Dirty Deeds (2005)

Dirty Deeds is a raunchy teen comedy which came to a few theaters in a bowdlerized PG-13 version. I'm not sure of the point of a raunchy PG-13 movie, but I'm not surprised there was no audience for it. The unrated DVD version has been ramped up to the equivalent of a lively R with breasts from three different girls, all of whom are exposed some length, standing up, and in good light. In addition, there is a special feature on the DVD which basically consists of nothing but breasts - it consists of the outtakes and alternate takes of the nude scenes.

So it's got that goin' for it.

The film itself is about a high school tradition which involves a sort of extreme scavenger hunt held annually on the eve of homecoming. Each year, one student is allowed to attempt "the dirty deeds," a set of ten extreme challenges which, if completed, mean ... absolutely nothing, as far I can see, except bragging rights. Nobody has completed them in the last 15 years or so, but one freshman wants to give it a try to get the bullies off his ass. The freshman's older sister asks her would-be boyfriend (Milo Ventimiglia) to talk her brother out of this foolishness, but the only way Milo can prevent the younger boy from attempting the deeds is to attempt them himself, because upperclassmen take priority over freshmen in the official deed rules.

It's completely predictable from there. Some of the bullies and authority figures try to stymie Milo, but he gets by with the help of the rebels, nerds, and druggies. The deeds themselves range from simple pranks and dares all the way to outrageous criminal behavior:  "steal a car worth more than $100,000," "place a dead body on the high school grounds," etc.

It's one of those movies with a good basic idea which made have been a good little comedy with better jokes, cleverer dialogue, and fewer stock characters and situations. There is an extended "little old lady farting" gag, for example, that is so juvenile it should obviously have been cut, but there it is in all of its embarrassing splendor. There is nothing new here, and it's not a theatrical-quality movie even with the additional nudity, but it does have a sort of minimal level of retro 80s appeal. In fact, if you don't recognize any of the actors, you could very easily believe it was made in the 1982-84 period. With the additional nudity, I'd say it is a C-, a minimally acceptable genre film, with the genre being "raunchy teen comedies."

There's plenty of nudity. Unfortunately, I have no idea who these girls are. The last four are from the bonus features, which are in full screen mode.
 

Big Women (1998)

British TV mini-series focused on the establishment of a feminist publishing house from the 1970's to the 1990's. We have not seen very good caps of this series, and it included full frontal and rear nudity from some semi-famous British actresses, particularly Clare Holman and Daniela Nardini. The other two women are Anastasia Hille and Anabelle Apsion

Various notes on new releases:

The Aristocrats (2005) is scatological and hilarious. If you have never heard of it, the entire film consists of several dozen comics telling the same joke, each trying to outdo the other. The other comics seemed to like Gilbert Gottfried's version the best, but I liked Bob Saget better, and my #1 choice would be Jason Alexander (George Costanza), who did some absolutely brilliant improv. There is no nudity except ... wait for it ... Carrot Top's ass.

My Big Fat Independent Movie (2005) is to independent movies as Scary Movie is to horror movies. It doesn't have any really big laughs, but it does have some good lines. "Why are we kidnapping her again?" "To form an unlikely bond, of course." "OK, you guys, I need to get some sleep tonight, so no voice-over after 11." No nudity.

National Lampoon Presents Barely legal (2003). I couldn't handle two raunchy teen comedies in one night, but Tuna was all over this. See below.

Other Crap:

Movie Reviews:

Yellow asterisk: funny (maybe). White asterisk: expanded format. Blue asterisk: not mine. No asterisk: it probably sucks.

Kla$h (1995)

Black Rainbow (1989) is a UK horror/thriller starring Rosanna Arquette, Jason Robards and Tom Hulce.

A young woman (Arquette) and her father (Robards) travel from town to town, where she earns their living doing a psychic medium show in local churches.  Like her mother, she turns out to be actually psychic and is being driven crazy by what she sees. Problems start when she accurately predicts a murder. It was a professional hit ordered by a town official who has the police chief in his pocket. Since Arquette "saw" the killer, the hit man is now after her.

Hulce plays a reporter whose skepticism is dispelled when, in the next town, the psychic accurately predicts a disaster in the local power plant. The reporter eventually becomes the love interest as well.  Rosanna says, "I would rather have a man lie with me than to me," and then shows her breasts and possibly a hint of pubes.

It is an interesting premise to show a spiritualist making money in "show business," and then turning out to have real psychic ability. Also, her telling people in her audience that their loved ones are dead when they aren't is riveting. Director Mike Hodges was honored at film festivals, and Arquette gave a very strong performance and garnered several best actress awards one the festival circuit. Hulce and Robards provided solid support. Unfortunately, the film never made it past the festivals to get a wide theatrical release.

It has an unsatisfying, ambiguous ending, but despite that it has developed a devoted cult following, as evidenced by some enthusiastic comments at IMDb

The overall IMDb score is 5.9.

Bottom line: C. The positive comments at IMDb indicate that it is a solid genre picture.

 

National Lampoon Presents Barely Legal (2003)

This film premiered at Cannes in 2003. Two years later, it went straight to vid in Germany, had a very brief US theatrical release, and is now available on DVD. IMDb calls it "After School Special," a title that makes sense, but doesn't seem to agree with any release titles anywhere, and calls it German. As near as I can tell, it is US, in that Motion Picture Corporation of America seems to be the primary production company. Funding came from everywhere, including Germany and Canada, but distribution is controlled by Barely Legal LLC, a US entity.

This is yet another High School gross-out comedy. It has completely escaped the notice of critics, and IMDb comments are split between worst film every made, and funnier than American Pie. I have been highly critical of many recent National Lampoon offerings. This one, I found acceptable.

Three nearly-cool High School nerds, still virgins, make a good living duping and selling porn to freshmen. Deacon Lewis (Erik von Detten), shit his pants in 5th grade, and nobody will ever let him forget it. Fred (Tony Denman) is painfully shy around girls, and masturbates six or seven times a day. Matt (Daniel Farber), the nerdiest of the three, is a wannabe film maker. The porn profits are set aside for their dream of getting a car and becoming babe magnets. .When Deacon doesn't get the car he expected for his 17th birthday, and Fred loses his job at the video store, thus killing their source of porn to dub, they decide to make their own porn film and distribute it on the Internet. They will slant it towards people like themselves, namely virgin nerds.

The problem of setting up a dummy company under an adult's name is easily solved. The next problem is finding performers. Creating a phony ID on their computer, the three go to a strip club looking for a female lead. My guess is that the Pretty Kitty was an actual strip club, and a very fancy one at that, where they find their leading lady in the person of Ashley (Sarah Jane Potts). Ashley is "19, but tells everyone she is 18" and wants a career in porn. She sees this film as a way to produce a demo reel which she can show to real porn studios.

The local Stifler character (of course we need a Stifler character) forces the nerds to make him the leading man, but he does not prove up to the task. Of course, there are other obstacles as well. One of the nerds stops being a virgin, and his new girlfriend nearly breaks up the film company. The local porn maker, clearly meant to be Ron Jeremy, is after their hides for cutting into his business. Finally, their enterprise is also in constant danger of discovery by their parents.

The whole thing ends rather predictably. In fact, nothing particularly surprising happens in the entire film. However, I found much to like.

• The DVD includes extended versions of the three major nude scenes, clearly demonstrating that they knew what the major appeal of this offering was.
• Potts was skilled enough to have a completely different character when acting in the porno and when not on camera.
• The male characters in the film are all over the top, but they kind of worked anyway.
• Some of the situations were amusing, and I even got one belly laugh caused by impeccable timing rather than a novel idea.
• The visual style of the film was better than normal for this genre, and they used every chance to insert little jokes. The following frames demonstrate. As they pull out of the garage in a family mini-van, armed with phony IDs to get into a strip club, we see the honor student bumper sticker.

The nudity is nearly as strange as the film. Brooke Dillman is a running gag as a horny and lonely SexEd teacher. She is always braless with major pokies. Tammy Morris, as a porn actress, shows breasts. Several unknowns also show breasts and buns both in the porn film and the strip club. Sarah Jane Potts shows breasts in several scenes, but always covered by transparent lingerie, nearly transparent tape over her nipples, or her hands. Neither the lingerie nor the tape leave anything to the imagination, and, with the other breast exposure in the film, it was heading for R anyway, so it was likely a no nudity clause in her contract, so please leave her blissfully ignorant as to how much she actually showed.

Bottom line: C.  I am a fan of these raunchy teen comedies, and found this one perfectly acceptable.

 

Sarah-Jane Potts

Brooke Dillman

Tammy Morris

Unknowns