Every October, one of my closest friends and I spend hours scouring the internet for any trace of a showing of "Rocky Horror Picture Show" within the entire state of Colorado. After five years of searching, we still haven't found a regular theatrical showing in any month of the year in our own state, as well as any of the ones directly bordering it. Somehow in the past twenty years, Dr. Frank-N-Furter seems to have packed up his lab once and for all and left popular culture for the planet of Transsexual. While many musicals have been hailed as its replacement (Snakes on a Plane comes to mind first), none seem to have really fulfilled on their promise. While it would please me greatly to herald to coming of a new Brad Majors, I can only tell you all that while "Reefer Madness" may never enjoy the widespread acclaim, or maybe, total lack of it, if you can persuade a group of friends with a flexible sense of humor to a in-house showing of it, you might once again be reminded of the glove-snapping, Time-Warping days of yore.
After a 2005 premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, "Reefer Madness" was given an airing on Showtime, after which it picked up an Emmy for best music/lyrics and received nominations for choreography and makeup design. With a surprisingly strong roster of actors, including Alan Cumming (X-Men 2), Kristen Bell (Heroes, Forgetting Sarah Marshall) and Neve Campbell (Scream), Reefer Madness is a tongue in cheek, cautionary tale satirizing the 1937 film of the same name, which preached to parents the danger pot posed to their children. Oddly enough, the one great fault I found with the film was that the tongue wasn't quite planted firmly enough in the cheek, and I cared about the leading characters almost too much to take the joke completely. Nonetheless, the musical numbers were catchy and ridiculous- with titles that are almost as telling as the songs themselves, ranging from "Listen to Jesus, Jimmy" to "Jimmy Takes a Toke". The story begins with a government agent (Alan Cumming) explaining to a group of nervous, 1930's-era parents how the demon weed was taking over their communities, using the parable of "The Harper Affair" to illustrate his point. "The Harper Affair" follows little Jimmy and Mary Lane who finds themselves staring into the face of temptation- the lit joint. You don't have to be a marijuana fan to enjoy this film and the humor within it- having never touched the stuff myself, I still was able to appreciate the sensationalized hype that still today can seize a society in its grip. The film, though satire, doesn't fall into the fatal trap of using throwaway characters and hoping we might take heed of their plight, but seems to genuinely examine their arcs (however ridiculous), and is assisted by some top-notch performances on behalf of its lead actors. Kristen Bell as Mary Lane is particularly delightful to watch; as both a sunshine-y Sandra Dee-esuqe throwback and latter, as a naughty S&M fiend. While the formula of the movie as a whole may seem a little too close to comfort to "Rocky Horror", that's part of the appeal of the piece itself. Much like its predecessor, "Reefer Madness" takes one of the underbelly aspects of our society, marijuana, (or as those in the movie say, "Mary Jew Wanna", and laughs in the faces of those who are too afraid to look into it a little closer. It's not quite "out-there" as aliens from the galaxy of Transylvania creating a sex-monster, but in my opinion, that's for the best in our more realist, contemporary age. Take a watch for yourself and see. Maybe in a few more years, "Jimmy Takes a Toke" will have beat out "The Time Warp" as the geek-dance of choice. Maybe. But frankly, I'm not sure I'm quite ready to let it go.
No comments:
Post a Comment