| Now, I’d like to explain why I have never seen
Plan 9. I consider myself a bad movie fan. I
even consider myself pretty knowledgeable on the subject. And still,
I had never seen this, the classic, the one bad movie which all others
are compared to. Why? Well, I felt that it was just too easy.
I had a sneaking suspicion that there were probably hundreds of movies
much worse than Plan 9, and after seeing it, I’m pretty sure
I was right. Plan 9 is a fun movie. It’s really
the perfect bad movie. It never gets boring, is consistently funny,
and has an energy which brings a certain level of what I can only call
goofiness to the screen. As much as I now love the movie, though,
I’m glad I never saw it until B-Fest. Like some people feel about
Rocky Horror, it’s just not the same until you see it in
a room full of screaming nuts throwing paper plates at each other and shining
flashlights at the screen. If you ever plan on going to a B-Fest
and haven’t seen Plan 9, avoid renting it at all cost!
Get Glen or Glenda, or Bride of the Monster,
or Jail Bait instead. When you hear the shouts of “Wicker!”
from one side of the room and “Rattan!” from the other, you’ll thank me.
If you do happen to watch it, or have already seen it, you’ll now be prepared
to yell it yourself whenever you notice the sheer amount of patio furniture
this movie has. The debate may rage on in your own homes about what
to call the furniture, but please, don’t let it get in the way of the day-to-day
workings of your family life. Wicker (or rattan) is only momentary,
family is forever!
After Plan 9, I think we were all a little spent, so Sex Madness was the perfect little feature to relax to. It’s no laff-a-minute riot, but it’s charming in its own little way. Sure, it pretty much says all sex is evil and leads to rotting body parts, blind children, and probably Communism, but it’s got showgirls and even a liberal hint of lesbianism. It teaches the kids of today some tough lessons about sexuality in a frank, straightforward manner they can understand. And it’s a good chance to make a lot of syphilis jokes. In short, Sex Madness (which didn’t really have that title but everyone called it that anyway) was syphiltastic! Jason and the Argonauts was next. I slept through all but the first 15 minutes of it. I was tired, I’ve seen it, and if I want some jerky looking stop-motion special effects I’ll fast forward about 30 years to Clash of the Titans to see the same stuff. To recap Jason and the Argonauts: I slept through it. I woke up refreshed and warm like a nice, toasty cinnamon roll, ready for whatever B-Fest could throw my way. But then, things got a little weird. The normal became the unexpected. The unexpected became the mundane. The mundane became really, really, really freaky. Let My Puppets Come was here, and my life will never be the same. Alan’s B-Fest memoir discusses the “Cloak of Silence” which surrounds this movie, a conspiracy which lets no one speak of it except in hushed tones, the same way old guys share rectal exam stories. Let My Puppets Come doesn’t deserved to be discussed, it deserves to be beaten soundly. I, however, cannot let it go, like the goldfish which has been floating in its bowl on its back for weeks, part of me just doesn’t want to let it go. Sure, you say, the movie had puppets in hard-core sexual situations, but you could of just looked away, right? The answer, esteemed reader, is a resounding “no.” We could not look away, for the tendrils of this movie wrapped itself into your brain, coiled tightly and said, “Hey, you’re not doing anything, why don’t you spend the next 45 minutes of your life watching puppets do horizontal lambada?” This is why one should never listen to their brain. You couldn’t help laugh throughout much of this movie just for its sheer audacity. One must remember this was a good ten years before Meet the Feebles came out (and for those of you who have seen that and think this one couldn’t have been as bad, try watching puppets perform all manner of acts illegal in West Virginia in a room full of people in shock. It’s pretty rough). This movie is one to look for, not because it’s good, but so you can drop its title when people are talking about bad movies. You’ll look like an expert. Those of you with weak, Republican stomachs might want to stay away (except for Clarence Thomas who probably owns the laserdisc). Those of you with caring, Democratic stomachs will also want to stay away (unless you’re a Kennedy, in which case you probably helped fund the production of this movie). This one separates the lovers of crap into the strong, ready for any B-Fest, and the weak, those who should probably stick to making fun of old Land of the Lost episodes. All that having been said, let us never speak of this movie again. Like a palate cleansing after-dinner mint came the Wizard of Speed and Time, an absolutely classic short film featuring a guy dressed like a wizard giving a woman a lift home or something. He runs around really fast with an evangelists smile and then has a great stop-motion dance scene with a bunch of photo equipment and a song straight from the Toys soundtrack. One of the coolest parts of the short is that when it begins, hundreds, er... I mean a dozen or so (c’mon people, we need to get attendance up!) B-Fest patrons jump to the stage below the screen and “run” with their feet in the air. It’s almost awe-inspiring. I laughed, I cried, I think I went up to take a pee. Seriously though, this short is a perennial favorite at B-Fest, and now that I’m no longer a B-Fest virgin, I can’t wait until next year when I, too, can jump up on the stage and join the commotion. Oh, yeah, forgot to mention that at some point there’s a short compilation of out-takes from old Ronald Reagan movies and stuff where he pretty much says “Goddamn” a lot. I just don’t get this generation’s humor... Sadly, the last movie we ended up seeing was upon us, and it was the one, the only Terror of Tiny Town. Now, I’ve been looking forward to seeing this movie since I first heard of it and was knee-high to a grasshopper (which was pretty much the average height in this movie, pa-dum ching!). Some guy who apparently owned a lot of midgets (according to the credits) decided it would be cute to make a whole western with the little guys. Not only that, but he decided it would be a musical. Yup, nothin’ funnier than short, singin’ cowboys. I have to admit, though, that I was fascinated by the movie. There were hundreds of opportunities for short jokes and not a single one got past the handful of alert viewers who were still awake. It was just so watchable in the way that coverage of a funeral is watchable. Everyone is England was pretty sure Princess Di wasn’t going to pop out of her coffin to sing “Crocodile Rock” with Elton, but they watched anyway with a morbid curiosity. This movie was the same to me. I just couldn’t get over the goofy gimmick of it all. Plus the fact that midgets are pretty much the only demographic group where it’s publicly acceptable to yell incredibly rude things about in a movie theater full of people without being pummeled. That, my friends, pretty much concluded our B-Fest
adventure. We had to get some sleep because the next day I had to
drive, and drive, and drive, and drive back to Maryland and then back up
here to Ithaca so that I could maybe pass some classes or something.
Besides, the last thing we saw was a short called La Folie Du Docteur
Tube which featured some pre-Gerard Depardue Frenchmen doing some
post-Napoleonic crap. It wasn’t exactly the kind of thing to keep
a tired man up. Next year, though, Alan and I have the whole thing
planned out: We’re going to fly in, ditch the women in favor for
a bottle of tequila and some bootleg Canadian cigarettes, and stay for
all 24 hours of B-Fest, and, dammit, you should too! We met a bunch
of great people in Ken and his cohorts and tons of others we didn’t get
to know but whose jokes left a lasting impression. I can only dream
that someday I’ll be one of the veterans like Ken who can smoothly let
fly a dozen quips a minute while some new guy (like me this year) rolls
around in laughter. Even now, weeks later, I’m still boring my friends
with B-Fest memories and I get all squooshie inside with the prospect that
only 11 months away at the time I am writing this, I’ll be back amongst
those who understand that bad doesn’t always mean “bad” and that sometimes
the best thing about a movie isn’t what is in it, but what you and a few
like-minded people bring to it. Exsiphilis!
|
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Have any B-FEST!!!
moments to share? Want them posted?
Mail Rob at rob@ohthehumanity.com. |