"Joe Bob Goes to the
Drive-In" for 5/21/93
cutline: Rue McClanahan, later famous
on "The Golden Girls," demonstrates the style that got her there in
the recently re-discovered exploitation classic, "5 Minutes To Love."
By Joe Bob Briggs
Drive-In Movie Critic of Grapevine,
Texas
I
met this guy one time who spends his whole life searching for nekkid pictures
of famous people. And the amazing thing about it is not that he spends all his
time doing this, but that he has something like a 95 PER CENT SUCCESS RATE,
especially with actresses. He can choose somebody who's famous for NEVER taking
off her clothes, like Vanna White, and pretty much deliver the goods every
time. There's always a video, or an old lingerie catalog, or a shot from some South
Pacific island where you THINK nobody is watching but a papparazzi guy with a
two-mile zoom lens is bobbing in a dinghy just outta sight.
And
now this has become a huge business. A lot of the stuff gets sold to skin
magazines, but there's also a booming business in old movies. I can hear the
agents now: "Honey, don't worry, it's just one VERY TASTEFUL nude scene,
and no one will EVER see this movie."
Then
ten years later: "Whoops! I guess we didn't count on the whole VIDEO STORE
thing."
One
of the best-selling books among pure video collectors is "The Bare Facts
Video Guide," written by my buddy Craig Hosoda of Santa Clara, California.
And all Craig does is list the exact places you can find all your favorite
actors in the buff. He even rates each nude scene according to how far it goes.
And this is all R-rated stuff--no porno at all. You would be amazed at how many
performers who are big stars today were at one time squirming around on hippie
couches or running through the jungle in G-strings.
In
other words, videotape is eternal. Thank God.
And
what I'm leading up to here is that this week we may have reached the PINNACLE
of sleaze archeology.
We
have one of "The Golden Girls" in her film debut, but I doubt that
she puts this one on her resume.
We
have Rue McClanahan in the 1965 exploitation classic "5 Minutes To
Love," with our girl playing "Poochie, the girl in the shack."
As the poster says, "Some called it a profession . . . she called it
PLEASURE." And, yes, it IS available on video.
Rue
gives a sensitive performance as the crazed nymphomaniac living in a junkyard
where she's used as a "bonus" for the guys who steal cars and bring
them in to Harry, the loud-mouthed gimp-legged owner, who breaks the cars down
and sells the parts. Rue spends the whole movie in lingerie and bathrobes,
bringing men beers and taking care of their needs. Finally, a guy named Floyd
tries to save her, by saying, "All you got is outside."
"That's
where it counts, isn't it?" she tells him. "That's where you can see
it--the outside. It's not a bad outside, is it?"
"It's
all right."
"What
do you mean 'all right'?"
"Like
it KNOWS HOW."
"But
not nice? Nice enough to touch?"
"Some
things you keep your hands off of."
"Why?"
"Why?
Because it's right, that's why."
"It
only takes a minute. Five minutes, that's all. Did you ever look at a clock?
That's all it takes, actual time. Five minutes maybe. Then what? It's all over.
There no sign left, no mark. It's all done and past. Just two people, for five
minutes."
"That's
all it means to you?"
"That's
all it is, the real of it. If you make it anything more than that, it's your
own fault. You're crazy."
And,
of course, pretty soon he's all over her like feathers on a goose.
"5
Minutes To Love" must have been a hit in the grindhouses of America,
because four years later the same producers made yet ANOTHER Rue McClanahan
sleazefest called "Hollywood After Dark." This time Rue plays a girl
who comes to Hollywood to be a famous actress but is driven by the casting-couch
system to stripping in a cheesy burlesque joint where she's reduced to tears
every time they force her to bump and grind. Meanwhile, she falls in love with
ANOTHER junkyard owner (did Rue ever guest on "Sanford and Son"?) who
helps commit an armored-car heist just so he can raise enough money to scream
at her "I'm offering you this money! Now climb up out of hell!"
And
in case you're wondering . . . yes, Rue looks GREAT.
Six
dead bodies. Four breasts. Dope-smoking. Big-butted strippers. Suggested
aardvarking (sorry, it's the sixties). Mambo with martini. Six fistfights.
Glass-shard stabbing. Light-stand bashing. Gratuitous Shakespeare. Drive-In
Academy Award nominations for Gaye Gordon, as the angry blonde wife who's tired
of living like a tramp, and screams "I'm so sick of hearing about
it!" at her husband; Paul Leder, as the loud-mouthed, evil, corrupt
junkyard owner who bribes cops and abuses everyone he comes in contact with,
for saying "I don't have to do business with you--YOU have to do business
with ME"; Norman Hartwig, as the beatnik poet, drughead and part-time car
thief who runs around the junkyard screaming "Power! Nietzsche! Carnegie!
Rockefeller! Laissez-faire! Poontang! The giants of aggressive man!"; King
Moody, as the oversized goon whose opening line is "I'm pretty good with a
tool" and whose philosophy of life is "I know all about how a woman
works--she says no, she means yes--she don't know what she wants til she gets
it"; and Rue McClanahan, for oozing sex through her pedal-pushers, garters
and push-up bras, and for saying "Didn't you ever get turned around all
upside down and not know everything you were doing?" and "I don't
holler--a lady doesn't ever holler." And we should probly have a special
commendation for screenwriter William Norton, who does half of the dialogue in
beat poetry. At one point Rue sees a guy in the junkyard drinking out of a
formula bottle, and she says, "I don't wanna see anybody sucking on a
baby's bottle!"
And
the guy answers, "I don't either. It's a symbol! Like a brass cymbal, or a
ruptured spleen, and a brass monkey, and a flight of the bumblebee, and a
fare-thee-well, and a well-digger's butt in Montana, and a home-is-where-the-heart-is,
and a homily, and an early to bed and an early to rise, and a Poor Richard's
Almanack! Benjamin Franklin was right! The homilies of life! Like get up in the
morning, and go to work, and save your money, and do a good job, and it all
goes around in a circle, but a desiccated liver is still a penny saved is a
penny earned, and any kind of a racket, any kind, is still gonna be crud!"
Whew!
We haven't had great dopehead poetry like that since Bruce Dern quit making B
movies.
Outstanding.
Four
stars.
Joe
Bob says check em both out. (Both videos are available from Sinister Cinema,
P.O. Box 4369, Medford, OR 97501-0168.)
JOE BOB'S ADVICE TO THE
HOPELESS
Deadbeat Alert! The Willow Creek Drive-In
in rural Willow Creek, Calif., has been up for sale ever since the owner bought
a "Texas Doughnut" trailer and hit the county fair circuit. This
drive-in was the only combination theater and "Early Bird Grocery and
Donut Shop" in the country, and Katherine Bauer of Burnt Ranch went there
so often she's actually going through withdrawal now that she's unable to eat
their fried chicken. She's looking for someone to take it over and reopen it,
and reminds us that, without eternal vigilance, it could happen here. To
discuss the meaning of life with Joe Bob, or to get free junk in the mail and a
copy of the world-famous newsletter "The Joe Bob Report," write to
Joe Bob Briggs, P.O. Box 2002, Dallas, TX 75221. Joe Bob's Fax line is always
open: 214-368-2310.
Dear Joe Bob,
As the other half of the "Assault of
the Killer Bimbos" creative team (story, producer, "Poodles the
gangster's moll") I wanted to thank you for your blistering expose of
"Thelma & Louise."
Having grown up as a motorhead, it was
always my dream to make a road movie, and Empire handed us the perfect chance
with "Bimbos." Naturally we consulted the greats of the genre,
"Faster, Pussycat, Kill Kill" and "The Wild One," along
with the entire oeuvre of Roger Corman's golden age, but were not so blatant as
to just copy the movie!
There are numerous scenes in "Thelma
& Louise" which do seem to be exact copies of those in
"Bimbos," and, of course, the "Peaches" coincidence, so I
was very interested in your program. It's been a big thrill to have you review
the movie and discuss it in your column, so go get 'em, Joe Bob!
P.S. As I'm sure Anita Rosenberg has told
you, we are hard at work on a new epic, "Valley Girl, Too!" The mall
will never be the same.
See you at the
drive-in,
Patti Astor
Los Angeles
Dear Patti:
I hate to break the news to you, but I'm
now investigating you and Anita for ripping off "The Great Texas Dynamite
Chase." When will it all end? Will we trace this back to a road movie made
in 1906?
Dear Joe Bob:
The best movie in the history of filmmaking
has to be "Glen or Glenda?," the charming fifties social
commentary of transvestitism. In a .01-star rated performance Bela Lugosi is at
his unintelligible finest. Watching the movie, however, made me wonder if
perhaps Mr. Lugosi was actually Bella or even Bellita? Maybe Bellita-turned-Bella?
I think I'm confused.
Gretchen Beh-Beanhaus
Plano, Tex.
Dear Gretchen:
My favorite scene in that movie is when
the star summons up the courage to put on his wife's cashmere sweater.
"Glen or Glenda?" is Ed Wood's forgotten classic--always overshadowed
by his more popular "Plan Nine From Outer Space." (By the way, Ed is
reported to have directed some of the scenes while wearing a dress.)
Bela, I believe, was his own sex.
Dear Mr. Briggs:
Your recent column hit a tender spot that
my husband and I also share over this issue of interrupting and confronting
speakers.
A few years ago my husband took me to visit
two classes in progress at his alma mater, Harvard Law. I looked forward to
experiencing, in awe, these hallowed halls. We were both shocked, however, by
what we found. In one very large lecture hall, the professor had to contend
with many late-comers who allowed the doors to close noisily behind them,
probably distracting to her as well as any serious student.
I've taught high school, and good classroom
decorum is a problem, but in the next class we visited at Harvard the students
(many of them) were eating breakfast during the lecture. At least at the
secondary level we can control classroom eating.
And when speakers are not allowed to speak
without being hissed at or booed or worse by those who disagree, how sad.
But as I read your well-done column, I
realized that we teachers may be the root cause of this problem. Back in the
days when we were working on "self-esteem," hearing students may have
been overdone. It seems we missed clarifying for them appropriate time and place
for discussion, for listening to others, and for disagreeing.
We've lost something very valuable, haven't
we, and I wonder if people will again recognize the importance of simple
courtesy.
I do like your "serious" columns,
but I'm also married to one of your fans of your movie reviews. He loves to
read portions aloud to me with great enjoyment. (Are these REALLY movies
showing somewhere?)
Sincerely,
Pat Barrett
Foster City, Calif.
Dear Pat:
I have been a teacher myself. (You
scoff?) I have a very simple system. If anybody disrupts the class, or the
speaker, or keeps showing up late, I kick em out. The students who get kicked
out don't like me very much. The ones who stay don't like me either--they tend
to think ANYTHING that seems "mean" is WRONG--but, at the end of the
semester, I win. And they win.
It's not a minor issue. It's something
you've got to do before ANY work can take place.
I know I'm preaching to the converted,
but it irks me. (I'm from a family of teachers.)
Dear Joe Bob,
I work part time as a typesetter, and one
of the most enjoyable things I type is your column. I get to make up headlines
for the articles frequently, too (lazy editor)--always a challenge to capture
the essence without giving away the punchline.
I've enjoyed just about all your columns,
especially the recent one about AIDS. (I sent it to a pinheaded local columnist
who wrote an article called "the myth of heterosexual AIDS," who had
brilliant remarks like "no teenagers have AIDS, so why do they need to use
condoms" and about a disease that "they brought on themselves"
and about the "gay conspiracy." I realize pinheads don't change, but
at least I felt better. I just lost an office mate to AIDS, age 31. Nice guy.)
But my favorite article of them all was the
one about Roman numerals. I, too, had a wonderful Latin teacher way back when.
(She was convinced there was a "plot to get rid of Latin" in the
U.S.; I thought she was crazy then, but she was right. Latin mottos, Latin
plurals, and Latin education have gone the way of the dodo--that is, modern
students. I have a friend who gave up being a college professor because she
couldn't stand the fact that each successive class of students was becoming
stupider and stupider and she ended up teaching remedial English instead of
senior advanced English--to her advanced seniors.) I, too, am a compulsive
Roman numeral translator, and always do the Roman numeral questions for my
husband in the crossword puzzle. (Don't you hate folks who ask you for help and
then get mad at you when you know the answers? Crossword puzzles are the
leading cause of divorce. A man killed his wife once for asking him endless
questions about a crossword puzzle--"Honey, what's a three-letter word for
zipper?"--and it was judged justifiable homicide.)
It's a great gift to make people laugh AND
think. Keep up the good work.
Sincerely,
Betsy L. Barr
Somerville, Mass.
Dear Betsy:
Are there any Latin students left?
Amo your letter.
Dear Joe Bob:
I am writing to you because you're the
smartest man I know--except for General Norman Schwartzkopf, who had the wit to
stay out of the presidential race--and I would like you to explain something to
me.
The snippet appended below appeared in the
very same section of my Sunday newspaper that carries "Joe Bob at the
Drive-in." So maybe it has something to do with slime-beasts, buxom
bimbos, or serial killers (it does say "mania"). Anyway, I am pretty
sure you can translate it if anyone can:
"Those who value art as counterpoise
to the mania for consumption that rote living today instills, the unit of art
remains the individual work."]
Is it:
a. part of a Jules Feiffer cartoon strip?
b. a profound message from the CULTURAL
ELITE?
c. the product of an afternoon of too many
Heinekens at the Harvard Lampoon office?
Please help me, Joe Bob.
Best regards,
Donna Ball
Lafayette, Calif.
Dear Donna:
Don't worry. That was just the art
critic waxing conceptual on us--or simply waxing his spear, I don't know which.
© 1993 Joe Bob Briggs All Rights Reserved