Tag Archives: A Blast From The Past

A Horror Blast From The Past: The Wave (dir by Alexander Grasshoff)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

First broadcast in 1981, The Wave stars Bruce Davison as Ben Ross, a high school social studies teacher who conducts a social experiment.

Frustrated by the fact that he can’t answer his students questions of how the German people could have allowed the Holocaust to occur, Ben decides to teach his students a lesson.  He starts by introducing a bunch of seemingly arbitrary rules to his classroom, concerning the proper way for students to sit at their desks and to address the teacher.  Ben is somewhat surprised to see how quickly his students adapt to the new rules, even taking pleasure in showing how quickly and efficiently they can follow orders.  The next day, Ben tells his students that they are now members of The Wave, a national youth organization with membership cards and a secret salute.

And that is when all Hell breaks loose.  Ben only meant to show his students what it’s like to be a member of a mass movement but the students take The Wave far more seriously than Ben was expecting.  Soon, other students are joining The Wave.  When the popular football players announce that they are a part of The Wave, others are quick to flock to the organization.  The formerly likable David turns into a fanatic about bringing people into the organization.  Robert, a formerly unpopular student, revels in his new job of reporting anyone who deviates from the rules of The Wave.  When a student reporter writes an article that is critical of the organization, she and the school paper are targeted.  Has Ben’s social experiment spiraled out of control?

42 years after it was originally produced, The Wave remains a powerful and sobering look at how people can be manipulated into doing things as a mob that they would never do as an individual.  If anything, the film feels more relevant today than it probably did in 1981.  The character of Robert, in particular, is a familiar one.  He’s someone with no self-esteem who latches onto a movement and finds his identity by taking down others and accusing them of failing to follow the rules.  One can find people like Robert all over social media, searching through old posts for any example of wrongthink that they can broadcast all through their social world.  It’s tempting to smirk at how quickly the members of The Wave sacrificed their freedom and their ability to think for themselves but it’s no different from what we see happening in the real world every day.  (Indeed, if the film had been made just two or three years ago, The Wave would probably be the people policing whether or not the rest of us were observing quarantine and wearing our facemasks correctly.)  People like to feel that they belong to something, even if that means sacrificing their humanity in the process.

Featuring a good performance from Bruce Davison as the well-meaning teacher who is both fascinated and terrified by the experiment that he’s set in motion, The Wave can be viewed below:

A Blast From The Past: The Drug Knot (dir by Anson Williams)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 1986’s The Drug Knot, Dermot Mulroney plays a high school student.

At the time this show aired, Dermot Mulroney was 25 years-old and he looked like he was 30 but, looks aside, he actually gives a pretty convincing performance as Doug Dawson.  Doug is a smart and musically-gifted high school senior.  He’s talented enough to make beautiful music with a saxophone and rebellious enough to skip class so that he can play the sax in the school locker room.  His girlfriend, Kim (Meryl Streep look-alike Kim Myers), is totally in love with Doug but she also worries that he’s getting too heavily into dugs.  He’s gone from smoking weed to snorting cocaine.  He hides his drugs in his bedroom.  His mother (Mary Ellen Trainor) has no idea that Doug is a drug addict while Doug’s little brother (David Faustino) wants to be just like him.

Can you see where this is heading?

In order to combat the school’s growing drug problem, the school has invited a speaker named David Toma to give a speech at a school assembly.  Toma is a former cop who struggled with addiction himself.  He inspired not one but two television shows, one called Toma and the other called Baretta.  He goes from school to school and he gives speeches about all of the teenagers that he knows who have died as a result of doing drugs.  As we see throughout the episode, Toma is a confrontational speaker, one who is not afraid to yell at his audience.  Doug shows up for the assembly but his bad attitude leads to Toma kicking him out.

Personally, I’ve always had mixed feelings about the idea of trying to change people’s behavior by yelling at them.  I know that it’s a popular technique and there’s been a lot of television shows (Intervention and Beyond Scared Straight come to mind) that are all about getting in people’s faces and screaming at them.  My feeling, though, has always been that this approach is more about making other people feel good than actually changing behavior.  Everyone wants to see the people who have caused them stress get yelled at.  On talk shows, audiences would applaud whenever a disrespectful teen got sent to boot camp but it’s rare that you ever heard about whether or not the approach actually worked.  I mean, I assume the approach works for some people but I know that if someone yells at me not to do something, my usual reaction is to go ahead do it just because I resent authority.  David Toma’s approach would not have worked with me.

(One interesting thing about The Drug Knot is that David Toma is a real person and he plays himself.  Apparently, he’s still out there and still at it, even though he’s in his 90s now.  I should note that, on YouTube, there’s a lot of comments from people who say that getting yelled at by David Toma saved their lives so maybe the yelling approach does work for more people than I assumed.)

Anyway, as always when it comes to these made-for-TV anti-drug programs, the drugs lead to tragedy and The Drug Knot ends on a particular dark note.  For once, there is no redemption.

Here is The Drug Knot, complete with an anti-drug message from Michael Jordan:

A Blast From The Past: Stoned (dir by John Herzfeld)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 1980’s Stoned, Scott Baio plays Jack Melon, a teenager with a problem.

Jack is shy, awkward, and can’t escape the shadow of his older brother, Mike (Vincent Bufano).  Mike is champion swimmer.  Jack is someone who can barely walk down a hallway without walking into a wall.  But then Teddy (Jack Finch) gets Teddy hooked on marijuana, the so-called weed with roots in Hell!  Soon, Jack is acting weird, making strange jokes, and getting all of the attention in the world.  Unfortunately, Jack is also alienating those closest to him and his newfound habit leads to a near-tragedy.

Stoned was aired as an ABC Afterschool Special and, while it’s not quite Reefer Madness, it does adhere to the general anti-drug formula.  In record time, Jack goes from being shy and dorky to being goofy and potentially dangerous.  We get all the expected scenes of Jack devouring ice cream, Jack wandering around in a daze, Jack realizing that the girl he likes what’s nothing to do with the new Jack, Jack’s well-meaning teacher (played by the show’s writer and director, John Herzfeld) confronting his students about their drug use, and Jack accidentally hitting his brother with an oar.  Jack thinks that marijuana is opening his brain because, while stoned, he suddenly realizes that a tree looks like “Old Man Eber.”  Stoned goes on to show Jack ruining his life but I have to admit that I spent most of the running time wondering who Old Man Eber was.  (Seriously, Old Man Eber sounds like some sort of Lovecraftian ghoul, waiting in the shadows to drag one to an Arkham cemetery.)  Of course, someone nearly dies as a result of Jack’s marijuana use.  What’s interesting is Jack is able to save the person’s life, even though he’s stoned.  Would non-stoned Jack have been able to do it?

From the fashion choices to the cast to the message that marijuana is the most dangerous thing on the planet, Stoned is one of those TV specials that epitomizes its time.  This was a film that was made at a time when it was inconceivable that there would some day be commercials for edible gummies and it shows.  Watching Stoned is like stepping into a time machine.

Today, of course, Scott Baio is better known for his politics than his acting.  Whenever I see a headline that reads, “This veteran Hollywood star is calling out his industry for not understanding America,” I know the story is inevitably going to be about Scott Baio complaining about his taxes.  That said, Scott Baio is convincing when he’s playing Jack as being awkward and insecure but he definitely goes a bit overboard once Jack starts smoking.  While that probably dilutes the effectiveness of the film’s message (because, let’s be honest, real stoners are going to watch this and easily recognize the fact that Jack is trying way too hard to convince everyone that he’s stoned), it does give this film a certain entertainment value.

Here is Stoned, complete with the commercials that aired when the show was original broadcast on November 12th, 1980:

A Blast From The Past: The Fourth Man (dir by Joanna Lee)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s Blast From The Past comes to us from 1990 and it’s a scary one.

In The Fourth Man, Peter Billingsley (yes, the kid from A Christmas Story) plays Joey Martelli, an insecure high schooler who thinks that he’ll be more attractive to girls if he becomes more like his best friend, friendly jock Steve Guarino (Vince Vaughn, making his film debut and already physically towering over everyone else in the cast).  With Steve’s encouragement, Joey tries out for the track team and, to everyone’s surprise, he makes it!

Joey is now an athlete.  He finally has friends.  Girls (including Nicole Eggert) are talking to him.  His father (Tim Rossovich) is finally proud of him.  But Joey soon discovers that staying on the track team is not an easy task.  His coach tells Joey that he has to pick up his speed.  Feeling desperate, Joey does what so many other television teenagers before him have done.  He starts taking steroids!  (Dramatic music cue!)  Soon, the kid from A Christmas Story is breaking out in pimples, throwing temper tantrums, and becoming a rage-fueled monster!  Joey only took the steroids because he wanted to be as cool as Steve but, unfortunatey, Joey learns too late that Steve’s success and popularity are not due to how big and strong he is but to the fact that he is played by a young Vince Vaughn.

(Myself, I was fortunate enough to go to a high school where the emphasis was placed more on the arts and intellectual pursuits than athletic success.  My school didn’t even have its own football field.  We had to share with the high school down the street!  Anyway, as a result, I don’t think knew anyone in high school who was abusing steroids and I never had to deal with anyone suddenly flying into a rage and punching a hole in a wall or any of the other stuff that always happens whenever anyone abuses steroids on television.)

The Fourth Man was written and directed by Joanna Lee, who is perhaps best known for playing Tanna the Alien in Ed Wood’s Plan Nine From Outer Space.  (Lee, it should be noted, had a very long and respected career as a writer and director of television dramas.  In many ways, she had the career that Ed Wood imagined that he would someday have.)  Along with Billingsley and Vaughn, the cast includes horror mainstay Adrienne Barbeau as Joey’s mother and football player-turned-horror-actor Lyle Alzado as a man who has his own history with steroids.  The film has good intentions and a good message about not taking shortcuts and being happy with who you are but I imagine that most people will just want to watch it to see Peter Billingsley descend into roid rage.  And I will say that, for all the film’s melodrama, there is something a little bit disturbing about watching fresh-faced Peter Billingsley turn into a physically aggressive bully.

From October of 1990 (and complete with the commercials than ran during the program’s first broadcast), here is The Fourth Man.

A Blast From The Past: The Secretary’s Day

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Since we are entering the Labor Day weekend, this seems like a good time to share a blast from the past that comes us all the way from 1947.

In The Secretary’s Day, viewers are told and shown what it takes to be a secretary.  Do you know how to take dictation?  Do you know how to carefully open up letters?  Do you know how to be courteous to random people who wander into the office?  More importantly, do you know how to make sure that Marge the Stenographer never gets into her head to try to seal your job away from you?

I watched this short film with a bit more interest than usual because I actually have worked as an administrative assistant in the past.  Watching the film’s lead character obsess over her desk calendar brought back some memories but I think that just has more to do with the fact that I’m obsessed with calendars than anything else.  To me, the main message of this film seemed to be, “A secretary’s day is pretty dull but at least she can bully the stenographer.”

Anyway, here’s a trip back to 1947!  The war is over, the Great Depression was now a memory, and Americans, flush with victory, were looking for jobs!  Check out The Secretary’s Day!

A Blast From The Past: Book Him! (dir by Sid Davis)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In this 1971 Sid Davis-produced educational film, young teens learn that going to jail isn’t as much fun as they might think.  After exploring all of the crimes that are on the rise (vandalism, shop lifting, etc.), the film follows Jerry as he gets arrested, gets booked, and gets shown to a cell.  As is typical with Sid Davis’s films, there’s a narrator present to let Jerry know that he’s ruined his life.

I’ve never been arrested but I know a few people who have been and, just from what they’ve told me, it appears that Jerry was lucky enough to go to one of the nicer jails.  As for the rest of the film, it’s a history nerd’s dream.  Just look at those clothes!  Just look at the hair!  Just look at 1971!

A Blast From The Past: John Wayne For The American Cancer Society

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Screen icon John Wayne was born 115 years ago, on this date, in Winterest, Iowa.  

Best-known for his appearances in western films, Wayne spent the last decade of his life battling cancer and serving as a spokesman for The American Cancer Society.  He made his final film appearance in 1976, starring in The Shootist as a veteran gunslinger who was, just like Wayne, facing his own mortality.  The film not only provided a capstone to Wayne’s film career but the footage of Jimmy Stewart (as a doctor) informing Wayne that he didn’t have long to live was used in one of the commercials that Wayne did for The American Cancer Society.

Of course, in the commercial, the footage was followed by Wayne encouraging viewers to get tested and also threatening to “take you apart” if they didn’t.  Three years after the release of The Shootist and this commercial, Wayne would succumb to cancer but his efforts would lead to more people getting tested and more cancers being detected early.

Here, from 1976….

A Blast From The Past: One Step Beyond 3.15 “The Last Round” (dir by John Newland)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In honor of what would have been Charles Bronson’s 100th birthday, today’s blast from the past is an episode of the old 1960s anthology series, One Step Beyond. The gimmick with this show was that every story was said to be based on fact, no matter how outlandish or improbable the story may be.

In this episode from 1961, Charles Bronson stars as Yank Dawson, an aging boxer who finds himself in haunted auditorium in England during World War II. Bronson was 39 years old when he starred as Yank Dawson and he gives a good performance. The role makes good use of both Bronson’s imposing physicality and also the smoldering anger that would eventually make Bronson a star in both Europe and, later, the United States.

The episode below first aired on January 10th, 1961.

A Blast From The Past: Swing You Sinners (dir by Dave Fleischer)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The much-missed Gary Loggins loved Halloween and he loved the old, frequently cartoons from the 1930s.  He was a particular fan of the Fleischer Brothers so it only seems right that today, on Halloween, we should share one of those cartoons.  Here is 1930’s Swing You Sinners.

In this bizarre cartoon, a dog named Bimbo attempts to steal a chicken.  After the police chase him into a cemetery, Bimbo is confronted by ghosts, demons, and apparently death.  Shockingly, there is no escape offered in this film.  Abandon all hope!

I guess chicken theft was a really huge problem in 1930.

A Blast From The Past: Halloween Safety (dir by Herk Harvey)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Director Herk Harvey

Tomorrow, we will be sharing the classic film Carnival of Souls. That means that today, it’s for us to show our last Herk Harvey short film of the 2021 Horrorthon. And appropriately enough, it’s all about Halloween!

This short film was made in 1977, long after the release of Carnival of Souls. In it, safety tips are offered up to make sure that all the kids have a safe Halloween. Make sure you can see clearly, even if you’re wearing a mask. Don’t wear dark clothing. Grab a flashlight. Don’t trick or treat alone! Hey, it’s all good advice. And Herk Harvey seems like someone who knew a little something about having a good Halloween!

From 1977, here’s some lessons on Halloween Safety!