My Heart Belongs to Jackie: Smokey and the Bandit II

By Eric Weber

As a connoisseur of horror and cult films, one might think that I would have absolutely zero interest in the action/comedy series Smokey and the Bandit. For one, the movies are all about trucks and cars, which does not appeal to me at all; and secondly, the smart-alecky, “good ol’ boy” humor can quickly become annoying.

Luckily, the movies are graced with a great cast of actors that make all of these macho hijinks watchable. I am definitely a fan of Burt Reynolds; I think he has a really good sense of humor about his image and is a legitimately funny guy. Sally Field is, of course, cute and perky. Yet the adorable Jerry Reed seems to be the unsung hero of the series with his infectious smile and charming personality. These performers enhance the second movie in the series, Smokey and the Bandit II, by taking what could have easily become a plodding and simple car chase movie and making it one of my favorites

Then we have Jackie Gleason.

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Don’t Give Up: Go Stir Crazy

By Jemiah Jefferson

“I only have one speed: balls out.”

One of the essential films of my childhood was released in 1980, and I am almost completely certain that I saw it in the theater, being an avid fan of both Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder by the age of eight. Besides hearing Pryor’s comedy albums, I had also been lucky enough to catch Silver Streak on late-night TV as a wee one, and I most absolutely had seen The Wiz in the theater, and loved the hell out of it. And I am fairly certain I came out of the womb as a fan of Gene Wilder; no one can prove otherwise.

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It Runs Like A Dream: Used Cars

By Cait Brennan

It’s hard to believe that once upon a time, at least in mainstream studio movies, gross-out comedy pretty much didn’t exist. The Motion Picture Production Code dutifully garroted impure creative expression from the early ’30s through most of the 1960s, and when the Code was finally broken, New Hollywood spent ten years making mirthless character studies about sexually dysfunctional bank robbers, suicidal Vietnam casualties, and internecine crime syndicates. There were hints of what was to come in movies like Michael Ritchie’s The Bad News Bears, but for the most part, auteur baby-boomer navel-gazing was the order of the day.

All that changed in July of 1978, when a no-budget frat comedy called Animal House belched its way into theatres with no real stars and zero expectations. It grossed over a million dollars a week and ran for a year and a half. Like a flatulent Trinity explosion, Animal House set off a raunchy-comedy arms race, with every studio in Hollywood frantically green-lighting anything with a dick joke. 1979’s Meatballs struck more box office gold, and by 1980 the marketplace was near-flooded with “adult comedies” from Airplane! and Caddyshack to the Tony Danza/Fran Drescher classic The Hollywood Knights. Even Mad magazine tried to copy their effete Ivy-League “betters” with the nakedly imitative Up The Academy (directed, almost beyond the limits of human credulity, by Robert Downey, Sr.)

In a year like that, it’s not surprising that a great movie might have gotten lost in the crowd. One did, and it might be the best of the bunch: director Robert Zemeckis’ 1980 comedy Used Cars. Zemeckis’ second feature (after his inventive and joyous Beatles tribute I Want To Hold Your Hand), Used Cars stars Kurt Russell and Jack Warden in a merciless send up of American corruption in the pre-Reagan era, with a razor-sharp script penned by Zemeckis and Bob Gale.
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But I Don’t Wanna Be In The Army: Private Benjamin

By Emily Carney

Being a Navy veteran, I have an abiding interest in military-themed films of any sort, so I decided to re-watch 1980’s Private Benjamin. While it’s no G.I. Jane (perhaps the greatest female-in-the-military film, in which we see Demi Moore become the baddest, hardest Navy SEAL ever), it does have its hilarious moments (and its anxiety-provoking, PTSD-inducing moments, for me).
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Billy Joel, Glass Houses

By Less Lee Moore

My first “grown up” album was Barry Manilow Live, which I received as a Christmas present when I was five. My sister Summer’s interest in rock and roll started at an earlier age; she was so obsessed with Billy Joel’s Glass Houses album that she received it for a present when she was two.

I read a lot of music magazines when I was a kid, and though I can’t recall the specific ones that criticized Glass Houses, I recall that it was a bit of a deal-breaker for Billy Joel’s fans. One of the most vocal critics was my then-stepfather Larry, who thought Joel spent too much time trying to sound like other musicians on the album and not enough time just being himself.
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Pylon, Gyrate

By Jimmy Ether

Rock punditry tends to beg for “who’s better” comparisons between bands. Either because they were rivals, peers, or part of the same scene. Beatles or the Stones? Nirvana or Pearl Jam? The Brian Jonestown Massacre or The Dandy Warhols? But if asked who from the 1980s Athens, Georgia music scene should battle it out for that trophy, you’re more likely to be asked “REM or The B-52s?” than you are to ever hear mention of the band Pylon.
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INXS, S/T

By Less Lee Moore

INXS was one of the bands that my peers actually made fun of me for liking, mispronouncing their name as “Ink-siss” and turning up their noses at my insistence that they were really good. I saw them open for Adam Ant in 1983 and became a fan of their video for “The One Thing” (including Michael Hutchence’s smoldering presence) which was aired frequently on MTV. During the Christmas season of 1984, I became obsessed with their most recent release The Swing, which placed them in an entirely new category of awesome (and should be written about at length at some point in the near future).

Soon after, when trolling the record stores, I chanced upon some of the band’s earlier albums, 1981’s Underneath The Colours and their self-titled debut from 1980. The sound they established and perfected with Shabooh Shoobah and The Swing was only hinted at on the somewhat-underwhelming Underneath The Colours album; their debut was something else entirely.
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Bauhaus, In The Flat Field

By Less Lee Moore

I first heard Bauhaus through a friend of a friend, but I first heard OF the band thanks to my frequent trips to Lakeside Mall as a teenager.

There was a cool-looking Chinese punk dude who also went to the mall frequently. He had spiky hair and wore a leather motorcycle jacket and a black T-shirt that said BAVHAVS. (I was soon to discover that he was a total lameass poseur, but that’s a story for another time and place.) In my ignorance, I thought that the band was actually called Bav-Haves until the aforementioned friend of a friend (or someone who took pity on me) set me straight.

Ah, those halcyon pre-Internet days.
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Three Bittersweet Songs to Walk Down the Aisle To

By Jesse Roth

Having hit that stage of my life where just about everyone I know is getting married, I have been somewhat forced to think about the details of my own wedding. From considering possible locations and times of the year, to who does (or does not) get an invite, I have a certain degree of confidence that I know what I want for my “big day” and possibly how to go about it.

This is all despite two very significant facts: (1) I don’t have any semblance of a significant other at the moment and (2) I’m not even sure I want a wedding when I do actually get married. Nevertheless, I am fully prepared when the time comes to plan a cost-effective, fun, reflective-of-me-and-spouse mini-spectacular . . . or just haul ass to the courthouse.

Though the jury is still out for me about about whether or not I want to dance at my wedding, I do know that walking down an aisle is almost unavoidable in most ceremonies, and usually involves some level of melodic noise. Over time, I have come across a few songs that were both beautiful as well as meaningful enough in my own life to warrant usage in a possible aisle journey. Being one of many who soundtrack their significant life moments to particular songs, I have also looked to my treasure trove of music to aid me in this fantastical pursuit. In several cases, however, I stumbled upon some aspect of the song’s history (or the story told in the lyrics) that caused me to wonder if such a sad tale ran counter to the image most of us are trying to project in a wedding environment. Presented are three such songs that I may find myself conveniently misinterpreting on my journey down the aisle:
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The Sacred Triangle: Bowie, Iggy & Lou, 1971 – 1973

By Christian Lipski

In 1971, David Bowie, Iggy Pop, and Lou Reed had careers that were in various states of stagnancy: Bowie’s a one-hit nonentity, Iggy’s a flaming wreck, and Lou’s a fading flower. Using testimony from eyewitnesses as well as music journalists, The Sacred Triangle aims to illustrate the bonds that tied together three of the most interesting entertainers the 1970s had to offer.
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