200 Motels (1971)

Created by eccentric rock musician Frank Zappa, the bizarre musical 200 Motels undoubtedly means more to Zappa fans and/or those habitually ingesting controlled substances, if not both. Belonging to neither group, I found almost nothing of virtue in 200 Motels. In fact, sitting through the movie’s 98 minutes—notwithstanding the passages that I’m fairly sure I slept through, but who can tell given the movie’s shambling excuse for “structure”—was an experience best described as laborious. Therefore, I can’t in good conscience suggest that plentiful redeeming qualities lurk in the wilds of 200 Motels, although it’s possible that’s true. As the saying goes, I calls ’em like I sees ‘em, and watching 200 Motels, I saw nothing but an endless barrage of self-indulgent nonsense. The title apparently refers to the temporary lodging that rockers inhabit while on tour, and Zappa drew material from the life of his on-again/off-again backing band, the Mothers of Invention. The plot (presuming there actually is one) concerns a band stopping off for mid-tour adventures in the town of Centerville, where one member leaves the group—or something like that. 200 Motels comprises lots of disassociated sketches, intercut with experimental passages that feel like bad examples of film-school endeavors (think mimes and A/V Club-style video effects), as well as a third layer of performance, during which the Mothers play with a full orchestra. Ringo Starr appears periodically, portraying a man dressed up like Frank Zappa, and the Who’s madman drummer, Keith Moon, appears every so often wearing a nun’s habit. Broadway actor Theodore Bikel pops up at regular intervals as some sort of MC in a military uniform. The real Zappa floats through the film like a ghost, mostly visible while conducting the orchestra in performance segments, Oh, and actresses playing groupies bare their breasts, because what’s a ’70s rock saga without some good, old-fashioned sexual objectification? The Mothers play songs including the interminable “Penis Dimension,” which largely comprises singing the word “penis” over and over again. It’s all quite exhausting to watch, and if there’s a central joke running through 200 Motels, it escaped me.

200 Motels: SQUARE

That’ll Be the Day (1973) & Stardust (1974)

          That’ll Be the Day and its sequel, Stardust, collectively tell the life story of a fictional “British Invasion” musician named Jim MacLaine. Compelling and evocative, the films are substantially more insightful than most rock-star pictures—freed from the usual obligation to rehash familiar episodes from the lives of real people, these movies create a pastiche reflecting the life cycle common to every self-destructive superstar.

          As the Buddy Holly-referencing title suggests, That’ll Be the Day takes place during the ’50s. Jim (played by real-life rock singer David Essex) is a tough English kid with abandonment issues—Daddy skipped out when Jim was a wee lad—and dreams of emulating his favorite American rock stars. Jim drops out of school, gets odd jobs like working at a carnival, and bonds with another testosterone-crazed youth, Mike (played by Beatles drummer Ringo Starr). That’ll Be the Day comprises atmospheric but meandering scenes of the buddies brawling and carousing, juxtaposing Jim’s bachelor adventures with his family’s expectations that he’ll get a real job and settle down.

          As written by Ray Connolly, who also penned the sequel, That’ll Be the Day is more about vibe than story, and the lead character comes across as opaque since he’s still in the process of finding himself. Nonetheless, the costuming, dialogue, locations, and period details create a highly credible texture, so at its best, That’ll Be the Day feels like a documentary capturing the vibrant pre-Beatles era in working-class England. Essex and Starr are loose and natural, and the whole cast is stocked with solid British players. However, it’s the music that really energizes the movie, because the soundtrack features amazing tunes by the Beatles, Ray Charles, the Who and others, sometimes played in their original versions as background music, and sometimes performed onscreen by musicians including the Who’s drummer, Keith Moon.

          The follow-up movie, which picks up almost immediately after That’ll Be the Day ends, features a much stronger story, and appropriately so—Stardust dramatizes what happens when Jim and his mates in a band called the Stray Cats become Beatles-type rock stars, leading to the customary onslaught of drugs, groupies, sycophants, and villainous record-company executives. There’s a great deal of continuity between the pictures, even though That’ll Be the Day director Claude Whatham was replaced for Stardust by the proficient Michael Apted. Additionally, Essex’s performance gets deeper and more complicated as his character shifts from post-adolescent angst to rock-star ennui.

          In Stardust, Jim conquers the world with the Stray Cats, ditches the band for a solo career, and eventually becomes a messianic pop-culture figure. At his apex, Jim presents an epic rock opera as a blockbuster TV special, and the project’s success transforms him into a kind of living god for his fans. Being worshipped makes Jim feel detached from society, however, so by the end of the picture, he’s a millionaire recluse living in a European castle, wandering around in a drug-addled haze while managers and promoters tempt him with lucrative comeback offers.

          Seen out of context, Stardust might seem overly melodramatic because of how far it takes the character down the path of self-indulgence, but for viewers who observed Jim’s troubled youth in That’ll Be the Day, the course he charts in Stardust seems believably sad. Once again, the music is great, with tunes by the Lovin’ Spoonful and the Righteous Brothers intermingling with perfectly crafted originals. Better still, the ending is a monster, so Stardust belongs to a select group of sequels that actually improve upon their predecessors.

That’ll Be the Day: GROOVY

Stardust: RIGHT ON

Sextette (1978)

          If there’s one scene that epitomizes the spellbinding strangeness of Sextette, a big-budget musical comedy that’s both tone-deaf and completely unfunny, it’s an extended romantic duet between the heroine and the younger man she just married. The leading lady is none other than Mae West, the notorious actress/writer who first achieved fame in the 1920s for scandalous stage shows. The bridegroom is played by Englishman Timothy Dalton, a decade before his brief run as 007. At the time, West was 84 and Dalton was 32, yet the scene features the actors sharing vocal chores (and they are chores, since neither can sing) on a lifeless, quasi-disco version of the Captain and Tennille hit “Love Will Keep Us Together.”

          Dalton’s a slim young man wearing an elegant tux, and West is an overweight senior hidden behind gallons of makeup, acres of Edith Head-designed sequined costuming, and a haze filter thick enough to trigger a smog alert. At the most ludicrous moment of this sequence, Dalton sings the laughably re-written lyric, “Young and beautiful, your looks will never be gone.” The camera then cuts to a close-up (shot from about 20 feet away) of West writhing seductively, her looks very much gone.

          And that’s pretty much the tone of this whole excruciating picture, which features an old-fashioned lark of a plot about legions of men lusting after West’s character, Marlo Manners. Marlo is a Hollywood movie star who just married her sixth husband, Great Britain’s Lord Barrington (Dalton). Their honeymoon is being celebrated by the public and documented by the media as a major event, but before the duo can (shudder) consummate their union, Marlo’s agent (Dom DeLuise) says the U.S. government wants Marlo to seduce a foreign leader (Tony Curtis) into cooperating with an international peace initiative. Meanwhile, Marlo’s fifth husband, gangster Vance Norton (George Hamilton), has resurfaced despite everyone believing him dead, and he’s intent on reclaiming Marlo’s hand.

          Also thrown into the mix are a fey fashion designer (played by The Who drummer Keith Moon), an imperious Russian film director (played by Beatles drummer Ringo Starr), real-life broadcasters Rona Barrett and Regis Philbin (as themselves), and cameo players Walter Pidgeon and George Raft. Oh, and shock-rocker Alice Cooper shows up at the end, without his trademark ghoul make-up, to (quite effectively) croon a number as a singing waiter.

          This whole mess is based upon the last play West wrote, also called Sextette, and because the play opened in 1961, questions of “why” are unavoidable. Why was a film adaptation deemed necessary almost 20 years after the play opened? Why was a West comeback deemed necessary, more than 30 years after her last starring role in a movie? And why the hell didn’t anyone realize how wrong all of this was? Answers to these puzzlers are lost to the ages, so we’re merely left with a cinematic curio. Sextette is filled with images that would be innocuous in other circumstances but are mind-warpingly bizarre given West’s advanced age: a roomful of bodybuilders flexing their muscles to curry West’s favor; a roomful of diplomats (including a stand-in for then-U.S. President Jimmy Carter) singing and dancing as West holds them in her thrall; West cooing sexual puns as she lounges in bed and drives men like Curtis, Dalton, and Hamilton to erotic distraction.

          West’s performance is abysmal, since she tries to mimic the sass of bygone days without acknowledging the passage of time; the poor woman looks close to toppling when she tries to shimmy in tight dresses. About the only good thing one can say about Sextette is that even though much of the dialogue recycles past favorites (“Why don’t you come up and see me sometime,” and so on), West had not completely lost her flair for penning ribald one-liners, like this zinger: “I’m the girl who works for Paramount all day, and Fox all night.”

Sextette: FREAKY