AH
Animal House – I never watched this movie as a kid, although it must have been on TV a million billion times and all of my friends saw it. Why?!?!?!?!?!?
Okay, it’s pretty funny, and it has lots of silly scenes. I don’t remember what I enjoyed the most, other than Belushi saying “Expelled? Seven years – down the drain.” (The other great line in the film is from Dean Wormer: “The time has come for someone to put his foot down – and that foot… is me!!). Great sexy, wacky scenes that reminded me of a big budget nutty version of M*A*S*H* (who dares to tell me that Animal House is better than M*A*S*H*, huh?!?!?). It even had Donald Sutherland (the star of M*A*S*H*) in it!!!!!!! Nice to see the film debut of Kevin Bacon, Tom Hulce, and Karen Allen (who, three years later, would appear as the love interest in Raiders of the Lost Ark… then nothing else of note). The social commentary is o-kay… Bullys, snobs, racists. Whatever, I deal with them all the time in real life anyway. Otis Day and the Knights not remembering the frat boys they played for, ha ha ha. Snobbishness and drunkenness. D-Day was good with his motorcycle, his Deathmobile; nice mustache, too.
The DVD comes with some great extra features, namely an in-character documentary of “where are they now”. Boon and Katy married and remarried: 64-69, 74-85, some time went by, Boon became a documentarian, they got married a third time, had a kid, Otis. Babs, tour guide at Universal Studios. “That’s the table from My Dinner With Andrew and Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner, declared a national monument by Ronald Reagan; no one can eat on it again.” Dorfman – battled weight, then went on a diet of injecting the urine of pregnant women. Got into self-help through the “Am I Really As Okay As I Should Be?” movement. Savagely beaten by Mike Tyson, grew up spiritually. “Mike has an anger problem.” Still waithing to meet the right woman. Kevin Bacon becomes a right wing religious nut, saw Jesus in his food, went on self-righteous missions to Africa. Good for him! As Chip Fuller he wrote 100 novels in fie years. Wrist injury from typing. Robert Hoover, four kids, wife, two cars, has everythinga man can want. Los Angeles District Attorney called him for advice, chuckle. Dean Wormer still harboring anger against the Deltas even in an old age home, his wife is a lush in some dive somewhere, Eric “Otter” Stratten, successful gynecologist. D-Day, Daniel Simpson Day. The Yearbook – an Animal House Yearbook and documentary, gets real with the story. The producers had created “Laser Orgy Girls”, which was like “Charles Manson in High School”, so in order to make it they moved it to college. John Belushi had a plastic face, they do a skit on it. “No college would let us film our movie on their campus.” One in Eugene, Oregon fell for it, since they had regretted turning down The Graduate. The Deltas and Omegas, as actors, were put in opposing camps even off-camera. Elmer Bernstein scored the comedy as if it were a serious film, Landis’ idea, as he had been childhood friends with the Bernsteins, and comedies have been doing it ever since (hello, Wes Anderson). First cut was 175 minutes, unfortunately we don’t get a glimpse at the 60 minutes that they trimmed (AAAAAAHHHH!!!!!!!). When they showed the sneak preview there was a fraternity convention in town, 80% of the audience was from the convention and it was mayhem. Bacon went back to waiting table, Belushi and writer Doug Kenny died.