Raven (1997) is an espionage action thriller staring Burt Reynolds as "Raven," a CIA operative who leads Raven Team, which includes Matt Battaglia. As the film opens, they are in Bosnia, whipping out a military installation and stealing a two piece Russian made decoder so their CIA bosses can sell it to a rich Iranian. All but Reynolds and Battaglia are killed, and Reynolds shoots Battaglia on the way home after they argue about whether or not to turn the two part decoder over to their CIA bosses, or sell it on the black market. Battaglia falls out of the helicopter, and Reynolds crashes into a lake.

Cut to a year in the future. Battaglia is living in San Diego, working as a boat mechanic in a marina, and living with Krista Allen, whom he plans on marrying. Reynolds is still trying to get Battaglia's half of the decoder, and the CIA and several crooked senators are trying to obtain it and turn it over to the Iranian. Lots of fighting and demolition follow, four breasts (two from Krista Allen, two from Lauren Hays), and there is exactly one great line, "Hey, they are CIA. They have a black belt in bullshit."

IMDb readers have this at 4.0 of 10. That is about all it is worth. The story is rater predictable and cliche ridden. I am a fan of Reynolds, but he showed me nothing here. D+, not quite genre minimum standard.

Pretty Maids All in a Row (1971):

Pretty Maids is an all-but-forgotten 1971 black comedy which was written by Star Trek's creator, Gene Roddenberry, directed by Eurotrash legend Roger Vadim, with a theme song by the Osmond Brothers.

It sort of hinges on the premise that all of our high school fantasies were true. All the chicks had perfect bodies, ran around in mini-skirts, and had sexual habits that made minks look like the Sisters of St Joseph. Remember that sexy teacher whose dress you looked up every day? Well, she really wanted to sleep with you, but you just never asked. Remember that wise coach who was also your guidance counselor and who taught you so much? You should have told him you needed some poontang. He'd have been there for you, dude. He would have told the hot teacher (who wanted his bod) that you were impotent and needed the cure, and that only she could help. And then she would have cleaned your pipes.

Rock Hudson plays the coach, “Tiger” McDrew, a former professional sporting great who has a wholesome recipe to turn youths into happy adults. For the boys - plenty of sports to keep them away from disruptive influence like girls and drugs and did I mention girls. For the girls - well, there's only one way that they can ever learn to be women, if you catch my drift. Ol' Dr Hudson has the prescription of love. Yes, that's right, Rock was sleeping with the females and pimping females for the males. He was really into that whole heterosexual thing. Unfortunately, more and more of the high school chickadees start to feel possessive about Rock, and their desire to hook him seems to coincide quite closely to their commitment to an eternal Dirt Nap.

Why, whoever could be killing them all? Well, Rock is happily married, and he just can't have his wife find out about his special proclivities, can he?

It is a completely irresponsible movie, filled with amoral characters, other characters who know about the amorality but don't care, and other characters who simply don't care - period. It features plenty of camera angles up the skirts of high school girls, except of course for the ones who are already naked. I suppose a film like this could be made today, but only as a no-budget independent film, almost an underground film, by someone like Larry Clark. Clark's film Ken Park is similar in some ways, but Ken Park was virtually unreleased. In the early 70s, however, this script was able to attract the wholesome Rock Hudson to star, backed up by Telly Savalas, Scotty from Star Trek, Roddy McDowell, Angie Dickinson, and Keenan Wynn.

I guess the film is sort of fun in a shallow, superficial Roger Vadim kind of way, although Vadim's slimy European softcore attitude didn't exactly mesh very well with the wholesome "palm trees and cheerleaders" setting, and the humor really didn't work for me, neither in 1971 nor now. The film's smirking condescension toward the dead women was coldly funny, and still is, as a satire of how little people really care for one another. But this film will absolutely make you squirm when you experience it with today's eyes and ears. Women found naked and brutalized? The perfect setup for plenty of cavalier remarks (“Cool! We never practice on the day of a murder”) and visual jokes. Roddy McDowell, the principal, offers a fitting funeral oration, that so-and-so was a great girl and a "terrific little cheerleader".

I'm embarrassed to admit that when I first saw this film with my friends, back when it was in the theaters, some of us were wont to repeat the line about "a terrific little cheerleader" when we discussed people who died tragically.

"Yeah, remember Bobby Kennedy? Geez, he was a great man ... and a terrific little cheerleader."

We did this for years, so I guess the film made some kind of an impression on us.

Amazin'!

I didn't have as much success with this VHS tape as some of the others I've tried to convert, but here's the goodies anyway.

• Angie Dickinson showed her butt. There is a brief flash of her breasts, and even a frame or two of pubes as she rolls over. (1, 2, 3)
• Joy Bang showed her breasts during and after a sex scene with Hudson
• Gretchen Burrell showed her breasts and a brief, dark flash of her crotch. She never appeared in any other movie before or after this one.
• Aimee Eccles showed the top half of her butt while sitting naked on a desk
• June Fairchild showed her breasts and pubes as she was taking a Polaroid of herself. The gorgeous Ms Fairchild disappeared from the movies around 1978. She turned up homeless and presumed alcoholic around 2001.
• an anonymous pretty maid took off her dress in Hudson's office

Other Crap:

• Jessica Alba is dating producer Cash Warren, the son of actor (Hill Street Blues) and former basketball star Michael Warren.
• Johnny Carson Writes Jokes for Letterman. Can I say something from the heart instead of the wise-ass remarks? I miss Johnny.
• Mrs Charles Foster Kane is dead. How old was Ruth Warrick? I'll give you a hint. Citizen Kane premiered 64 years ago.
• Closer rules the box office in the UK. #2 is Team America - World Police.
• A featurette for The Chronicles of Narnia
• Peter Jackson will direct The Lovely Bones. Jackson optioned the feature film rights to Alice Sebold's debut novel.
• Globes Ratings Not Golden - down 40% from last year.
• The Daily Show looks at the Abu Ghraib trials
• The trailer for Fantastic Four. My hopes are up! This looks cool.
• Martin Scorsese becomes honorary president of Vienna Film Museum
• Weekly World News: "THE EIFFEL TOWER IS A PORTAL TO HELL".
• How to use Japanese style toilet. It isn't easy to do this while having sex with an octopus.
• Clean out some space in your cupboard: "a leap back from financial ruin with an innovative product: frog-in-a-can."
• The trailer for Dear Wendy, from director Thomas Vinterberg and writer Lars van Trier.
  • "'Dear Wendy' is a story about the young loner Dick who lives in the poor mining town of Estherslope. When he happens upon a small handgun one day, he finds himself strangely drawn to it, despite his fervent pacifist views. Together with his newfound partner he soon convinces the other young outcasts in the town to join him in a secret club he calls The Dandies. A club based on the principals of pacifism and guns. Despite their firm belief in the most important Dandy rule of all - never draw your weapons - they soon find themselves in a predicament where they realize that rules are made to be broken."
• I'm as tired as you are of reading about Bradifer, but this story is poignant. Brad Pitt reportedly rejected an attempt from Jennifer Aniston to save their marriage.
• Be still my beating heart! Sylvester Stallone says he will make another Rambo film.
• Nicole Kidman is afraid of butterflies. Who isn't? Those are some scary-ass motherfuckers.
• Did you know "FCC" is pronounced "Fuck"? FCC fears force Fox to pixelate cartoon nudity in Family Guy re-run.
• The Yeti and penguin are back in the Sam Peckinpah version of their game.
• Full Body Floss
• Fronm the "quixotic, but amusing" department: The Online Petition to Stop Ashlee Simpson.
• Two great tastes that taste great together. Your got porn in my reality show. No, you got reality in my porn.
• Stars and Stripes does an excellent job with their photo of the day
• Warning: Don't brush teeth with toilet brush!: "Awards handed out for wackiest consumer warnings"
• The trailer for Bendito Infierno. Trailer??? You can watch the whole film on DVD. This "new release" is actually a four year old film with Penelope Cruz , Victoria Abril and Gabriel Garcia Bernal. It has been available on Region 1 DVD for a long time, under its English distribution title "Don't Tempt Me". (It was called "Sin noticias de Dios" in Spain in 2001.)
• Chanel gets director Baz Luhrmann and superstar Nicole Kidman together again for a sexy advert that's more like a short film. Beautiful visuals, but it is so pretentious it makes Phantom of the Opera look like a Farrelly Brothers film.
• Dirty Harry dumps Warner Bros after 30 years!! He told DreamWorks, "Go ahead, make my movie." Eastwood will be working with Spielberg, so I guess he's not that big. (Old joke: "You think you have a big dick? My dick is so big it won't return Spielberg's calls")
• Tobey Maguire was supposed to introduce the clip of 'The Aviator' at the Golden Globes but he dropped out at the last minute, supposedly because he's overweight and his handlers want to keep him out of sight until he loses the lard.
• Oh, noooooooooooooooo, Mr Hand .... The Golden Globe for worst concept in a comedy or musical goes to : 'The Apprentice: The Musical.'.
  • "It's a love story," Burnett said of the project. "It's very inspirational."
  • And they can turn the tryouts into another reality show. Talk about vertical integration! A scene from Springtime for Trump. "People. People. Only the dancing Trumps are over here! The singing Trumps are on stage five."
  • If you want to by-pass the open auditions, I have five key words for casting directors looking for the singing Donald Trump: Golden Globe winner Bill Shatner.
  • There has to be a role for my man, William Hung, in this project.
• The Daily Show continues to gloat over the failure to find WMDs in Iraq.
• The theater counts for the new releases in the upcoming weeks.
• The Weekend Warrior looks at this weekend's box office. The Warrior thinks Coach Carter will hold on to the #1 spot, Fockers and Good Company will continue to do well, and the two wide new releases will finish an uninspiring #2 and #6. He expects Elektra to fall to #8, despite the fact that it is in 3200 theaters.
• This week's movies: Are We There Yet? - 25% positive reviews, but based upon only four reviews. A lack of pre-screenings for critics is generally a bad sign.
• This week's movies: Assault on Precinct 13 - 71% positive reviews. I haven't seen this remake, but the reviews are surprisingly impressive. General consensus: mindless action movie, but very exciting and suspenseful.

Other Crap archives. May also include newer material than the links above, since it's sorta in real time.

Click here to submit a URL for Other Crap

MAILBOX

Hi, Scoop

In your Monday review of "Who's Your Daddy?"...  the "don't know who she is but she certainly has awesome gonzagas" girl is heffer Carrie Stevens. Keep up your super work. My daily visits to your site make my day.

K

Scoop's reply: I knew one of you guys would know her! Thanks.

MOVIE REVIEWS:

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that there isn't any significant humor, but I inexplicably determined there might be something else of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Junior or Brainscan, or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

Words, pictures, and vids from ICMS

"Last Tango in Paris" (1972)

• Maria Schneider 1 (.wmv zipped, .avi zipped)

• Maria Schneider 2 (.wmv zipped, .avi zipped)

• Maria Schneider 3 (.wmv zipped, .avi zipped)

• Maria Schneider 4 (.wmv zipped, .avi zipped)

We're looking for the best film as well as screen nudity debut (both in the same film) by an actress between 1980-1989.

Email Scoopy Jr. if you have any comments or suggestions.

Today the Ghost takes a look at the 1983 movie "Breathless", starring Richard Gere and Valérie Kaprisky.

Kaprisky is topless in almost all of these 'caps. We see some rear nudity in links 6, 19 and 20. in #17 there is also a full frontal view.

In the vids we have plenty of toplessness again, plus rear nudity in #2 and #5. In clip #3 we see brief pubes in #3 and a full frontal view in #4.

• Valérie Kaprisky (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
• Valérie Kaprisky zipped .wmvs (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

• Evangeline Lilly, the "Lost" star showing a little red carpet cleavage. (1, 2)

• Mariska Hargitay the "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" star looking very lovely backstage. Hargitay took home the Golden Globe for the 'Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series - Drama' category. (1, 2, 3, 4)

Eva Longoria
(1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)

CARTOON CHICKS GET MAKEOVERS
But Can Homer Get It Back Up? - Dove is launching a series of unusual celebrity hair care product ads in magazines. They feature famous cartoon women with bad hair, made over to show how they'd look with "beautiful styles that move naturally." The ads will feature Marge Simpson letting down her blue beehive, as well as Wilma Flintstone, Jane Jetson and Velma from "Scooby-Doo."