to bring the railroads to their knees.  Often Bill is maligned as being a Bolshevik, a common derogatory term for anyone who tried to buck the system of the rich being the elite and the rest of the population just being expected to go along with it. Sure there is some similarities between bill's political agenda and that of the hated Communists of the era, but Bill is not a Marxist or a "Bolshevik".

One of the minor characters, and the person to whom Bill directs most of his animosity, is H. Buckram Sartoris (played by David's father, John Carradine). Sartoris has no love for Bill, and in fact has as much told his hired hands that given the "dead or alive" capture of Bill. (He has a bigger preference for "dead".)

 

Over the course of the film, Bill often gets arrested, and Bertha, sometimes with help from Rake and Von, and sometimes on her own, has to get him out. At one point, however, Rake is killed and the rest of  her cohorts end up in jail. Bertha is forced to take the only job available for women all alone in the Depression... prostitution. But one day she encounters Von in a bar and he tells her that Bill escaped and is living in hiding. Bertha loves Bill (maybe not on the same level as Bill loves her, but it is love) and goes to him.

 

The ending of this movie is pretty stark (and what else would you expect from Scorcese...?) I won't give away the ending any more than that, but as far as Scorcese pictures go, I would say it is well worth watching. This despite the fact that Rotten Tomatoes ranks it #34 out of 34. I wouldn't put it in the top 10, maybe not even in the top 20, but I would say it's better than several of those that rank higher on the list. 

 

Well folks, time to get the old Plymouth to make that trip home. Drive safely.

Quiggy