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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (May 5, 1978)
***',«**»£ V-N'®* 1 .' S’. K> W k ififift fii'tfi r,nft m uim .>ii!7i» vm THE BATTALION FRIDAY, MAY 5. 1978 Page 11 ntertainment Rocky Horror is a sing-along ith comedy, fantasy, eroticism PIPES — CUSTOM BLENDED TOBACCO CIGARS — DOMESTIC & IMPORTED Imported Cigarettes SNUFF AND SPITTOONS Town & Country Center I I I Bryanj By J. WAGNEK MINES Battalion Staff I just had a nightmare... .or an ^rotic fantasy, I’m not sure which. You see, there’s this movie, JncL.well, uh...it’s about this ransvestite named Dr. Frank-N- r urter.. .uh...I mean, it’s a sa- ..well, actually it’s a science fic- comedy...ana there’s a handy- tan named Riff Raff... and the au- Bience is singing along and throwing |ice...oh, it’s also a musi- |al...uh...uh... Oh hell, there’s only one way to Lplain the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Go see it. The movie has been playing as a midnight feature at a College Sta tion theater for the past several weeks. Almost every night they have had a full house. Oh, and when you go see it, be prepared. To put it mildly, the au dience likes to get involved. In fact, unless you have an I.Q. of 5 or less, you’ll notice things are a little un usual the minute you walk in. Yes, that is a guy sitting over there. Yes he is wearing makeup and a dress. No, don’t ask questions, just relax. After the movie’s over you’ll understand everything. The movie begins with a huge pair of crimson lips. Yes, lips. Big ones. Fully equipped with big white teeth and a strangely, urn, unset tling tongue. Review The lips sing a song. Listen care fully to the words because they will be your final warning. Consider them a mere indication of things to come. If you find yourself com- Hrector improves style d Gore prevails in ‘Fury’ k ent I the( sentei iontrii ;ger / Pol ormiti itor the By JEFF GILLEY Like a barker at a sideshow, the ads for this new movie promise “ter- or and suspense. Actually, “The fury” is about as terrifying as a piggy cartoon. Review I “The Fury, like its predecessor ICarrie,’ is about psychic forces [one wild. Robin (Andrew Stevens) jnd Gillian (Amy Irving) are two Jeenagers with powerful rectoc 'Sychokinetic abilities (the power to y S)il 10ve objects at will). That means idedo ^ er characters had better just §j U( jj mile and tiptoe out of the room if lobin and Gillian get mad. Robin is kidnapped by a secret ut frugal government agency iboutl jrved jived ard. headed by John Cassavetes. Robin believes his father (Kirk Douglas) has been killed. Not so. To find his son, Robin’s father joins forces with Gillian, who has the gift of making people hemorrhage. The writer in ject lots of forced humor along the way for the true masochists in the audience. It’s hackneyed and confused, but rarely boring. “The Fury” is well paced and has enough dead bodies to please anyone. Winsome, believ able Amy Irving and a straight-faced Kirk Douglas keep the film afloat, with a little help from John William’s score. Director Brian DePalma (“Sis ters,’’ “Obsession,” “Carrie”) doesn’t plagiarize Alfred Hitchcock even once in this one, which may make “The Fury” something of a landmark for him. His style has im proved, too — less of the artsy non sense of his earlier films. But DePalma’s mania for turning characters into caricatures is pain fully evident, much to the chagrin of bad guy Cassavetes, who must slink through the melodrama like an em barrassing parody of Dr. Stangelove, complete with black suit, crooked, black-gloved arm, and the same silly grin. What DePalma never seems to learn is that gore does not substitute for suspense and a clever plot. He should take a lesson from Hitch cock, who insists he made “Psycho” in black and white so he wouldn’t have to show the blood in red. That’s good taste. DePalma repor tedly used 20 gallons of the stuff in just one scene of “The Fury,” and that’s not even in the imaginatively bloody climax. Those who like that sort of thing will love The Fury. Otherwise, there is little to recommend it, and the people who pay $3.50 to see this unthrilling thriller may be the really furious ones. treasi •, have; mo, I d c4 )ort 1 ciatioil thep or d it's this vl 16-HSI WE BUY ALL BOOKS / • (Even paperbacks & out-of-edition books if you bring them in with your good text books) Sell your books before you leave for the summer — they’re worth more now! We also buy used Biology, Chemistry & drawing equipment jjl University Bookstore At the Northgate’ TEXT BOOKS CALCULATORS SCHOOL SUPPLIES m How to be the life of the campus. Put a worm on your chest! A Monte Alban Mezcal “Eat The Worm” T-shirt. Here’s the craziest T-shirt on campus. And it’s official proof you’re in the know about Monte Alban Mezcal—the mysterious drink from Mexico that comes with an Agave worm in the bottle. (Legend holds it the source of incredibly wondrous experiences!) You can find out more about Mezcal from the necker b(X)klet on every bottle. So get yours soon. But right now send in for your colorful “Eat the Worm” T-shirt and get ready for fame on campus! Every T-shirt comes with an official “Order Of The Worm” diploma that’s ideal for framing. Morvte Alban. Authentic Mexican Mezcal. The proof is in every bottle. Yes sir, I want to put a worm on my chest! Please send... - - — T-s fiat The Worm” @ $3.95. Size. -shirt(s) with diploma certificate(s). Color: Black Gold. Name Address City State Zip No purchase necessary. Allow 4-6 weeks for delivery. Do not send cash or stamps. Send check or money order to; Barton Brands Monte Alban Mezcal Offer. P.O. Box 2418, Chicago, Illinois 60690. Offer void where prohibited by law. © 1978. Monte Alban Mezcal. 80 Proof. Imported exclusively by Stuart Rhodes, Ltd., New York, New York. UT505 pletely repulsed, leave quickly. In a few scenes you’ll be getting the shock treatment. The star of the show is Dr. Frank-N-Furter. He’s a scientist who is creating a man. He’s also a sweet transvestite from Transsexual, Transylvania. Honest. Those aren t my words, they’re straight out of the movie. Maybe I’d better stop right here. You'll probably think I’m crazy if I tell you any more. In fact, you prob ably think I’m crazy right now, don’t you? Well, I m not. It’s just that I happen to like the film. I ve seen it six times. I even bought the sound track. So who cares what you think? I’ll keep going. In addition to Frank, there are Brad and Janet. They are the healthy, normal kids who are rav aged by Frank’s “crazed imagina tion” when they are forced to stop at his castle because of a flat tire. Then there are Riff Raff and Magenta, Frank’s servants who turn villain in the end. There’s also Frank’s creation, Rocky Horror, a tanned muscleman with the mental ity of a grasshopper. And there’s Dr. Scott, a rival scientist; Columbia, a groupie; and Eddie, Dr. Scott’s nephew who serves a somewhat grisly purpose for Frank. And last, but by no means least, there’s the audience. That’s right, I said the audience. The movie has been playing for several weekends in College Station and up to a year or more in some major cities. Yet each weekend the audiences keep getting bigger, wilder and weirder. Most of them have seen the show at least five or six times. Con sequently, they know every part and every song by heart. They don’t hesitate to sing along, either. In addition, there are several parts of the movie to which everyone responds physically. There’s a wedding scene (cover your head or you’ll get rice down your shirt), there is a song called “There’s a Light” (everyone holds up a candle or lighter), a rainstorm scene (the guys with the squirt guns are really starting to multiply), and a scene featuring a dance called the “Time Warp” (don’t sit next to the aisle, the dancers will block your view.) If you decide to risk your sanity and see the movie, plan to see it twice: once to get used to things and watch all the weirdos in the audi ence, and another time to really watch the film. The experience would not be nearly as impressive without all the help from the crowd, but the movie is superb in its own right. If you can manage to keep your eyes on the screen and hear all the dialogue, you’ll realize that it successfully ridicules horror movies, science fic tion movies, today’s sexuality, and about a dozen other things that have been needing a good swift kick where it counts. But enough of all this. Im getting the itch to do the Time Warp again. Go. Leave. Stop reading right now and go see the Rocky Horror Picture Show for yourself. It’s either a nightmare or an erotic- fantasy. I’m not sure which, and I want a second opinion. midnite show sponsored by the society for creative anachronism A RALPH BAKSHI FILM WIZARDS may 5 & 6 cinema I & II $1.25 Hoax fools Titusville ******+***.****+***** { THIS SUNDAY % * Plant Sale $ jcZachburgers Happy Hour M United Press International PHILADELPHIA—Six students recently pulled an elaborate hoax that fooled the president of the Uni versity of Pittsburgh at Titusville, a newspaper, and almost—but not quite—the Quaker State Oil Refin ing Corp. The students wanted to see how people in western Pennsylvania’s oil country would react to an impressive—if fake—entourage of rich Saudi Arabian oil barons travel ing around in public. To stage the hoax, the students spent $1,000 on costumes, makeup, stationery, flags and a rented car. Christopher Krysinski, 19, who came up with the idea, constributed $600 to the scheme. “We just thought it would be fun,” he said. “Some people go to Walt Disney World and spend a thousand dollars. We just did it in Titusville.” Krysinski played the fictitious Crown Prince of Geptwab, Saudi Arabia. His entourage included Chris Rasmussen, 20, as his chauf feur, and four others who imperso nated Bal Shey-tar, the prince’s sec retary; his half-brother; a body guard, and an interpreter. “We just walked around and ap parently people believed us,” Krysinski said. Thinking it authentic, the Titus ville Herald published a letter in which the prince called Titusville an “excellent location to live, work and invest.” A reporter said the news paper took the gag in good humor and said the group had become “folk heroes” to their fellow students. A letter to the president of the university’s Titusville branch, how ever, had a different impact. It said the prince had been “rudely insulted by students on a visit and found the school’s housing facilities “deplor able.” T had visions of $2 million going down the drain when I read that let ter,” Joseph Ball, the school’s presi dent, told the Herald. But he added, “It was a good-natured spoof of self-viewed importance. Krysinski and Rasmussen also said the hoax sparked rumors that the Quaker State Oil Refining Corp. in Oil City would be sold to Arabs. On April 9 the retinue took pictures of the company’s headquarters. However, Quentin E. Wood, president and chief executive offi cer, said the only thing the group did was attract the attention of a se curity guard who called police. * * * * * * * * * * * 1-7 p.m. ZACHAR1AS GREENHOUSE dub & game parlor •• :■■■ ••.■PSKij* 12BT'Hwy. 30 (the Briarwood Apts.) 693-9781 * * * * * * * * f * • Judge, Court of Criminal Appeals: since Jan. 1,1978 • Judge, 85th District Court: 10 years • County judge: 9 years • Municipal judge: 4 years • Practicing attorney: 1948—1967 • 1948 graduate: Baylor University Law School • World War II veteran • Deacon and teacher of men’s Bible class: First Baptist Church, Bryan Vote to retain Judge W. C. (Bill) Davis—the QUALIFIED candidate — on the Court of Criminal Appeals, Place 3. Democratic primary: May 6. There is only ONE issue in a judicial race: QUALIFICATIONS. JUDGE W. C. (BILL) DAVIS Political advertisement paid for by W. C. Davis Campaign, W. C. Davis, Treasurer, 1212 Guadalupe, Austin, Texas 78701 MAKE YOUR CHOICE 86 DISTRICT JUDGE, 85TH JUDICIAL DISTRICT JUEZ DISTRITO, DISTRITO JUDICIAL 85 W. T. (Tom) McDonald, Jr 86 THE RIGHT CHOICE W.T. (Tom) McDonald/ Jr. FOR YOUR DISTRICT JUDGE Pd Pol. Adv by W 7. McDonald. Treasurer, Box 445, Bryan, Tx. 77801.