Film Crew: Hollywood After Dark

Movie: (1961/62/68/69) A cynical loner at a salvage yard is invited to a life of crime by the owner of a burlesque house, where he meets an ambitious stripper played by a young Rue McClanahan. 

First released: 7/10/2007 (on DVD)

Premise:  Mike, Bill and Kevin play lightly-fictionalized versions of themselves, sitting in a basement putting commentary tracks on films under the direction of “Bob Honcho.”  To quote: “Think of us as a value-added reseller, increasing profits for people who aren’t us.” 

Opening:   The premise is established with Mike, Bill and Kevin introducing themselves, then taking a conference call with their boss.  Honcho assigns them to provide a commentary track for Rue McClanahan’s Hollywood After Dark.

Break:  Bill wants to run a lunch meeting while Mike and Kevin just want lunch.

End: An attempt to reenact the ‘character killed by lightbulb’ scene is scuttled when they realize that the character was not in fact killed.

Extra: Bill recites a sonnet about lunch.

Availability: DVD sold out at Shout, but available on Hulu, Amazon, Amazon instant, and Netflix.

Reminds me of:  some of the JD/crime films, like Beatniks, Sinister Urge, Racket Girls or Dead Talk Back.  Not quite as nihilistic as the Coleman Francis series, but getting there.

Stray observations:

This was a welcome return to riffing over five years after the end of MST3K.  The Film Crew’s Wikipedia and IMBD pages give the basic story behind the production:  Originally filmed as a direct-to-DVD release for Rhino home video, disputes with Jim Mallon over similarities to MST kept the episodes on the shelf until picked up by Shout Factory.  After some adjustments in post-production (“Bob Rhino” became “Bob Honcho”) a poll was taken to determine the release order for 4 new Film Crew productions, and this was the first chosen by the fans.  (This still seems strange to me.)

The year the film was made or released is given several times, none of which match.  Bob Honcho says it was made in 1962, and the opening credits are 1969.  However IMBD (aka Walk the Angry Beach) claims it was made in 1961 and released in 1968.  The earlier date is reflected by the cars and clothes in the film.  (Note the Film Crew’s own release date was 2007, with credits for 2005!)

The stripping sequences look like they were inserted later, perhaps for the 1969 release.  There is thankfully very limited Rue stripping, and she is shown from behind and side instead of full on with pasties as the ‘real’ strippers are.  While the film may have been cut in places the stripping sequences are not edited, and go on far too long. 

Cast and crew roundup:  There are actually no credits on the movie itself!  Strange.  Of course Rue McClanahan is the big name here:  the writer/director’s IMBD page mentions that he was seeing Rue for several years, which probably explains her presence.

Credits watch: Several names from the MST days are here, most notably the beloved Beez McKeever as the secretary’s voice and behind the scenes prop work, but also Brad Keely and Jeff Stonehouse.  The Film Crew is a well-populated production:  by my count 23 people listed in the credits in various production capacities, which is actually more than the last season of MST where I count 19 working on a representative episode!

Callback: There’s a “Mike Nelson” riff which Mike responds to that seems very much like a late MST routine.

Fave riff:  “If Jim Jarmusch directed a caper film.”/Honorable mention:  “Sexy or horrifying? You decide!” and "We call ourselves 'McLana-fans'."

Next week: Cinematic Titanic starts off with “The Oozing Skull”!