Purely Cinema

My collection in this area, as I’ ve said time and time again (and again and again?), allows me to see and re-see and re-re-see good films, really watchable films, pictures that truly make an impression. The latest additions to this intensely, intensely long list are Fatal Instinct, a parody film that sends up such pictures as Fatal Attraction and Basic Instinct, and American High School, the latest (so far as I know) teen film.

Before I continue, I need to say something: For reasons that will be explained, I will not deal with either flick in great detail but will give the highlights of each. As mentioned, there are reasons for that. We begin with Fatal Instinct.

First, however, I need to explain something. I’ m not going to go into the plot of Fatal Instinct for the simple reason that, where these parody pictures are concerned, the plot just isn’ t important. Indeed, the actual story at all–repeat, all–times is merely an excuse upon which to hang a series of satiric scenes and parodistic characters and lines. In that sense, all–all–filmic parodies are, as they say, “plotless.”

Having uttered all that, let me now turn to the highspots of Fatal Instinct, directed by the one and only Carl Reiner and edited by Bud Molin–Reiner’ s old crony dating back to the Dick Van Dyke Show days–and Stephen Myers:

The opening-credits sequence, which has the female protagonist Lola Cane (Sean Young) walking along a boardwalk and, as she walks, she gets first gum, then a wrapper on her shoe (This is turned into a genuinely delicious running gag, as, when Lola walks, she proceeds to get toilet paper and, finally, an entire outside tile, upon her shoe).

When Instinct‘ s hero Ned Ravine (Armand Assante), a cop/lawyer, catches the bad guy he’ s been after, he reads him his Miranda rights from cards held up by his black friend/sidekick Arch.

When Ravine’s unfaithful wife Lana (Kate Nelligan) outlines her plan to kill Ravine and thus inherit his money to her lover Frank Kelbo (Christopher McDonald), she shows him an exhibit and tells Kelbo how Ravine’ s route will be “through Dealey Plaza, past the bookstore suppository, and around the grassy knoll.”

At one point, Lola visits Ravine and requests his help, whereupon Ravine replies: “Well, I’ ll help you, Miss Cane, if I’ m able.”

Ravine’ s assistant/secretary Laura (Sherilyn Fenn) has a flashback/dream that terrifies her and makes her scream out loud. In mid-scream, a torrent of water hits her, entirely drenching her face, hair, and shoulders area. Cut to Ravine, holding a small cup of water upward–the source, supposedly, of the water torrent.

In one scene, Max Shady (James Remar), a career criminal whom Ravine sent to prison, is introduced by one tattoo upon his right shoulder that quotes Pee-Wee Herman enquiring: “I Know You Are, But Who Am I?” and by another tattoo upon his left shoulder that has Bart Simpson urging: “Don’ t Have A Cow, Man.” In the middle of his back there is a large tattoo of Ravine with an insignia above that says: “Dead Meat,” all of which amounting to satiric references to Robert DeNiro’ s Max Cady in his remake of the classic film Cape Fear (The pictures upon Max’ s prison cell are of, respectively, Mussolini, Hitler, and Julie Andrews).

In another scene, Ravine takes Laura shopping, and, in one store, she tries on various hats, and, as she does so, he, sporting a bright red set of pumps, breaks into an exuberant dance–all to Van Morrisson crooning his hit, “Brown-Eyed Girl”–all of it being a parodistic poke at the Julia Roberts-trying-on-different-hats sequence in her smash-hit picture Sleeping With The Enemy.

At another point, Lana sets out to shoot Ravine, but winds up accidentally plugging Shady. Ravine decides to defend her, and, before he questions her during her trial, he enquires of her: “May I call you Lana?” “Oh, please,” she responds passionately, “call me Angel Tits.” At this, the opposing attorney announces: “I object!” To which the presiding judge (Tony Randall) rules: “Sustained.” He then turns to Ravine. “Counselor,” he tells him, “you will refer to Angel Tits as Mrs. Ravine.”

At the close of his summation urging the jury to find Lana innocent, Ravine exhorts: “Strike a blow for motherhood! Strike a blow for the American justice system! Put the ‘can’ back in ‘American’! Put the ‘ju’ back in ‘jurisprudence’! Put the ‘con’ back in the Constitution! And put the ‘dom’ back in ‘freedom’!”

Finally, soliciting the jury’ s verdicts, the judge inquires of the foreman: “How do you find the defendant on the count of manslaughter?” Foreman: “Not guilty.” Judge: “On the count of murder in the first degree?” Foreman: “Not guilty.” Judge: “On the Count of Monte Cristo?” Foreman: “Not guilty.”

All of which, of course, being very funny, very pointed stuff.

Very well. Now we move on to the highpoints of American High School.

Before doing so, some things need to be pointed out. First, American High School, like literally all teen films, is, overall, useless in an artistic or even in a genuinely creative sense. The film, as is true of every film of its ilk, is hip-deep in the kind of basic falsenesses of plot and character and dialogue that Not Another Teen Movie aggressively satirized. Also: I shall at all times refer to the players in School by their “character” names, not their actual names. This is partly because all the performers in said picture, with the exception of Nikki Ziering, were and continue to be unknowns, and partly because, despite the attractiveness and the charm and the sexiness of the female players, none of the cast really stand out in any sense. Their acting, as is true of the acting in literally all teen films, can be described as “barely standard,” the performers themselves pretty much interchangeable.

So why, you enquire, does American High School deserve to be written about at all?

The reasons are two.

First, School, like all the “best” teen films, has a youthful spirit, a screw-it brio that’ s quite enticing. It doesn’ t come through in the direction or in the script or in the “performances”; it’ s more like an air that permeates the entire picture. You become seduced and want to follow its high energy, despite its considerable limitations as a production.

Second–and this is really the main attraction–the girls in School, like the girls in all teen films, are hot, hot, HOT! With all these young she-babes, you want to look and look and look and look some more–and, whether they’ re underage or not, you want to go further. Honestly, the gals in School, like the gals in its brethren teen pictures, are spicy and alluring enough to populate a Baywatch spinoff series.

Okey-dokey. Here we go to the highlights of American High School.

Any time the film’ s heroine Gwen Welles, is in her room either directly addressing us or (as happens much later) dancing around while preparing for the beachside prom. The fact is, that girl has the kind of body that would give Angelina Jolie worry wrinkles.

At one point, while in her room talking right to us, Gwen shows us a (marked-up) photo of her high-school rival Hilary Weiss, “the devil with a vagina.”

Later, Gwen informs us of her plan to run for class president opposite Hilary. She doesn’ t care all that much about the position itself, she tells us, “but I want the satisfaction of beating Satan.”

While watching Gwen and her husband sitting in the outside area from his office, her high school’s Principal Mann (a little person), flanked by his two buxom female assistants, reaches in back of him and touches one of said assistant’s breasts. “Principal Mann,” she tells him, “that’ s my breast.” Mann then looks back at her, telling her: “I know.”

The ever-venomous critic John Simon, in praising a Neil Simon film, asserted that said picture “is not to be written and read about but to be seen and modestly enjoyed.” So it is with Fatal Instinct and American High School. Neither picture is meant to be subjected to deep-dish analysis and criticism but is meant to be viewed and–within limits–appreciated.