We Used to Know

By Chris Vosburg

As Mitt Dullard Romney rejuvenates the cold war dreams of the Reagan years in his campaign speeches, I thought it might be worthwhile to remind us all that there are those of us who were never quite down with the whole “evil empire” thing, even back in the “space race” days—we thought the world of Yuri Gagarin and his brave venture into orbit in the Vostok spacecraft, and it tickles me to remember that his biggest fans were the American astronauts assembled for the similar US effort.

International Space Station resident and flautist Colonel Catherine Coleman is one such brave new worlder, and last year, perhaps as the result of a Craigslist ad (“looking for musicians to jam with—have rehearsal space”) found someone to play flute with—an aging popstar fellow who shared her appreciation of the cosmonaut’s journey and “our rocket heroes”, and they performed a duet:

 Coupla notes:

Awesome hair, babe. This was, by the way, in April 2011, commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Gagarin’s trip. There’s been on TV since a series of ads for a sexual stimulant that promises to “blow your hair back”, with resultant hairstyles to demonstrate, so, yeah, okay, comedy.

Cady Coleman confirms: it’s much easier to play flute standing on one leg in zero gravity.

Yuri Gagarin bumped in ‘68, crashing a jet he was test-piloting. Doesn’t seem fair, does it?

“We Used To Know”, is the title of an old Jethro Tull song, which has some notoriety as a result of the fact that the Eagles, which toured with Tull in ‘72, used the same chord progression in “Hotel California”. Different key, different time signature, but Ian Anderson noticed as well, and graciously said in an interview that he considered it “a tribute, much in the same sense as the tribute Rolex watch I’m now wearing.”

And lastly, I salute our “Rocket Heroes” often, as I watch the ISS sail overhead. Yes, it’s visible from the ground, and NASA has a web page which gives time, duration and direction (page is for Los Angeles, select other location as required). It’s typically the brightest object in the sky, and you might mistake it at first for an aircraft-- but it has no blinking lights, so there you go. If in Los Angeles, by the way, note that we have a nice one coming up tonight (Saturday), appearing on the Northwest horizon at 8:43 PM and traveling directly overhead, departing in the Southeast horizon three minutes later. Cool, huh?

Post Friday Beast Blogging: The Panic and Passed out Edition

Riley:  Help!  I'm trapped with a book on cinematography theory, and it's getting really pretentious in here!  Send help...!

Moondoggie:  ...while I am experiencing the otherworldly calm and total bliss known only to a Tibetan Lama or a taxidermied moose.

Good News! Bad News!

Actually, there's good news, bad news, and weird news.  The good news is that the Good News isn't the Good News starring June Allyson and Mel Tormé.  The bad news, however, is so bad it might as well involve Mel Tormé, so let's get that out of the way first:

Some of you may have already heard that Annti -- our own much adored Joanna -- has suffered yet another cruel misfortune, this time the loss of her beloved "furry chirren."  The Boy, as he was affectionately known, passed away in September, and now his sister, Biddy is gone.  Perhaps it's a small mercy that Biddy, an older cat in poor health, won't have to spend her final days enduring the shocks and stresses that will surely follow Annti's eviction, but that means Joanna herself much face those same things alone, making this normally sad event seem all the more heartbreaking.

Joanna sent me this photo months ago, and I wish I had posted it sooner.  But perhaps there is no better time than now.

 Farewell, Boy and Biddy.

Happily, there is one slim ray of sunshine beaming down on the World O' Crap community.  Yesterday, our Special Correspondent Keith sent me the following email:

 After 16 mos. of unemployment, as of this afternoon have finally been offered a position that offers gainful employment. I'll start in a few weeks.

[Details redacted so Michelle Malkin isn't tempted to snoop around his office break room, looking for granite countertops.]  So that's one positive thing that's happened to a fellow Crapper, but the good news for us is that Keith (despite blandishments from another blog which has been attempting to poach our staff) will be maintaining his Wo'C Special Correspondency:

However, I shall not abandon the magnificent cause of crap and will continue to provide our readers with the worst of the worst. So stay tuned.

In my own life, things continue to be stressful, but occasionally the tension is relieved by a bit of Dadaist street theater.  Walking down Hollywood Boulevard yesterday, en route to meet a friend, I had to step off the curb as a young guy dressed in a backwards baseball cap, a button down shirt, and nude below the waist, burst onto the sidewalk after stealing a plaid tea towel from a souvenir shop.  He engaged in a brief, violent tug-of-war with the store's middle-aged proprietor, and lost, perhaps because he could only wrestle one-handed, as the other was assigned to clutching his groin.  He spun around and sprinted down the street, with the grizzled, wheezing, bespectacled shopkeeper in hot pursuit.

When I recounted this to my friend, her main interest was in the tea towel.  "Was he covering his junk, or just being an asshole?"

"He was both covering his junk and being an asshole," I said.  "But not, alas, successfully covering his asshole."

Toward a Radical Re-Interpretation of Just For Men Mustache Dye

Smear of greasepaint Joseph Farah is giddy with his own bad self, for he has written a naughty headline at internet snake oil dealership, WorldNetDaily.  But don't worry about slipping into a fugue state after reading his outrageous, paradigm-shifting words, because on advice of counsel he spends the first paragraph talking you down like you're on a bad acid trip.  So relax.  Take some vitamin B complex.  If you've got a beer, drink it.  And put on some Allman Brothers.

Live like George Zimmerman
Exclusive: Joseph Farah says shooter behaved as men should in a self-governing society

While Joseph behaves as Maoists do in a free society, since there was a long lived graffito in downtown L.A., applied to a overpass pylon during the whole "Gang of Four" business in 1976, that read, "Jiang Qing, Live like Her!"  This was replaced about four years later, presumably by dues-paying members of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, with the slogan, "Bob Avakian: Live like Him!"  I absorbed these messages at a formative time in my life, and by 1980 I didn't know who to live like, so instead I adopted the Depression Era motto of the National Restaurant Association: "Enjoy Life--Eat Out More Often."

I know that’s a provocative headline – especially when all the facts on the Trayvon Martin case are not yet in.

But it's not like the facts could ever boomerang and make this sentiment seem stupid and short-sighted.  It's just like Joseph's earliest money-making scheme, back in 1966 (before he started selling the crisis seed banks, the secret karate moves the government doesn't want you to know about, and the perpetual motion Galtian solar engines you can make from stuff found in your junk drawer), his line of "Live like Richard Speck" t-shirts.  Oh sure, some unsavory things came out at the subsequent trial, but these rugged Beefy-Ts remained a popular item pretty much everywhere they were sold, except in certain Chicago-area nursing school gift shops.

However, as we learn more about this case, it is becoming clearer every day that George Zimmerman was not only defending himself against a vicious attack when he shot Martin, he was doing so while attempting to be a good citizen, a Good Samaritan, watching out for his family, friends and neighbors.

That's pretty much the lesson I drew from the parable of the Good Samaritan, and it bugs me that people focus on the protagonist helping that one injured man, rather than focusing on all the men he injured along the way.  It's like the complaint lodged by Peter Graves Impersonator Bryan Fischer that the Pentagon has totally "feminiz[ed] of Medal of Honor," because "every Medal of Honor awarded during these two conflicts has been awarded for saving life. Not one has been awarded for inflicting casualties on the enemy. Not one."

Clearly, there's only one cure for this misunderstood, vulva-ized parable, and that's an action movie.  I'm just spitballing here, but I see a kind of Superfly-style poster, with the Samaritan standing in the foreground, holding a bloody sword and giving the camera a hard look while a woman clings to his leg, and the tagline reads: "To You, He's a Good Samaritan.  But to Them...He's Bad News!"

Since the facts of the case clearly no longer support the hysterical claims of Al Sharpton, Spike Lee and Jesse Jackson that Zimmerman stalked Trayvon Martin and murdered him in cold blood because he was black, there is a new fallback narrative emerging from the media. It goes like this: “Well, the police dispatcher advised Zimmerman not to follow the suspicious person and let them handle it. If he only had listened to the authorities, Martin would still be alive and Zimmerman would not be facing second-degree murder charges.”

Nonsense.

In a self-governing society, the police are not the boss of you, and aren't allowed to tell you who you may and may not hunt within the confines of your own gated community.  The most they can do is issue you a ticket if you bag more than your limit (although, if you shoot a teenage girl, they may ask to see your doe license).

No. 1: We don’t know that Zimmerman was still following Martin. Martin may have been following Zimmerman, for all we know.

It could have been a wacky French style farce, playing out on the streets of Sanford, Florida, with Feydeau's trademark slamming doors replaced by the sound of fatal gunshots.

No. 2. This is what police say all the time. It’s what the Nanny State-types persuade Americans to do: “Just let the police handle it. This is our job. We’re trained to deal with these matters.”

That's exactly what police detective Christopher George said to embittered Vietnam Vet Robert Ginty in the 1980 film The Executioner, when he advised Robert not to go into crackhouses and roast hopheads at close range with his homemade flame-thrower.  I like to think this typical Carter-era scene was the pivot that turned viewers against the Nanny State and helped to spark the Reagan Revolution, leading ultimately to more "Stand Your Ground" legislation, and fewer FDA busybodies poking their noses into poultry slaughterhouses.

What we have as a result of that kind of programing is the beginning of the end of a self-governing society in which neighbor watches out for neighbor and citizens take personal responsibility.

I agree with Joseph.  Society was much stronger back before the state shoehorned itself into personal issues like who killed who, and murders were avenged by family members, leading to feuds that could last for years, because the cornerstone of civilization is the family, and nothing brings a family together like having a tradition.  Ours was cottage cheese and lime Jell-O salad at Thanksgiving, while yours might be a multi-generation blood vendetta.

Not too long ago, I saw a suspicious pickup truck parked in front of my property. I went out to see what was up. Naturally, I took my two best friends, Smith and Wesson, with me.

He also tried inviting his other close buds, Ass and Hole, but they've learned through hard experience to screen their calls.

Over the years, I’ve had to chase many suspicious people off my property or out of my gated community.

Most of them were rather transparently disguised as "UPS Delivery Men," "Paperboys," or "Neighbors."

I never had to shoot any of them. But I was always armed and ready to do that if they attacked me.

That appears to be what happened with George Zimmerman.

You're jealous, aren't you?

We shouldn’t be demeaning such men. We shouldn’t be booking them for second-degree murder. We shouldn’t be putting bounties on their heads. We shouldn’t be calling them racists. We shouldn’t be railroading them through the justice system.

We should be thanking them.

We should be rewarding them.

We should be honoring them. Because this is the way men are supposed to behave in a self-governing society.

Remember, "The Only Way You'll Get My Gun is When You Pry It from My Cold, Dead Hand.  Which, Coincidentally, Will Also Be the Way I'll Get Your Skittles."

And The Sinner Is...

Wo'C Correspondent Keith alerted me that the results are in for that Worst Movie Ever poll we talked about here, and the winner, as he more or less predicted, is...Battlefield Earth!  So I apologize for recycling yet another piece from Better Living Through Bad Movies, but the temptation -- let alone the synchronicity -- is simply too great to resist.  So here's our exegesis of L. Ron Hubbard's magnum opus, along with a few life lessons we picked up along the way.

Battlefield Earth (2000)
Directed by Roger Christian
Written by L. Ron Hubbard (novel), Corey Mandell and J.D. Shapiro

A crawl informs us that it’s the Year 3000, and for the past thousand years, Earth has been ruled by the "Psychlos." How did such an advanced race of space-faring beings wind up with such a stupid name? Well, they’re obviously a nutty bunch, judging by John Travolta’s performance, and they seem to have wiped out every trailer park on the planet, so I’m guessing that author and Church of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard just combined the words “psycho” and “cyclone.” Anyway, they’re big-assed aliens from a planet where George Clinton is the dominant life form.

The Psychlos have spent the past millennium prospecting for gold, so I assume that when not invading other planets and committing genocide, they act as the Gabby Hayes-like comic relief to an alien species that resembles Roy Rogers or Hoot Gibson.

Meanwhile, humans (represented by pasty white people dressed like Vikings) are confined to pockets of wasteland, where they are rapidly becoming extinct—so I guess all those dead 19th century Indians are having a bit of a laugh. Just so we get the point, the director pans the pristine, snow-capped Rocky Mountains (giving us a glimmer of hope that even in the bleak, post-apocalyptic future, there will still be beer commercials) and a subtitle reads: “Man is an endangered species.” Despite this, the Bush Administration still wants to drill in the Arctic National Man Refuge.

The survivors of humanity have adopted the usual trappings of barbarism—furs and buckskin clothing, polytheism, and French braids. One courageous lad (Barry Pepper) defies the anger of the gods and boldly ventures forth alone to find his destiny. Within thirty seconds he gets thrown from his horse, and panicked by a miniature golf course. Fortunately, he runs into a pair of hunters, and offers them snacks in exchange for exposition.

They take shelter in the Apocalypse Galleria and huddle around a cook fire. But one of the Psychlos turns out to be a mall walker, and he takes exception to their careless use of an open flame so close to Lane Bryant. The alien stuns the two hunters with its ray gun, but Barry is too fast for it, perhaps because the alien isn’t entirely at ease clomping around in Gene Simmons’ platform boots from
KISS.

Eventually, Barry and the hunters are put in a cage built into the belly of an alien jet. Yes, even though it’s a thousand years in the future, and the aliens can instantly teleport across the galaxy, they still use internal combustion engines. Suck it, Al Gore!

The jet flies to the Psychlo’s capital, Biosphere 2. The humans are issued those little anti-snoring patches for their noses, which somehow helps them to survive the extraterrestrial environment inside the dome. But it’s not only the air that’s different; the entire domed city is perpetually bathed in a dim blue glow, suggesting the Psychlos can only exist in the atmosphere of a soft-core porn film.

The jet lands at the “Human Processing Center—Denver,” and we look forward to watching Barry get rendered into a form of alien Velveeta. Instead, he startles his captors by shooting one of the Psychlos with its own gun, and making a break for it. But he immediately slips and falls, for along with man’s loss of art, science, and medicine, he has also forgotten the ancient admonition not to run on the linoleum in your socks.

Barry slides to a stop at the platformed feet of Psychlos John Travolta and Forrest Whittaker, who were in the middle of discussing how beeswax will help to keep the fuzz down on your dreadlocks.

Travolta, it seems, has fallen from favor with the Home Office, and has been condemned to serve as security chief of Earth for another 50 years. All the other Psychlos laugh at John, except for his immediate supervisor, who’s too busy cultivating the largest dewlap in the galaxy.

Cut to Planet Psychlo. It’s a grim, inhospitable world; a dark urban landscape stretches to the horizon, studded with towers belching fire and pollution into the perpetual twilight of a purple sky, and inhabited by cruel beings thirsting for wealth and power. So basically, it’s Houston.

Cut right back to Earth, where John is getting drunk and working himself into a thick, creamy lather of overacting, which is later harvested, and dispensed as food to the humans with the help of a sour cream gun from Taco Bell.

John plans to buy his way off the planet by secretly training “man-animals” to mine a newly discovered vein of gold. First, however, he sets the humans to remodeling his office with pickaxes. But Barry, who is evolving faster than the apes in 2001, turns on John’s stereo and boldly messes with his equalizer settings.

The outraged Travolta immediately straps Barry into a dentist’s chair and has a Portuguese Man O’ War teach him Conversational Psychlo. Then they shoot some pollen in his eye, and suddenly, he’s The Computer Wore Moccasins.

John, realizing that Reading Is Fundamental, takes Barry on a field trip to the Denver Library, and tells him that “Man is an endangered species,” because Barry was ignorant when the film began, and couldn’t read the opening titles.

Later, John hauls Barry and his friends out to the forest, and proves his technological superiority by shooting the legs off a cow. Just as he’s about to win the plush toy, he’s jumped by a feral tribe wearing fox pelts on their heads, which menace him with spears. John miraculously escapes, however, when the tribe itself is attacked by PETA.

Suddenly, Forrest arrives with Barry’s girlfriend, who they’ve identified because she was carrying a chamois with a face scratched into it. The image looks remarkably like one of Red Skelton’s clown paintings, so the Psychlos immediately deduce that it must be Barry. The Girlfriend is then accessorized with the latest in explosive collars.

Back at Biosphere II, John sexually harasses his new secretary, giving us the opportunity to see that female Psychlos have prehensile tongues and male pattern baldness, and, one would assume, an escort service that does pretty well when the House Republican Caucus is in town.

Suddenly, Travolta discovers that governor Dewlap has been skimming profits, and threatens to report him to the Nevada Gaming Commission unless he does something about that Elizabethan ruffle of loose skin hanging from his neck.


Cut to the Rockies, where Travolta orders Barry (who has now gotten his alien jet learner's permit) to fly the human miners up to the gold vein, since the thin atmosphere at high altitudes doesn’t supply enough oxygen to support the Psychlo’s spittle-flecked, mouth-breathing acting style.

Instead, Barry flies to Ft. Hood, where the illiterate, spear-wielding fox-head guys learn how to pilot F-16s by playing Asteroids, while Barry watches that How to Assemble an Atomic Bomb film strip  they always used to make us watch on rainy days in junior high. Then they fly to Kentucky and rob Ft. Knox in a scene that’s not exactly the climax of Goldfinger.

Later, Barry manages to sow doubt and distrust between Forrest and Travolta, with the result that John decapitates a bartender, and shoots off Forrest’s hand.  Forrest looks confused, and considers reporting John to the EEOC for creating a hostile work environment.

Barry riles up all the human prisoners in the Planet of the Apes Memorial Cellblock, and sparks a revolt, but it doesn’t go very well. Just in the nick of time, however, the tribe of primitive hunter-gatherers arrive, flying jet fighters which are in perfect working condition after a thousand years of neglect. But let my car sit for more than a week, and I can just forget about getting it started again without begging one of the neighbors for a jump. Anyway, a bunch of illiterate, lice-ridden, half-naked savages suddenly turn into Top Gun fighter jocks after one trip to the Drivers Ed simulator and start shooting down the technologically advanced Psychlos, proving that Scientology really does work wonders.

The humans blow up Biosphere 2. Then Barry uses his girlfriend’s explosive collar to blow off Travolta’s right arm, in a ruthless act of attempted irony.

Meanwhile, one of Barry’s posse teleports to the Planet Psychlo with an atomic weapon. This is where the aliens really pay for basing their entire economy on the petrochemical industry, since the bomb causes their atmosphere to catch on fire.

And even though the film isn’t explicit about this, we sense that as every living thing on the surface of the planet is incinerated, certain cashiered whistleblowers from the Psychlo EPA enjoy a moment of smug vindication.


So what new truths have we gleaned from Battlefield Earth? Basically, if you're looking for a weird, nerdy religion with a scripture based on classic sci-fi themes like time travel, teleportation, and strange alien worlds, then you might as well just join the Mormons.  At least they don't make crappy action movies, and if you're an attractive young woman, you're much less likely to be selected by church elders as the host organism for Tom Cruises' next baster baby.

She's Like Perry Mason, But With a Breathable Cotton Panel

Our friend, mystery writer Debbi Mack is giving away an e-book version of her latest novel, Riptide (not the 1984-86 TV detective series with Joe Penny and Perry King, which I always confuse with the 1960-62 TV detective series Surfside 6, with Troy Donohue and Van Williams).  I'm a little late to the party, and the coupon on her site is only good until Saturday, so as she says, "act fast."

Remembrance of Dicks Past

Dick Clark, as you've probably heard, has passed on to a better, Ryan Seacrestless place, and at the risk of speaking ill of the dead, we thought we'd take a look back at Dick's brief movie career, with this review culled from the Teenage Wasteland chapter of Better Living Through Bad Movies.

Because They’re Young (1960)
Directed by Paul Wendkos
Written by James Gunn, based on a novel by John Farris.

Tagline: “Whoever you are, you’re in this picture! Because this tells of youth’s challenge to grown-ups who can’t understand!”

Based on the tagline, this film was a seminal influence on the early works of DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince.

But let’s meet our cast of characters:

Dick Clark is a new history teacher, a “firebrand” who believes in really talking to teens, asking them meaningful questions like what they think of the new single by The 1910 Fruitgum Company. But this school doesn’t allow gum, so Dick is in for trouble.

Joanne, the principal’s secretary, is an uptight, sexless spinster known around campus as “The Snow Queen.” She’ll be Dick’s love interest.

Shy, awkward Buddy. He worships his mother, who, unbeknownst to him, is a blowsy drunk who “dates” guys for a bottle of tequila. Buddy will be having some emotional problems in this movie.

Ricky is a cute, wholesome cheerleader who can’t wait to get married to boyfriend Doug McClure, while Doug is a red blooded, boneheaded football player who can’t wait to get into Ricky’s pants. “Don’t give me that malarkey about cold showers,” he says. Doug will be learning a few things about sex in this movie.

Tuesday Weld has already learned a few things about sex. Her shrewish mom thinks she’s a slut, but Tuesday avers, “I am not going to be a scarlet woman! I made a mistake! It won’t happen again!” Or will it?

Griff has a bad reputation, a worse attitude, and a history with Tuesday (she used to be his regular Tuesday night thing). He’s your typical suburban JD, a rebel without a brain.

So, let’s begin our movie. It’s the first day of school and already Dick has been called to Principal Woodman’s office because he doesn’t like Dick’s casual way of dealing with the Sweathogs. Secretary Joanne begs Dick to do things by the book, that book presumably being “Blackboard Jungle.” While it looks like something is brewing between Dick and Joanne, the kids give the romance a “3,” saying that it doesn’t have a good beat, you can’t dance to it, and Joanne is frigid.

Dick shows his heroic idealism at the big event of the year, the Honor Society Dance. First, he makes them admit all the students, not just the ones with honor. Then, when some young toughs from Hoodlum High try to crash it, Dick won’t let the football players trounce them. Joanne offers to call the police, but Dick nixes that too—he will handle it. And he does, by telling the hoods to leave. They
sneer “Says who?”

“I do,” Dick answers firmly. So, the gang departs, intimidated by the stern dance-show host. Or maybe they realized that James Darren was about to burst into the title song now and were afraid he might get through the entire thing, without being Raptured in mid-chorus by the Time Tunnel.

Later than night, Doug McClure gives Ricky his school ring, and then kisses her. Ricky pushes him away and flounces off—she is not the kind of girl who goes to first base, and especially not when it’s a base on balls. When Doug returns to the gym, Dick can see something is wrong—but he tactfully averts his eyes from Doug’s groin. Doug whines that Ricky is supposed to love him, but she won’t,
and stuff. Dick tells him to think about it from her perspective—and to take a cold shower.

Joanne is jealous of all the attention Dick is paying to Doug’s…problem, and warns Dick that he can’t give so much of himself to his students. At least not with the authorities pressing charges. But Dick says he can’t change, because being a teen messiah is just who he is.

Now it’s report card time. Griff got good grades, and it’s the talk of the school! Doug and all the cool kids are really impressed with how nicely Griff’s conforming these days. We learn why when he tells Tuesday he modeled himself on Eddie Haskell just for her. He turns off the lights, throws her on the couch, and kisses her passionately. Sleazy music plays and he says hungrily, “Let’s take that ride
now!” But Tuesday doesn’t want to ride Griff’s Wild Mouse, since it’s cheap, tawdry, over in two minutes, and leaves her feeling nauseous. She pushes him off and orders him out. Griff is furious to have fake-changed his life for her. He immediately goes to Chris, the butcher at Safeway, and the town’s criminal mastermind and signs up for a life of crime.

Chris invites Griff to a felony scheduled for that weekend. Chris and teen henchman Patcher have a big heist planned, and Griff can be the getaway driver. But when Chris sets off the alarm at the wiener and cold cuts warehouse, Griff gets scared and runs, leaving the ruthless Chris and the homicidal Patcher to
trudge home with link sausages draped around their necks.

Meanwhile, Buddy comes home unexpectedly and finds Mom entertaining Otis, the town drunk. Buddy is horrified to learn that any man can have his mother for a bottle of cheap wine, so he runs away from home. He winds up at play rehearsal, where he weepily confides in Tuesday that mom really isn’t a saint.

She puts a comforting hand on his shoulder, causing him to yell, “Don’t touch me! You’ll get dirty, just like me! Just like my mother!” Griff, who was hiding in the shadows, pops out to tell Buddy that Tuesday is already as grimy as Buddy’s mother, and it’s a ground-in grime that leaves her with Ring Around the Hymen.

This totally destroys Buddy’s faith in virginity, so he pummels Griff, then throws him down the stairs and runs away. Again!

Dick is suspended for having taught Buddy history, which is probably what caused him to go berserk. The FBI initiates a shoot-to-kill search for Buddy, but just then, a student rushes in with vital evidence: it’s Tuesday’s library book, and it has blood on it! DNA testing reveals that Tuesday went all the way with Griff, and so Buddy was justified in beating the crap out of him. Joanne tries to get Tuesday to come forward and save Buddy, but Tuesday hysterically explains that her mother thinks she’s a tart so she has to get away to drama school! But if anyone knows she’s impure she will never be admitted, since the acting profession has very strict moral standards.

Griff, jealous of Buddy’s and Tuesday’s bad mothers and the opportunities they provide for big, dramatic scenes, shouts at his father, “You never did care about me!” and storms out of the house.

Dick finds Buddy and tells him sympathetically that it’s always a shock to find out that your mother is the town’s cheap floozy, but hey, nobody’s perfect. Mom and Buddy hug and cry, and Buddy gets a contact high from her breath.

Tuesday resolves to confess and save Buddy from the death penalty, even if it means she’ll never get her SAG card. But when she and Dick arrive at the principal’s office, they find that Griff has already cleared Buddy. So, Tuesday’s reputation is safe and she can play a virgin in Dobie Gillis without anyone being the wiser.

Doug and Ricky reflect that they have learned a valuable lesson from all this: never have sex, because it only leads to violence, shame, and overacting. Doug says half-heartedly, “We can still have fun,” as he and Ricky sublimate through weenie roasts or something.

But just when everyone’s problems are solved, Patcher shows up and tries to kill Griff. The two boys have a knife fight in the biology lab, considerately avoiding the big aquarium that modern movie teens would feel compelled to break.

Patcher stabs Griff, but Dick, who was a football star at Neurasthenic University, tackles Patcher, thus proving that while history is all well and good, it’s sports that really matter. As the police take Patcher away, Principal Woodman calls an ambulance for Griff, causing him to say in amazement, “What you do you know? You guys give a damn!” Even better, the knife-fight cured Joanne’s frigidity, and she symbolically embraces Dick, and all that Dick stands for. The End.

Thanks to Because They’re Young, we now know that back in the early Sixties teenagers were all in their thirties, so normal adolescent angst was often complicated by erectile dysfunction, or osteoporosis. But perhaps a more eye-opening element is the filmmakers’ conviction that the proper way to treat erotophobia is with a shiv-wielding rumble.

 Our understanding of human sexuality is still incomplete, but it is clear that Because They’re Young was largely responsible for inspiring the Sexual Revolution. Its influence was apparent the very next year, when West Side Story was released, and countless potential spinsters found their career plans to be cold and unresponsive ruined by the musical’s climactic knife fight. No longer able to effectively sublimate, America’s sour-faced secretaries and purse-lipped librarians found that the merest suggestion of an attempted stabbing rendered them moist and febrile, and before the decade was out, these same prissy, bun-wearing killjoys were doffing their cat-eye spectacles and rolling around naked in the mud at Woodstock. There are even some who claim Because They’re Young paved the way for the Voting Rights Act of 1964 when its bold therapeutic approach was adopted by The Black Rebels, made later that same year, and released with the tagline, “Switchblade fights and civil rights!”

So while Because They’re Young may not have much to offer in the way of handling teens, it does have much to teach us about curing vaginal dryness and eliminating the poll tax.