Tag Archives: Alex Cord

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 7.12 “The High Cost of Loving/To Fly With Eagles”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Unfortunately, the show has been removed from most streaming sites.  Fortunately, I’ve got nearly every episode on my DVR.

The Island just hasn’t been the same without Tattoo.

Episode 7.12 “The High Cost Of Loving/To Fly With Eagles”

(Dir by Jerome Courtland, originally aired on January 21st, 1984)

Craig Bradshaw (Doug McClure) is an aging pilot and daredevil who comes to the Island because he wants to compete in one final competition before he gets too old to keep going up in the air.  His girlfriend (Christine Belford) doesn’t want him to keep risking his life.  In the end, Craig finally comes to peace with the idea of getting older and he also gets engaged.

This fantasy felt pretty familiar.  A lot of people have come to the Island over the years with the hope of winning one final competition.  Actually, that’s probably one of the more realistic recurring fantasies that this show employs.  Who wouldn’t want one last chance to win?  If I went to Fantasy Island, I’d probably want to return to my high school years and compete in another speech and debate or drama competition.  As for this specific fantasy, it’s always difficult for me to take Doug McClure seriously and this episode was no different.

As for the other fantasy …. yeesh!  Lynn Redgrave plays Kristen Robbins, a former advertising exec who was fired when she refused her boss’s sexual advances.  Instead of suing the guy, Kristen comes to Fantasy Island and tells Mr. Roarke that her fantasy is to fall in love and get married and start a family because that means she will never be sexually harassed again.  (For a 40-something veteran of the advertising world, Kristen is incredibly naive.)

Kristen meets Paul Horner (Alex Cord) and it’s love at first sight.  Paul is actually on the Island to interview Kristen for a job with his firm but instead, they have a night of passion.  The next morning, Paul tells Kristen that, before they had sex, he recommended her for a job in which she would be working with him in Hawaii!

Kristen asks Roarke to change her fantasy.  She now wants to get that job and work in Hawaii.  Roarke reluctantly agrees.  Kristen does get the job but the company decides that Kristen will be their sole representative in Hawaii and Paul will remain in New York.  Kristen asks Mr. Roarke to change her fantasy once again.  She doesn’t want the job, she just wants Paul.  (Keep in mind that she’s known for Paul for one day.)  Paul overhears and pretends to be a cad so that Kristen will take the job.

Now convinced that Paul is a compulsive womanizer, Kristen tells Roarke to change her fantasy back to taking the job.  Roarke tells Kristen she needs to make up her own damn mind and then tells her that Paul was only pretending to be a womanizing jerk.  In the end, Kristen decides to take the job and marry Paul.  Paul decides to continue working in New York.  As they leave the Island, they assure Mr. Roarke that they’ll make it work.

Yeah, good luck with that.

This fantasy irked me.  Kristen lost her job because she refuses to sleep with her boss.  I would rather have seen her get a revenge fantasy than a love fantasy.  At the very least, Roarke could have introduced her to a good lawyer.  Instead, we got a fantasy in which the main theme was that women are irresponsible and can’t make up their own mind.

This was not my favorite trip to the Island.

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 6.16 “Eternal Flame/My Date With Burt”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Unfortunately, the show has been removed from most streaming sites.  Fortunately, I’ve got nearly every episode on my DVR.

This week, our trip is all about getting older.

Episode 6.16 “Eternal Flame/My Date With Burt”

(Dir by Don Weis, originally aired on March 5th, 1983)

When I first saw that one of the fantasies this week was called “My Date With Burt,” my immediate assumption was that someone would come to Fantasy Island and demand to go on a date with Burt Reynolds.  I was actually looking forward to seeing if Burt would play himself or if they would just have some stand-in who was always shot from behind.  Unfortunately, I was wrong.

The Burt in this case is Burt Hunter (Ron Ely), an actor who is the latest to be cast as a James Bond-type of secret agent.  Margaret Winslow (Sandra Dee) has a crush on him and wants to meet him.  For his part, Burt is depressed because he’s getting older and the producers of his films want to replace him with a younger actor.  At first, Burt just goes out with Margaret in order to generate some publicity for himself.  He hires a stuntman to fake a fight so that Burt can emerge as a big ol’ hero.  Burt is trying to save his career but Margaret is not amused by any of that.  Margaret realizes that films are not real life.  Margaret’s pretty old to only now be figuring that out.  Anyway, Margaret and Burt still fall in love and leave the Island together.

This fantasy was predictable but it did give us one of those fun Tattoo subplots where Tattoo claimed to be Burt Hamilton’s best friend and tried to get involved in managing his career.  Tattoo always had a side hustle going and good for him!  One gets the feeling that Roarke didn’t pay him that much.  Seriously, Tattoo was always trying to find a way to make more money.  Pay the man what he’s worth, Mr. Roarke!

Our other fantasy features Linwood Bolton and Randi Oakes as Alex and Diana Weston, two newlyweds who want to find the Fountain of Youth so that they can be young and in love forever.  Yay!  Roarke has them take a dip in a pool and, when they emerge, they’re on an isolated island that is ruled over by Ra-Mas (Alex Cord) and Maatira (the great Stella Stevens).  Maatira will let them drink from the fountain but there’s a catch …. one of the cups is full of poison!  Alex can be eternally young and he can be spend the rest of eternity as Maatira’s lover but Diana has to die.  And Diana does die.  Luckily, the water from the fountain can also bring people back to life.

This was a weird fantasy and you really do have to wonder what would have happened if Alex hadn’t come to his senses and if Diana hadn’t been revived.  Would Roarke have just shrugged and told Tattoo to burn Diana’s passport?  It just doesn’t seem like that would be good for business.  That said, Stella Stevens was an actress who was always willing to embrace the melodrama and she does so here, keeping things somewhat entertaining.

This was a pleasant if not particularly memorable trip to the Island.

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 5.5 “Mr. Nobody/La Liberatora”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Almost the entire show is currently streaming on Daily Motion, YouTube, Plex, and a host of other sites.

This week, Charo shows up but Tattoo doesn’t.

Episode 5.5 “Mr. Nobody/La Liberatora”

(Dir by Cliff Bole, originally aired on November 7th, 1981)

Once again, we have an episode the features only stock footage of Tattoo shouting, “The plane, the plane!”  Otherwise, Herve Villechaize is not in this episode.

What excuse does Mr. Roarke come up with this week to explain Tattoo’s absence?

He’s hung over.

Seriously, that’s what Mr. Roarke goes with!  He explains to Julie that Tattoo was up very late, helping another guest celebrate a drunken fantasy.  It must be said that Ricardo Montalban seems to be quite amused to be labeling his sidekick a drunk.  Apparently, Herve Villechaize was holding out for more money when this episode was shot and I’m guessing Tattoo being hung over was a “take that” on the part of the show’s producers.  To be honest, it feels a bit petty.

It falls to Julie to help Charles Atkins (Sherman Hemsley) fulfill his fantasy.  Charles is a short man who has been picked on by bullies all his life.  He wants to feel strong and confident.  Julie gives him a potion that she thinks will give him “inner strength” but — whoops! — instead it turns Charles into the world’s strongest man.  As Roarke admonishes Julie for not being specific when she ordered her potion, Charles embarks on a wrestling career.  Can Charles defeat Sampson Smith (H.B. Haggerty), the most savage wrestler in the world?  Or will he instead fall in love with Sampson’s publicist, Carrie Wilson (Vernee Watson) and realize that true strength comes from inside?  We all know the answer.  A more important question is whether Mr. Roarke will ever be foolish enough to let Julie handle a fantasy again?

This fantasy was nothing special.  The comedy was a bit too broad, though I did like the heartfelt performances of both Sherman Hemsley and Vernee Watson.  The main problem is that the whole thing hinged on Julie screwing up in a way that really didn’t make any sense.  Surely, she would have been smart enough to make sure she had the right potion before giving it to Charles.  I mean, not being careful with your potions sounds like a lawsuit waiting to happen.  Surely, Mr. Roarke would have kept a closer eye on his goddaughter as she handled her first fantasy ever.  Poor bumbling Julie doesn’t really work as a sidekick.  The show suffers without Villechaize’s snarky attitude.

Villechaize’s absence means that we also miss the chance to see him acting opposite Charo and that just seems like a crime against pop culture.  I have to admit that I was a little worried when I saw Charo’s name in the opening credits, largely because I thought she would be playing her silly Love Boat character.  Instead, Charo plays a world-famous guitarist named Dolores DeMurica, whose fantasy is to go back to the days of Spanish California and meet her ancestor, the famous El Lobo Rojo.  (El Lobo Rojo is basically Zorro but if Fantasy Island’s producers weren’t going to give Herve Villechaize a raise, they certainly weren’t going to pay for the rights to Zorro.)

I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by Charo’s fantasy.  There was a lot of swashbuckling action, Cesare Danova and Alex Cord both gave good supporting performances, and Charo seemed to be energized by playing a character who, while comedic, was not quite as silly as The Love Boat‘s April.  Charo actually gave a pretty good performance here and the entire fantasy was fast-paced and fun to watch.  It would have been even more fun if Tattoo had shown up but it was not to be.

This episode was a mixed bag, with one forgettable fantasy and one entertaining fantasy.  In the end, both fantasies would have been better with Tattoo.

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 4.12 “Doc’s Dismissal/A Frugal Pair/The Girl Next Door”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986!  The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

This week, Doc’s in trouble!

Episode 4.12 “Doc’s Dismissal/A Frugal Pair/The Girl Next Door”

(Dir by Richard Kinon, originally aired on January 3rd, 1981)

Carl (Lew Ayres) and his wife, Violet (Janet Gaynor), board the boat in a good mood.  Carl has just retired from the post office and they’re about to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary.  Awwwww!  Carl and Violet are the sweetest couple ever, frequently referring to each other by pet names.  They’re also very frugal.  Violet brings her own tea bag on board.  Carl turns down a bottle of champagne.  They are a nice old couple who know the value of pinching a penny.

But, on the morning of their anniversary, Violet tells Carl a secret and everything changes.  It turns out that Violet has been buying stock for years.  She based her purchases on whatever pet name Carl used for her that day.  If the name started with a G, she bought General Motors.  If it started with an S, she bought Standard Oil.  Once, Carl used a name that started with a “Z,” and she bought stock in Xerox.  She explains that she didn’t know how Xerox was spelled at the time.  (So, how did she buy the stock?)  Anyway, the important thing is that Carl and Violet are rich and they have been for several decades.

Carl is upset by this news.  If he had known he was rich, he wouldn’t have spent years at the post office!  I see his point though, to be honest, they’re not that rich.  The total stock portfolio is only worth $200,000.  Still, Carl and Violet stop speaking to each other.  Julie, Isaac, and Gopher jump into action and throw them an anniversary party, which causes Carl and Violet to remember how much they love each other.

Meanwhile, Charley Cole (Sal Viscuso) tells Pam Madison (Lynda Goodfriend) that he’s with the CIA so that she’ll let him stay in her cabin so that he can spy on his girlfriend (Denise DuBarry) and the guy (Stephen Shortridge) with whom she is cheating.  Got all that?  This storyline was incredibly dumb but it was saved by the frantic performance of Sal Viscuso, who managed to make even the lamest of lines seem funny.

Finally, Sally (Jessica Walter) boards the ship with her lout of a husband, Hank (Alex Cord).  Hank is the type of jerk who looks at other women while his wife is sitting right next to him.  Complaining of a headache, Sally goes to Doc Bricker’s cabin for some aspirin.  Doc, who has witnessed Hank’s bad behavior, is sympathetic to Sally.  Later, Sally tries to make Hank jealous by saying that Doc hit on her when she went to see him.

Angered, Hank calls the captain and accuses Doc of sexually harassing his wife.  The Captain is forced to suspend Doc from his duties until an investigation can be launched.  The crew is shocked.  Doc would never hit on a patient, they all say.  Except, of course, Doc does exactly that every single episode!  Seriously, Doc is a walking HR nightmare.  (Fortunately, for Doc, he was played by the always likable Bernie Kopell.)  When the captain makes it clear that Doc could be fired and lose his medical license, Sally admits that he never hit on her.  Doc keeps his job and somehow, all of this fixes Sally and Hank’s marriage.  Later, Gopher and Isaac joke about how Doc got in trouble for the one time he “didn’t hit on a passenger.”  Gopher and Isaac aren’t blind to what’s happening.

This was a surprisingly effective episode.  Lew Ayres and Janet Gaynor were adorable and Jessica Walter’s intense, method performance as a desperately unhappy wife provided a good change-of-pace from all of the usual Love Boat goofiness.  Even with all of the CIA nonsense, this was an entertaining cruise.

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 4.20 “Delphine/The Unkillable”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Almost the entire show is currently streaming on Daily Motion.

Smiles, everyone, smiles!

Episode 4.20 “Delphine/The Unkillable”

(Dir by Cliff Bole, Originally aired on April 11th, 1981)

For our first fantasy, Dr. Paul Todd (Randolph Mantooth) is a paleontologist who feels that the first life on Earth was silicon-based and that the missing link lives underneath a volcano on Fantasy Island.  He comes to the Island with his girlfriend, Liz (Annette Funicello) and his assistant, Kyle (Alex Cord).  With Roarke’s weary approval, they head off to the volcano to search for proof of Todd’s theory.

And they do find proof!  After Kyle attempts to sexually assault Liz, she falls through a crevice and finds herself in the lair of …. well, it appears to be someone who is waring a rubber suit but Paul and Kyle are convinced that they’ve found their silicon man!  (Kyle attempting to force himself on Liz is seemingly forgotten.)  The Silicon Man appears to be immortal, which proves to be a bit of problem when it decides to carry of Liz.  But then the Silicon Man falls in a pool of lava and dies so I guess he wasn’t immortal.  At the end of the show, Tattoo suggests that the The Silicon Man was made of lava and that’s why he was vulnerable to it but …. what?

Mr. Roarke doesn’t seem to be that worried about the Silicon Man or the fact that one of the island’s volcanoes is spewing lava.  He’s more concerned with his goddaughter, Delphine (Ann Jillian).

According to Roarke, Delphine is the daughter of one of the Island’s oldest families.  She has spent the last few years off the Island, working as an assistant for a magician named The Great Zachariah (Carl Ballantine).  Delphine’s secret is that she actually does have magical powers!  She’s the one who does all of Zachariah’s tricks for him.  However, Delphine now wants to marry Greg (Don Galloway) and she doesn’t want him to know that she can move stuff with her mind and make people materialize out of thin air.  Her fantasy is to lose her powers.

Zachariah, not happy about the prospect of losing his assistant, comes to the Island and teams up with fortune-telling Madame Cluny (Doris Roberts) to trick Delphine into revealing her powers and driving Greg away.  Myself, I’m not really sure I understand why her magic powers would be a deal-breaker.  I mean, Delphine can literally do anything!  And, as we see in this episode, she only uses her powers for good.  Why would Greg have a problem with that?

On the plus side, Ann Jillian (who starred in another show that I reviewed on this site, Jennifer Slept Here) gives a good performance as Delphine and it’s easy to imagine an alternate version of the show where she played Roarke’s sidekick.  On the negative side, the rest of the show and both of the fantasies are just silly and never make any sense.

This was not a memorable trip to the Island.  Seriously …. silicon?

Retro Television Reviews: Fantasy Island 4.6 “With Affection, Jack the Ripper/Gigolo”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1986.  Almost the entire show is currently streaming is on Youtube, Daily Motion, and a few other sites.

This week, Fantasy Island is full of gigolos and harlots!

Episode 4.6 “With Affection, Jack The Ripper/Gigolo”

(Dir by Michael Vejar, originally aired on November 29th, 1980)

“Here comes a real wimp!” Tattoo declares as Stanley Hocker (Ken Berry) stumbles off of the airplane.

Roarke rolls his eyes at Tattoo’s rudeness but then goes on to admit that most people would consider Stanley to be a bit of a wimp.  Stanley is shy and awkward and he wears dorky clothes and he’s never had much success with romance.  Stanley’s fantasy is to become a gigolo.

“Good luck!” Tattoo says.

Roarke doesn’t need luck when he can get just give Stanley a magical bracelet that once belonged to Don Juan.  As soon as the bracelet appears on Stanley’s wrist, Stanley is suddenly confident, cool, and much better dressed.

“I’m not a turkey anymore!” Stanley declares, “I’m a hunk!”

Soon, every woman on the Island is attracted to Stanley.  However, a trip to the Fantasy Island singles bar, leaves Stanley with a large bar tab.  It turns out that Roarke may have given Stanley the bracelet but he didn’t give him any extra money.  The bill is paid by another gigolo, Monty (Lyle Waggoner).  In return for his help, Monty requests that Stanley seduce the wealthy Jessie De Winter (Carolyn Jones) so that Monty can make a move on Jessie’s niece, Dina (Meredith McRae).

Of course, Stanley falls in love with Dina but she’s the only woman on the Island who is not impressed with his gigolo style.  Stanley finally agrees to remove the bracelet and sacrifice his fantasy so that he can approach Dina as his true self.

While this is going on, Jack the Ripper is stalking Fantasy Island!  Yikes!

It’s all the fault of Lorraine Peters (Lynda Day George).  Lorraine has developed a theory that Jack the Ripper was actually a surgeon named Dr. Albert Z. Fell (Victor Buono, rarely speaking but often dramatically rolling his eyes).  Lorraine’s fantasy is to go back to 1880s London to find proof of her theory.  Despite some reservations, Roarke gives Lorraine her fantasy.  Lorraine steps through a time door and finds herself in London.  She manages to find Dr. Fell’s office and a diary in which Fell has written about his hatred of “harlots.”  However, Dr. Fell also finds the time door, steps through it, and is soon on Fantasy Island!

Upon discovering that history’s most infamous murderer is now stalking the Island, Roarke sends Tattoo out to let everyone know that they need to stay inside.  Of all the people that Roarke could send, it’s interesting that Roarke selected the person least likely to survive if he was caught by Jack the Ripper.  Seriously, there are a lot of athletic guys on Fantasy Island and any one of them could have beaten up the rather portly and middle-aged Jack the Ripper.  Instead of asking one of them to look for the killer, Roarke sends Tattoo.  Even in a moment of crisis, Roarke is always looking for a way to get rid of his assitant.

Fortunately, Dr. Fell is too busy trying to kill Lorraine and her boyfriend, Robert (Alex Cord), to waste any time on Tattoo.  Dr. Fell chases Lorraine all across the island.  Lorraine leads Fell back through the time door and Fell is promptly run over by a carriage in London.  Lorraine returns to the present and tells Mr. Roarke that she’s decided not to reveal the truth about Dr. Fell because …. well, I don’t know why.

Despite some lapses in logic, the Jack the Ripper story was actually really entertaining.  There was nothing subtle about Victor Buono’s performance but it was still exactly what the story needed.  Lynda Day George was appearing in films like Pieces and Mortuary when she appeared in this episode and she puts that horror experience to good use.  The scenes in London were atmospheric and the idea of Jack the Ripper on Fantasy Island was intriguing, even if the episode didn’t do as much with the idea as it could have.  The superior Jack the Ripper fantasy and the silly but inoffensive gigolo fantasy combined to make this an enjoyable trip to Fantasy Island.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Monsters 1.11 “Rouse Him Not”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire show is streaming on Tubi.

This week, there’s a monster in the cellar!

Episode 1.11 “Rouse Him Not”

(Dir by Mark Shostrom, originally aired on December 31st, 1988)

Linda McGuire (Laraine Newman) is a painter who, for financial reasons, has moved from New York to a cottage in New England.  (As she explains it, she wouldn’t even be able to afford the tiniest hovel in New York for the amount she’s paying for the cottage.)  Along with hoping to paint some landscapes, Linda also plans to transform the cellar into her own personal art gallery.

Unfortunately, things are not going quite as well as one might hope.  First off, the scenery is not as inspiring as Linda thought it would be.  Instead of painting beautiful landscapes, she’s been painting portraits of the cottage, often with a dark figure standing in the doorway.

Secondly, her neighbor, Mr. Ritzen (Terrence Evans), keeps peeking through her windows.  Linda thinks that he’s just a perv but Mr. Ritzen actually has another reason for continually checking on her and the cottage.

One day, after Linda chases off Mr. Ritzen, she is visited by a mysterious man named John Thunston (Alex Cord).  The eccentric Thunston informs her that her cottage was once the home of a warlock named Crett Marrouby.  The warlock was hung by the other townspeople, an event that was witnessed by Mr. Ritzen.  Before Crett was executed, he warned everyone to avoid using black magic because they might accidentally summon something evil.

While Thunston is talking to Linda, a guttural roar comes from the cellar.  When Thunston and Linda go down to check on what is making all the noise, Thunston discovers that, as a result of Linda’s renovations, a mystic seal has been broken.  Thunston speculates that Crett summoned a demon and then used the seal to keep it trapped in the cellar.  Now that the seal has been broken, the demon is free to attack and kill.  Fortunately, Thunston just happens to have a special sword that he claims can be used to behead and kill the demon.  Now, it’s just a matter of waiting for the demon to appear and removing demon’s head before the demon removes Thunston’s.

The odd thing about this episode was how straight-forward it was.  I kept waiting for some sort of diabolical twist that would reveal that Linda was actually a witch or that Thunston was actually the warlock but it never came.  Instead, everyone in this episode was exactly who they said they were and the monster was pretty much exactly what Thunston thought it would be.  Things would have been improved by a sudden twist or two because, despite an effective monster and a enjoyably campy performance from Alex Cord, this episode is pretty boring.  The premise promises some Lovecraft-style horror but the anti-climatic conclusion will leave most viewers saying, “Really?  That’s it?”

Next week, let’s hope that things will be a bit more interesting when three friends battle a fire-breathing troll!

Retro Television Reviews: The Love Boat 3.12 “The Brotherhood of the Sea/Letter to Babycakes/Daddy’s Pride”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986!  The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

This cruise is all about deception!  Welcome aboard, it’s love!

Episode 3.12 “The Brotherhood of the Sea/Letter to Babycakes/Daddy’s Pride”

(Dir by George Tyne, originally aired on November 17th, 1979)

Julie’s birthday is coming up and the crew is planning to throw her a surprise party.  However, to keep Julie from catching on to what they’re planning, Doc, Gopher, and Isaac decide that they need to keep her occupied.  They tell her that they are all member of the “The Brotherhood of the Sea” and that they’re now prepared to make Julie a member as well.

Somehow, Julie falls for this very obvious lie and she spends almost the entire cruise doing all of the silly activities that Doc, Gopher, and Isaac have set up for her.  As I watched this, I found myself wondering if maybe Julie had somehow forgotten when her birthday was because, seriously, it couldn’t have been any more obvious what Doc, Gopher, and Isaac were doing.  Even worse, Julie gets so busy trying to join the Brotherhood of the Sea that she neglects her latest romantic partner, Rory Daniels (Christopher Connelly).

It’s time that we just face facts.  Until Julie gets off that boat, she’s never going to find the husband that she always says that she’s looking for.  The Boat pretty much dominates Julie’s life and there’s no way that her male co-workers are ever going to stop out of the way and allow Julie to find any sort of happiness.  It’s an interesting dynamic and I think it’s one that’s familiar to any woman who has worked with mostly male co-workers.  On the one hand, the ground you walk on is worshipped.  On the other hand, they don’t ever want to let you go.

While Julie is trying to join the Brotherhood of the Sea, Olympic gymnast Penny Barrett (Nancy McKeon) just wants to hang out with Kevin (Stephen Manley), a passenger who is her own age.  Unfortunately, Penny’s father (Alex Cord) is also her coach and he wants her to devote all of her time, even her time on the Boat, to training.  Poor Penny!  Seriously, back when my whole life was about going to dance class, I met so many people like Penny, whose parents basically lived their entire lives through them and never allowed them to have a childhood.  I was glad my parents supported me but didn’t pressure me.

Finally, wealthy Bart (Demon Wilson) boards the ship with his girlfriend, Tracy (Telma Hopkins), and his assistant, Wally (Jimmie Walker).  After Bart meets Ginger (Sydney Goldsmith), he decides that he wants to cheat on Tracy and he expects Wally to help him pull it off by keeping Tracy busy while Bart goes off with Ginger.  Needless to say this leads to Tracy and Wally falling in love.  Ha!  Take that, Bart!  This storyline would have been a bit more interesting if the two leads actors weren’t so boring in their roles.

This was a so-so cruise but at least Julie knows where she stands now.

Under the Sea: Goliath Awaits (1981, directed by Kevin Connor)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

1939.  War is breaking out across Europe.  The British luxury liner Goliath is torpedoed by a German U-boat.  Presumed to be lost with the ship are a swashbuckling film star, Ronald Bentley (John Carradine), and U.S. Senator Oliver Barthowlemew (John McIntire), who may have been carrying a forged letter from Hitler to Roosevelt when the boat went down.

1981.  Oceanographer Peter Cabot (Mark Harmon, with a mustache) comes across the sunken wreck of the Goliath.  When he dives to check out his discovery, he is shocked to hear big band music coming from inside the ship.  He also thinks that he can hear someone tapping out an S.O.S. signal.  When he looks into a porthole, he is stunned to discover a beautiful young woman (Emma Samms) staring back at him.

Under the command of Admiral Sloan (Eddie Albert), who wants to retrieve the forged letter before it does any damage to the NATO alliance, Cabot and Command Jeff Selkirk (Robert Forster) are assigned to head an expedition to explore Goliath.  What they discover is that, for 40 years, the passengers and crew have survived within an air bubble.  Under the leadership of Captain John McKenzie (Christopher Lee), they have created a new, apparently perfect society within the sunken ship.  Cabot discovers that the woman that he saw was McKenzie’s daughter, Lea.

McKenzie is friendly to Cabot and his crew, explaining to them the scientific developments that have allowed the passengers and crew to not only survive but thrive underwater.  The only problems are a group of outcasts — the Bow People — who refuse to follow McKenzie’s orders and Palmer’s Disease, an infection that only seems to infect people who are no longer strong enough to perform the daily tasks necessary to keep McKenzie’s utopia functioning.   Even when people on the boat die, they continue to play their part by being cremated in Goliath’s engine room and helping to power the ship.

Everything seems perfect until Cabot announces that he has come to rescue the survivors of the Goliath.  Even though Goliath is starting to decay and will soon no longer be safe, McKenzie is not ready to give up the perfect society that he’s created.  McKenzie sets out to prevent anyone from escaping the Goliath.

Goliath Awaits is a massive, 3-hour production that was made for television and originally aired over two nights.  (The entire 200-minute production has been uploaded to YouTube.  Avoid the heavily edited, 91-minute version that was released on VHS in the 90s.)  It’s surprisingly good for a made-for-TV movie.  Because a large portion of the film was shot on the RMS Queen Mary, a retired cruise ship that was moored in Long Beach, California, Goliath looks luxurious enough that you understand why some of the passengers might want to stay there instead of returning to the surface.  Beyond that, Goliath Awaits takes the time to fully explore the society that McKenzie has created and what it’s like to live on the ship.  McKenzie may not be as benevolent as he first appears to be but neither is he a one-dimensional villain.

Mark Harmon is a dull lead but Robert Forster is just as cool as always and Christopher Lee is perfect for the role of misguided Capt. McKenzie.  The movie is really stolen by Frank Gorshin, who is coldly sinister as Dan Wesker, the Goliath’s head of security.  McKenzie may by Goliath’s leader but Wesker is the one who does the dirty work necessary to keep the society running.

Goliath Awaits also features several character actors in small roles, with John Carradine, Duncan Regehr, Jean Marsh, John McIntire, Jeanette Nolan, Alex Cord, Emma Samms, and John Ratzenberger all getting to make a good impression.  (Ignore, if you can, a very young Kirk Cameron as one of the children born on the Goliath.)

Goliath Awaits is far better than your average made-for-TV movie from the 80s.  With any luck, it will someday get the home video release that it deserves.

 

The Movie That Nearly Killed The Godfather: The Brotherhood (1968, directed by Martin Ritt)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Brotherhood_1968Once upon a time, Paramount Pictures released a movie about an Italian-American organized crime family.

It was a self-styled epic that used the Mafia as a metaphor for both business and politics.  The movie mixed scenes of violent death with family and community ceremonies.   The main mafioso was played by a famous actor who was a big box office draw in the 1950s and another character, a war hero who was initially reluctant to get involved in the family business, was played by an up-and-coming young actor.   The majority of the movie took place in New York but there were several scenes that were set in Sicily.

It may sound like The Godfather but actually, it was The Brotherhood, a film that flopped so badly that Paramount executives nearly passed on the chance to make a movie out of Mario Puzo’s bestselling novel.  According to Peter Biskind’s The Godfather Companion, Francis Ford Coppola frequently cited The Brotherhood as being exactly the type of movie that he did not want to make while he was directing The Godfather.

Kirk Douglas, who both produced and starred, plays Frank Ginetta.  Frank, an old-fashioned and honorable mobster, is hiding out in Sicily with his wife, Ida (Irene Pappas).  Frank knows that a rival gangster, Jim Egan (Murray Hamilton), has put a price on his head.  When Frank’s brother, Vinnie (Alex Cord), shows up in Palermo, Frank is overjoyed at first.  But Ida reminds him, “They’re going to send someone.”

Most of the film is taken up with flashback to Frank and Vinnie’s old life in New York.  When Vinnie returns from serving in the army, he marries Emma Bertolo (Susan Strasberg), the daughter of Don Bertolo (Luther Adler who, as a stage actor and director, served as an early mentor to the future Don Corleone, Marlon Brando).  Frank grew up idolizing their Sicilian father and, at first, he is happy when Vinnie announces that he wants to enter the “family business.”  But then Vinnie starts to side with non-Sicilian gangsters like Egan and Sol Levin (Alan Hewitt).

The scenes in Sicily work the best, with Frank unsure as to whether or not Vinnie has arrived to visit or to murder him.  But the scenes in New York are such a mess that it took me a while to realize that they were even supposed to be flashbacks.  It is hard to keep track of how much time has passed from scene to scene and Alex Cord and Kirk Douglas are two of the most unlikely brothers imaginable.

The main problem with The Brotherhood is that it is impossible to watch it without thinking about The Godfather.  The Brotherhood has much in common with The Godfather but it has none of its authenticity and does not come close to matching its epic scale.  Kirk Douglas tries his best and puts a lot of effort into talking with his hands but he is miscast from the moment he first appears.  Robert Evans once said that he chose Coppola to direct The Godfather because he wanted to “smell the pasta.”  The Brotherhood was directed by Martin Ritt and you never smell the pasta.

The Brotherhood is an interesting footnote in the history of The Godfather but ultimately, it’s an offer you can refuse.

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