Summertime Fun Flix
“Summa, it turns me upside-down… Summa Summa Summa… it’s like a merry-go-round.” So spoketh Ric Ocasek, and we all wept. Summer is a time for sun, summer is a time for fun, summer is a time to get naked on an island and sleep with multiple partners… n’est pas? I challenge you to watch these shining examples of summer excess, and for gawd sakes try not to get sand in yer crack, it’s so uncomfortable.
Summer Lovers (1982)–Who doesn’t love a good threesome once in a while?
That’s the question posed by writer/director Randal Kleiser in his follow up
to Grease and The Blue Lagoon. Michael (young and humpy Peter Gallagher) and
Cathy (young humpette Daryl Hannah) travel to the Greek Isles for some summer
fun, ’82-style. But trouble in paradise erupts when Michael starts to diddle
around with Lina, a French archeologist. Cathy finds out and soon they are all
in bed together making happy. Actually, to give this film a little justice,
it is quite engaging, very sexy and beautifully photographed. Dare I call it
a forgotten gem? Yes, I dare!
Corvette Summer (1978)–Post-Star Wars, pre-face mangling car wreck,
Mark Hamill is a high school kid who loves him some cars, ‘specially the tricked
out Corvette his auto shop class has been working on all year. Then some baddies
steal it, so Mr. Mark goes after ’em. On his cross-country travels, he meets
a very young prostitute played by future Designing Woman Annie Potts. This is
a true drive-in classic, kind of dumb, a little sweet, but all bitchin’.
One Crazy Summer (1986)–I’m sorry to bring this movie back into the
vernacular. I know, it was safely stowed away in the dark greasy crevices of
your brain, and now you’re like, “Oh yeah, that movie was funny!” Well, like
most things you think you remember, you are only half-right. John Cusack, Demi
Moore, Bobcat Goldthwait, and Booger from Revenge of the Nerds must pull together
to win a big boat race in order to help save Demi’s big old house from being
destroyed by the bad preppie assholes. This has USA Up All Night written all
over it. Where’s Gilbert Gottfried when we need him? Oh yeah, doing voice-overs
for Subway commercials.
The Endless Summer (1966)–A sports film for people who don’t particularly
like sports? Can it be? I kept feeling like this was a ’60s Disney film and
at some point there were going to be mountain lions fighting bears, but alas,
this is a surfing movie for all to consume. A throwback to when surfers were
clean-cut and bore no tattoos. The cinematography is amazing, which is probably
the biggest reason this film has stood up so well over the past 35 years. More
importantly is the naîve gaze of the surfers. Their klutzy brand of ethnography
is sweet and harmless, even though now it seems a bit racist.