Monday, September 17, 2018

Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama is the greatest film of all time


Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama is total trash but a great late-night flick perfect for The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs and USA Up All Night. They don't make them like this anymore. Cheaply made dumb horror comedies done by directors with enough know how to crank it out and keep it fun with crazy kills and lots of nudity. This was director David DeCoteau's specialty as he did it close to 150 times with his most recent flick coming in 2016. This is his first of several featuring scream queens Michelle Bauer, Linnea Quigley, and Brinke Stevens. One such flick, Nightmare Sisters, was filmed in the four days following this one, another testament to DeCoteau's. Have two and a half weeks to film a B-movie. Do it in 12 days under budget with a some extra film in the can. Might as well crank another out. Two movies in 16 days. Crazy. Fuck it, right? DeCoteau was one of many proteges of the great Roger Corman who perfected the art of cranking out serviceable low budget flicks. Maybe not as successful as others to come out of the Corman school, directors like James Cameron, Francis Ford Coppola, Jonathan Demme, Ron Howard, or Martin Scorsese, but hey, DeCoteau has more film credits than all of them combined, which is insane.

This dipshit
Anywho, This also marks the third Linnea Quigley movie I've written about. The first two being classics in Night of the Demons and Return of the Living Dead. I, personally, don't see the big deal. She does seem pretty cool and all but not what I'd call attractive in any way. I guess that must be it, being a bad, cool chick. Regardless, this movie. Fun AF. Greatest film of all time.

Pros: Well made for what it is. Lots of nudity (though it's probably not nudity you'll really want to see). While not the greatest looking kills, they are pretty amusing. Super fun though not what I would call funny.

Cons: Sexual misconduct is treated pretty lightly (the dudes break into the sorority, do an insane amount of peeping, and sort of joke about maybe committing rape). The monster looks like trash and is a totally racist stereotype for no reason. Decent amount of stuff that happens goes nowhere and happens for no reason (specifically thinking of a scene where a chick that has been turned into a demon with all this shit coming off her face tries to put on makeup but there are plenty more). Acting isn't great but what do you expect.

Here's the gist... Three bored frat bros peep on a sorority ritual that involves 20 minutes of paddling, spraying their two pledges down with whipped cream, and then sexy showering. Once they are inevitably caught by the head mistress or whatever the the president of a sorority is called, this sorority has three members and two pledges by the way, they make the pledges and the frat bros, who just committed a sex crime, go out to the local bowling ally and steal a bowling trophy. With the fat one, who is extremely aggressive and disgusting, this is more or less like telling these chicks to go and get sexually assaulted. Once they have broken in and got what they came for, they drop the trophy when smoke and a demon comes out. The demon ends up being this ridiculous looking jive talking imp named Uncle Impy. Impy has the ability to grant wishes but these end up coming at the price of their lives and end up being bullshit anyway.

In addition to Bauer as Lisa, Quigley as Spider whom we meet when she is trying to rob the bowling ally which is both trashy and stupid considering there are cameras everywhere and probably no money in the register, and Stevens (the one with the eyebrows) as Taffy who gets pulled apart like her namesake, the movie stars Carla Baron as Frankie (whom I think is the one that turns into the Bride of Frankenstein and looks like Alison Brie in Glow) and Kathi O'Brecht as Rhonda who are pretty much interchangeable, Hal Havins whose the fat, disgusting one that was also the fat, disgusting prick in Night of the Demons as Jimmie, Andras Jones as survivor dude Calvin, the late Robin Rochelle as head of the sorority Babs, and John Stuart Wildman who gets it on with Bauer who reminds me of Brett Kavanaugh since they both have the same shitty hair and also like to commit sexual assault plays Keith. The guy who plays Uncle Impy, a guy named Michael Sonye, goes by the stage name of Dukey Flyswatter. Dude is indeed Caucasian and was in several cult classics including Surf Nazis Must Die. The demon, which is pretty unnecessarily racist, talks hella shit and sounds like the Oogie Boogie from Nightmare Before Christmas or the flytrap in Little Shot of Horrors the musical.

Best line of the movie comes from the janitor, played by George "Buck" Flower. You might recognize him from the role of drunk homeless man in every John Carpenter film from the 1980s or from Back to the Future from the role of drunk homeless man where he says the memorable line "crazy drunk driver" or from Wishmaster where he plays a homeless man. He was basically always a homeless man. In this flick though he at least has a job and ends up being an Imp expert as he was the one that trapped in the bowling trophy and such. Anyway, his line is "Demons munching your friends? I gotta tell you both, kids, drugs are not the answer."

None of the kills are all that great but the one where the chick with the welty demon gets bowled to death, basically they roll the ball down the lane into her face, is alright though you know it's coming. The one chick named Taffy is pulled apart like the candy but you don't see anything. I do like the idea of ironic punishment though. Sort of thought the one dude who wishes for Bauer to do him would get liked boned to death or whatever but that doesn't happen. He eventually realizes what a fucked up situation this is, like slipping a chick a ruffie or something, and tries to shut it down but the chick is super persistent... Yeah, I'm pretty sure they did it, unfortunately. Maybe an appropriate outcome would have been him going to jail and justice getting served and what not, but instead a chick come and fries his face.

Best scene is the one where the demon chicks kill the fat frat guy, Jimmie, by decapitating him somehow with an ice machine. The demon chick then takes his head and obligatorily rolls it down the bowling lane. We get some pretty sweet commentary from Uncle Impy here. When the chicks goes to roll his head, he says "she steps up, she wriggles her fanny," and then when bowls is all, "it could be a strike," and I feel that most directors or whatever would have her roll a strike. But DeCoteau ain't got the time or film for that and we get the head bouncing and rolling halfway down the lane before getting caught in the gutter.

MVP of the movie is Linnea Quigley. I mean she is way over-the-top like you'd expect but she manages to go a whole movie without getting neked and is sort of bad ass. She kills the demons, traps Uncle Impy, and has a couple three solid one-liners. Stuff like "It's too bad we had to kill her. I really liked the outfit she had on." That when kills the one that looks like the Bride of Frankenstein. Then there is this touching little exchange: Spider: "What is this, Midnight Wimp Bowling League?" Taffy: "Who are you? The Bride of Dracula?" Spider: "Oooo. Jump back. Prom queen on the loose. Or is it high school hookers?" Overall it was a pretty serviceable performance by Quigley. And she takes the nerd she saves home with her to go to the bone zone and what not.

Watched this as part of Joe Bob Briggs's new show The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs where he introduces said movies, gives the infamous "Drive-In Totals" where in he gives a ridiculous rundown of the movie, and pops in in the middle to talk some shit. This was his shtick on MonsterVision which I was completely obsessed with as a kid and am thrilled is back. This was the perfect film to start with and is definitely right up his alley. Greatest film of all time.

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