Music Video of the Day: The Wild and the Young by Quiet Riot (1986, directed by Jeff Stein)


The music video for Quiet Riot’s The Wild and The Young takes place in a future that’s controlled by the military and the Parents Resource Music Center (PRMC), the Tipper Gore-led organization that campaigned for albums and CDs to come with warning labels.  Because the PRMC was largely made up with the wives of U.S. Senators, there was actually a Senate hearing on obscene lyrics in 1985, which led to a bunch of Senators being made to look foolish by everyone from Dee Snider to Frank Zappa.

Director Jeff Stein has directed several TV shows, along with doing videos for The Who, Weezer, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, George Clinton, Cinderella, Warrant, and Wilson Phillips.

Great Moments In Television History #33: The Thighmaster Commercial Premieres


Rest in peace, Suzanne Somers.  Whether she was mouthing “I Love You” to Richard Dreyfuss in American Graffiti or playing Chrissy Snow on Three’s Company or playing the mother of a blended family on Step By Step, Suzanne Somers was long a part of our shared pop culture.

In 1991, after having been out of the spotlight for a few years, Suzanne Somers made a comeback with The Thighmaster.

Today, it’s hard to explain just how popular this commercial was in 1991.  Adding to its notoriety was that many stations would not play the commercial except as a part of their late night programming.  In the days before YouTube and DVRs, people would actually stay up late to catch the Suzanne Somers Thighmaster commercial.  For a while, this commercial revived Somers’s career as an actress and a talk show host.  Needless to say, it also sold a lot of Thighmasters.

Previous Moments In Television History:

  1. Planet of the Apes The TV Series
  2. Lonely Water
  3. Ghostwatch Traumatizes The UK
  4. Frasier Meets The Candidate
  5. The Autons Terrify The UK
  6. Freedom’s Last Stand
  7. Bing Crosby and David Bowie Share A Duet
  8. Apaches Traumatizes the UK
  9. Doctor Who Begins Its 100th Serial
  10. First Night 2013 With Jamie Kennedy
  11. Elvis Sings With Sinatra
  12. NBC Airs Their First Football Game
  13. The A-Team Premieres
  14. The Birth of Dr. Johnny Fever
  15. The Second NFL Pro Bowl Is Broadcast
  16. Maude Flanders Gets Hit By A T-Shirt Cannon
  17. Charles Rocket Nearly Ends SNL
  18. Frank Sinatra Wins An Oscar
  19. CHiPs Skates With The Stars
  20. Eisenhower In Color
  21. The Origin of Spider-Man
  22. Steve Martin’s Saturday Night Live Holiday Wish List
  23. Barnabas Collins Is Freed From His Coffin
  24. Siskel and Ebert Recommend Horror Films
  25. Vincent Price Meets The Muppets
  26. Siskel and Ebert Discuss Horror
  27. The Final Scene of Dark Shadows
  28. The WKRP Turkey Drop
  29. Barney Pops On National TV
  30. The Greatest American Hero Premieres
  31. Rodney Dangerfield On The Tonight Show
  32. The Doors Are Open

Cruella’s Castle (2010, directed by Fred Olen Ray)


Dr. Bikini Jones (Christine Nguyen) is a world-famous adventurer and archeologist who is willing to brave any danger and sleep with any security guard or spy in her hunt for treasure.  She has just recovered a golden idol that contains a code that will lead to the Temple of Eros and a tiara that, when worn, makes the wearer the Empress of Moronica.

Evilla Cruella (Heather Vandeven) may have born in Hoboken but her family came from Mornica and she is determined to be Queen of the Morons.  She sends her lover Drago (Frankie Cullen) and her other lover, Carol (Rebecca Love), to steal the idol.  Working with CIA agent Mark X (Tony Marino), Bikini must keep Cruella from being the first to find the Temple of Eros.  It won’t be easy because the Temple itself is guarded by a hungry dinosaur!

Cruella’s Castle started life as an 82-minute softcore film called Bikni Jones and The Temple of Eros.  When the film moved to streaming, it was edited to remove all of the explicit sex and most of the nudity and renamed Cruella’s Castle.  (Without the sex and boobs, Cruella’s Castle is only 40 minutes long.)  I imagine many would say that the editing took the main reason why anyone would want to watch this movie in the first place but, even in edited form, Cruella’s Castle has got enough double entendrees and intentionally dumb jokes to be entertaining.  The dinosaur is surprisingly effective, considering that the budget for this movie was undoubtedly not high and Christine Nguyen has so much energy and enthusiasm as Bikini Jones that it’s hard not to mourn that she hasn’t had any more adventures.  This is a typical Fred Olen Ray joint, dumb but inoffensive and even a little fun if you’re in the right mood.

Music Video of the Day: Prime Mover by Zodiac Mindwarp & The Love Reaction (1988, directed by ????)


In this music video, the members of Zodiac Mindwarp & The Love Reaction fly their mechanical airship to what appears to be a church school.  It’s ever parents worst nightmare.  The lyrics of the song features references to X-ray specs.  Zodiac Mindwarp, as far as their lyrics were often concerned, was not necessarily meant to be taken seriously.

Enjoy!

Fan Base (2021, directed by Curtis Everitt)


Cray (Blair Kelly) has spent his entire life convinced that his father is a famous horror actor.  When he sees the actor sitting on a bench and reading a newspaper, Cray introduces himself as the actor’s son.  The actor politely explains that he was rendered sterile in a motorcycle accident and cannot be Cray’s father.  Cray beats the actor to death and then heads over to another movie site so he can stalk the actor’s former co-star, Janey Romero (Carol Lynn Fortin).

This low-budget, straight-to-video horror film tries to make fun of the whole process of making other low-budget, straight-to-video horror films but the dialouge is never as funny as the movie seems to think and none of the actors appear to have a semblance of comedic timing.  There have been many instances of horror stars, especially women, getting stalked by obsessive fans so the story does have some root in reality.  It is something that particularly seems to happen to the final girls from the Friday the 13th films, with Adrienne King literally putting her career on hold because of an obsessed stalker.  Some people really do take their fandom too far.  But Fan Base doesn’t do much with the idea and never finds a way to balance both the bad comedy and the bad horror.

Music Video of the Day: Spellbound by Siouxsie and the Banshees (1981, directed by Clive Richardson)


Spellbound was the lead single off of Siouxsie and the Banshee’s fourth studio album, Juju.  In later interviews, Siouxsie would describe Juju as being an accidental concept album as all of the songs dealt with dark themes and subject manner.  Juju was a horror-themed album but the horror was psychological and not supernatural.  As a sign of that theme, Spellbound was named after an Alfred Hitchcock film about a man who is troubled by disturbing dreams.

Clive Richardson directed several videos from Siouxsie and the Banshees.  He also worked with Depeche Mode, Steve Winwood, Big Country, and Tears for Fears.

Enjoy!

Corbin Nash (2018, directed by Ben Jagger)


Corbin Nash (Dean S. Jagger) is a New York cop who has been suspended for shooting a rapist.  While he and his stepfather (Bruce Davison, making a cameo appearance) sit in a bar and talk about how much the world sucks, they are approached by a mysterious man (Rutger Hauer, also making a cameo appearance) who explains that Corbin’s father was not just a minor league baseball player but he was also a demon hunter who was murdered by his enemies in Los Angeles.  Jack confirms that what the stranger says is true.

Corbin does what anyone would do.  He moves to Los Angeles, joins the LAPD, and starts to investigate cases of missing children.  This leads to Corbin being captured and held prisoner by two vampires, a drag queen named Queeny (Corey Feldman, camping it up to a cringe-worthy degree) and Queeny’s lover, Vince (Richard Wagner).  Queeny and Vince force their prisoners to participate in cage matches until finally feeding on them.  Corbin escapes but, as the Blind Prophet (Malcolm McDowell, collecting a paycheck) reveals, Corbin is now a vampire.  Like a less memorable version of Blade, vampire Corbin sets out to battle evil.

The film’s overall tone is grim and serious, which makes Corey Feldman’s mincing performance as Queeny feel all the more out-of-place.  Watching him in films like this, it can be easy to forget that Feldman was actually a fairly good actor before his career went off the rails in the 90s.  As a child, he appeared in some classic films and, as a teenager, he often redeemed otherwise subpar material.  But he never made the transition into adult roles.  Being one of “The Two Coreys” didn’t help and he had the misfortune of struggling with drugs before Robert Downey, Jr. made rehab cool.  Well into his 20s, he was still playing high school students and, even today when he’s in his 50s, Corey Feldman still comes across as being the world’s oldest teenager.  That’s certainly the impression that I got from Corbin Nash, where Feldman seems like a high school theater student who is more interested in showing off than actually acting.

Of course, Feldman’s self-indulgence is still more interesting than the rest of the film, which feels like an origin story for a super hero who never really took off.  There are a few interesting idea to be found in the film but mostly, it just feels like a cut-rate version of Blade and a dozen other recent vampire films.  Corbin Nash never creates an identity of its own.

Music Video of the Day: If Darkness Had A Son by Metallica (2023, directed by Timothy Saccenti)


Today’s music video of the day is the third single from Metallica’s 11th studio album (and the second Metallica album to be released by their own label), 72 Seasons.  This video finds the band performing in front of what appears to be a tank that is full of both water and flames.  This song marries the hard sound of Metallica with some of the most serious and introspective lyrics that James Hetfield has ever sung.  If darkness had a son, who would that son be?

Along with directing several other videos from 72 Seasons, Timothy Saccenti has worked with Korn, Phantogram, Franz Ferdinand, Depeche Mode, and the Animal Collective.

Enjoy!

Scary Bride (2020, directed by Dan Grin)


Anthony (Vitt Ray) is a loser living in Minnesota who cannot get over his ex-girlfriend.  He decides to do what his neighbor did and fly over to Russia so he can search for a woman who is desperate to get married.  Anthony’s trip to Russia starts out promising enough, with a meeting with a helpful cab driver and a trip to a dance club where Anthony meets the beautiful Nina (Evgeniya Yarushnikova).  But then Nina turns out to be a witch who literally wants to take way Anthony’s balls.  After putting a curse on him, Nina chases Anthony through Moscow, while Anthony searches for anyone who can remove the curse.

This film’s plot is pretty much a one-joke premise.  Anthony even breaks the fourth wall and says, “Sometimes, it’s better to look for a bride in your own country.”  The movie plays with the stereotype that you can get anything you’re looking for in Moscow, if you know the right people.  (Needless to say, this film was made before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.)  What’s interesting is the film itself is a Russian film so the humor is less about Russia being a dangerous place and more about how stupid Americans like Anthony are for coming over in search of a bride.  This is a Russian film that tells the rest of the world to stay out of Russia.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t take long for that one-joke premise to get old.  Anthony is not a likable hero.  The witch could have done better.  The version that’s on Tubi is dubbed into English and it is some of the worst voicework that I’ve ever heard, with Anthony in particular getting a deep voice that does not at all go along with his character.  Even though they were supposed to be residents of Minnesota, Anthony’s neighbor is dubbed with a British accent and keeps calling everyone “mate.”  Evgeniya Yarushnikova is beautiful enough that it is easy to believe that any man would fall under her spell but the rest of the movie is just the same joke told over and over again.

Music Video of the Day: Mirror Man by The Human League (1982, directed by Brian Duffy)


In the music video for Mirror Man, Philip Oakley plays a ghost who is haunting a theater.  A few years after this video came out, Oakley mentioned in an interview that the song wasn’t actually about a ghost but was instead about Adam Ant.

Director Brian Duffy was best-known for his work as a fashion photographer.

Enjoy!