Hot Times (1974)

After making several well-received projects as part of the independent-cinema fringe, filmmaker Jim McBride moved toward the mainstream with this vulgar, wisecracking sex comedy, which nearly becomes pornography during several scenes. Set in the New York City area, the picture concerns a high-school schnook named Archie Anders (Henry Cory), whose hormones are driving him crazy. Archie’s beautiful girlfriend, Bette (Amy Farber), has become a devotee of Eastern religion, so she torments Archie during sex by insisting that he refrain from ejaculating for spiritual reasons. This sets the plot of Hot Times—also known as A Hard Day for Archie—in motion. Put bluntly, this is a movie about a young man with a near-constant erection trying desperately to find a sex partner who’s willing to go all the way. In what one presumes were intended to be outrageous comedy setpieces, Archie tries to score with hookers, porn actresses, promiscuous local girls, and so on. Every so often, something mildly amusing happens, but then McBride bludgeons the moment with an obnoxious sound effect or silly narration. Archie’s pal Mughead (Steve Curry) provides said narration, and here’s a sample: “He’d never been next of skin to so much feminology in all his years!” The movie is full of these would-be witticisms, as when Archie’s sister issues a barrage of puns when she discovers Archie masturbating: “Hey, Mom, he’s gonna have a dishonorable discharge!” Were the rest of the movie not so repetitive and sleazy, McBride’s enthusiastic wordplay might have seemed endearing. Yet Hot Times is mostly an endless procession of nude scenes, interspersed with vignettes of softcore coupling. Those who watch sex comedies to ogle female flesh will get their fill, but those who prefer a balance of edifying and erotic content will be disheartened.

Hot Times: LAME

Glen and Randa (1971)

          Lyrical and offbeat, cowriter-director Jim McBride’s postapocalyptic saga Glen and Randa offers a humanistic spin on a genre that’s normally marked by nihilism and violence. Rather than imaginging a near-future Earth where survivors of a cataclysm battle each other for dwindling resources, McBride posits a primitive environment where the eradication of knowledge is the biggest danger to the human race. The lead characters, hippie-ish teenagers Glen and Randa, are introduced nude and in the wilderness, hitting the Adam and Eve allegory hard, so the idea is that they’ve grown up as primitives without schools and other social structures to shape their understandings. Glen has gleaned his sense of the world from comic books that he (barely) reads, so he dreams of finding the gleaming city of Metropolis, where everyone can fly. (Glen’s so beguiled by power fantasies, in fact, that he shouts “Shazam!” whenever lightning strikes.)

          After a long and largely wordless sequence of Glen and Randa cavorting in the woods, the movie shifts to civilization, of a sort, when the young lovers join an enclave of raggedy survivors who gather around a campfire and eat scraps. Next, an old man known only as “The Magician” shows up, putting on a show featuring a random assortment of gadgets from the technology era—a blender, an record player, and even a fire-retardant suit. The Magician is a mile-a-minute blabbermouth, but his connection to the old world fascinates Glen, who becomes the Magician’s de facto assistant. (“You’re too good a man for slavery, Prince Valiant,” the Magician says to Glen in a mishmash of highfalutin phraseology and literary references. “I give you a quest.”) After Glen steals maps from the Magician, he and Randa set out for their next adventure, even though Randa has become pregnant. Finally, the duo falls into the orbit of Sidney Miller (Woody Chambliss), a sweet old recluse living in woods by an ocean shore.

          One could argue that nothing much happens in Glen and Randa, simply because McBride eschews the usual postapocalyptic tropes (messanic characters, radiation, roving bands of savages, etc.). Yet the vibe of the picture is strangely persuasive, and the specific choices that McBride makes are interesting—for instance, the Magician plays a warped 45 of the Rolling Stones’ “Time Is on My Side,” with the irony of that song in a postapocalyptic context emerging gradually. Ultimately, Glen and Randa is a strange little movie filled with connection and despair in equal measure. FYI, although the film carried an “X” rating during its original release, the only edgy material is nudity and some discreet sexuality.

Glen and Randa: GROOVY