Catherine Parks | Through the Shattered Lens

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!

It’s time set sail for adventure!

Episode 5.28 “A Dress To Remember”

(Dir by Robert Scheerer, originally aired on May 8th, 1982)

This week’s episode features three stories and one dress.

The dress, a lovely blue gown, is brought on board by diet doctor Dr. Alfred Farney (Kelly Monteith), who claims that his “muskmullet” diet will lead to Donna Baker (Markie Post) losing 10 pound by the end of the cruise. The proof will be that Donna will be able to fit into the dress. Alfred’s former partner-turned-rival Dr. Tucker Martin (Lyle Waggoner) is also on the ship and his plan is to tempt Donna into eating so much that she’ll instead gain 11 pounds and the dress will rip. Boooo! Shame on both of those doctors! Seriously, Donna looks miserable for the entire cruise. That said, despite the efforts of Dr. Martin, Donna still loses the weight …. in fact, she loses even more than 10 pounds. She loses 11! Doctors Farney and Martin agree to partner up again and Donna, who looks like she’s about to faint, suggests that they celebrate over pizza. The doctors make some money and Donna gets an eating disorder but at least the dress looks good.

That dress goes through a lot over the course of one episode. For some reason, Gopher and Isaac have been tasked with keeping it safe. Why would you trust those two with something important? Actually, Isaac is usually pretty smart and Gopher’s actually been behaving a bit more like a professional than usual this season so I guess they were just having an off-cruise.

Norman Lomax (Bob Denver) wears the dress (and a wig) to keep his ex-father-in-law, Tom (Forrest Tucker), from recognizing him. Tom must be an idiot because Bob Denver in a wig and dress still looks and sounds like Bob Denver. Norman’s ex-wife, Nancy (Brianne Leary), is also on the cruise. Norman tries to win her back.

Finally, Tom falls for Rosie Strickland (Eleanor Parker), who makes her living selling flowers to people boarding the cruise. When Rosie’s daughter (Catherine Parkes,) shows up, Rosie doesn’t want her to know that Rosie isn’t rich. So, the Captain gives her the dress to wear and helps Rosie pretend to be a rich woman. Fortunately, it turns out that Rosie’s daughter loves her regardless of whether or not she’s rich. And so does Tom!

Myself, I’m a little bit concerned by the fact that the Captain just gave away a piece of clothing that belonged to one of the passengers. That doesn’t really seem very professional and it kind of goes against everything that we know about Captain Stubing. He’s a good man but he’s not exactly a rule-breaker. That said, everything works out in the end. Stubing even gets to perform a triple wedding.

The third story, I actually liked it. It’s heart was in the right place, even if it was basically just a remake of Lady For a Day. Eleanor Parker actually gave a really good performance, finding some much needed reality in Rosie’s character. The other two stories were pretty forgettable (or, in Bob Denver’s case, annoying) but Eleanor Parker’s story made up for both of them, making this a very nice and ultimately rather touching cruise.

Today, we continue to consider the Friday the 13th film franchise with Friday the 13th Part 3, a film that many (like me) consider to be one of the worst slasher films ever made. Certainly, it’s a contender for the title of the worst Friday the 13th film.

Taking place a day after the end of Part 2 (and with John Furey still nowhere to be seen), Friday the 13th Part 3 tells the story of Chris Higgins (Dana Kimmell), her annoying friends, and their weekend at Crystal Lake. Her friends include pregnant Debbie (Tracie Savage) and her boyfriend Andy (Jeffrey Rogers), who is cute but for some reason is always walking on his hands. There’s also the fat and rather depressing Shelly (played by Larry Zerner) and Vera Sanchez (Catherine Parks), who comes from the wrong side of the tracks and has been recruited to serve as Shelly’s date. And then finally, there are two hippies (David Katims and Rachel Howard) who appear to be in their late 30s and who appear to just pop up mysteriously in the back of Andy’s van at one point. Seriously, I’ve seen this film a few dozen times and I’ve never figured out just why the hippies are there.

Anyway, once at Crystal Lake, Chris goes off with her ex-boyfriend Rick (Paul Kratka) while her friends spend their time having sex, smoking weed, and dealing with three angry bikers who apparently belong to the Red Herring Motorcycle Gang. Chris tells Rick about how, two years previously, she was attacked by a disfigured maniac who just happens to hang out around Crystal Lake…

Anyway, pretty much what you would expect to happen happens. Soon Jason Voorhees (played in this one by Richard Brooker, who is very physical and intimidating in the role) is killing everyone. Along the way, he puts on his hockey mask for the first time and the legend, as they say, is born.

Friday the 13th Part 3 was originally filmed in 3-D and was apparently initially released under the title Friday The 13th 3-D. This makes it a somewhat weird experience to watch the film on video because you spend the whole time spotting scenes that were obviously included just to exploit the 3-D. Sometimes, the scenes shot for the 3-D are still effective even in 2-D. The scenes where an arrow flies straight at the camera and poor old Rick’s eye literally pops out of his head remain surprisingly effective. However, for the most part, the film is made up of scenes where Andy plays with a yo-yo or some weird kid points a softball bat the camera. Seen in 2-D, the majority of these scenes feel weird but yet they still have an oddly ludicrous appeal to them. If nothing else, spotting these scenes make for a fun drinking game.

So, why is Friday the 13th Part 3 widely considered to be the worst of the Friday the 13th films? There are several reasons but a lot of it comes down to the fact that the film is badly acted even by the standards of Friday the 13th. Whereas previous (and future) installments featured casts that, at the very least, seemed to be trying to at least keep things interesting, the cast of this one seems to be incredibly bored with the whole thing. (In their defence, I’m sure the filming was more about getting the 3-D right than worrying about crafting an interesting ensemble dynamic.) As portrayed by Dana Kimmell, Chris Higgins is probably one of the least sympathetic final girls in the history of the slasher genre. Essentially, she drags all of her friends off to a place that she knows is inhabited by a maniac (though she apparently doesn’t bother to say anything about it until they’re already there) and then — surprise, surprise — all of her friends get killed! Good job, Chris. Way to go.

Oddly enough, everything I’ve read about Friday the 13th Part 3 seems to suggest that Dana Kimmel actually played a surprisingly large role in the production of this film. Kimmel was reportedly pretty religious and somehow talked the filmmakers into removing several scenes of excessive violence and gratuitous sex, which kind of seems to defeat the whole purpose of making a film like Friday the 13th in the first place. Strangely, even after the film was watered down, it’s still probably the most mean-spirited of the entire franchise. This after all is the film where Jason kills a pregnant girl, an outspoken chicana who has bravely defied her mother just so she can take part in the Chris Higgins Weekend of Death, a poor fat kid who is desperate to be loved, and not one but two comic relief hippies.

Director Steve Miner, who did such a good job keeping Part 2 creepy and exciting, seems to have been bored when he directed this film and the whole thing has a harsh, YouTube feel to it. Some of that may be due to the fact that the film was originally done in 3D but it’s hard to deny that Friday the 13th Part 3 is exactly everything that its many critics claim it to be. Luckily, in the next chapter of the Friday the 13th saga, a new director would breathe new life into the franchise even as he attempted to kill it for good.

Coming tomorrow…my review of Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter.