204 – The Catalina Caper
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Things I liked about the movie:
Little Richard.
The dancing.
The hip lingo.
Impressions
Apparently season one went over well because the sets in season two are obviously much more expensive. This is late, but I just came from several season one episodes and actually injured myself watching K04 Gamera vs. Barugon. I thought I’d take it easy and watch this highly reviewed, Rhino released, color film with perfect digital mastering. This movie actually had a plot, but it was probably worth about 10 minutes of film. It couldn’t decide whether it was a comedy, an action film, or a musical. The director wisely padded it with an hour of girls in bikinis, which brought it up from 2 stars to 3, but it’s still a lousy film. Really, it was just a film about teens in bathing suits and the plot was just a poorly designed structure intended to prop up the skin scenes. There were some funny sight gag riffs but these were sparse. Far and away the best part was Tom’s “Creepy Girl” song in the third host segment.
Synopsis
An art thief steals a scroll and heads for Catalina.
Two dorks get on a cruise ship bound for Catalina with their sights set on girls. One of them is cool, and the other is nerdy. The “cool” one goes below deck to find some bimbos and the nerdy one finds himself a perfectly suitable crazy chick on the deck, whom we later come to know as “the creepy girl.” She rambles on about a dream of being a fish and they fall in love. The “cool” guy returns with some floozies and throws them at the nerdy guy like merchandise. This makes Little Richard appear. It’s a musical! The teens dance like they’ve never danced before (because they haven’t). In fact, my teenaged son walked in, saw one of the scenes of the dancing and asked, “What the heck? Oh, it’s dancing!”
The boat arrives at Catalina Island, where hijinks begin. The art thief actually plans to scam his buyer by doing a bait and switch. The buyer is no honest crook himself. He tries to steal the scroll instead of buying it. The scroll falls into the harbor (sealed inside a tube). Tension mounts as both sides try to recover the tube from the water.
The “good” guys find the tube first, but the “bad” guys take it away. Later, we discover that the “bad” guys actually were tricked into taking a fake. The tricky son of the crooks has fooled the bad guys and secretly (even unbeknownst to his crooked parents) retained the real scroll. He enlists the help of his new friends (the dorks from the beginning of the movie). They talk in some sort of sixties teen language for a long time and come up with a plan to “scare the larceny” out of the crooked parents. It works as only a second rate plot device could. They let the bad guys know they still have the real scroll. The bad guys steal the tube and the chase is on!
After a bunch of running around and fighting, the tube is recovered by the mysterious man who turns out to be an insurance investigator. But, in a cruel twist of fate, when the tube is opened, there’s no scroll inside. I have to admit even I am not sure what just happened here.
Finally, the son of the crooks secretly returns the scroll to the museum. The teens go back to dancing spastically. Realizing they’ve been given a second chance to lead a legit life, the crooks join the dancing.
Host Segments
Intro: The ‘Bots are saying bedtime prayers. First they pray for worthy and sympathetic people, like the extras in Westworld, but then they start focusing on robots. They further narrow their prayers to what must be cute lady robots and they become more and more enthusiastic about it. Joel makes them pray for “Tweaky (?)” against their less loving natures. Joel makes them pray for the Mads! The ‘Bots are reluctant but Joel says they are probably watching and control his oxygen. The Mads don’t want them to pray for them, they want them to pray to them! The Mads are wearing battle tanks. Many clever puns. They’re wearing tank tops. The best beach party ever was Normandy. They can go “shelling” on the beach. Frank picks up a spent shell, holds it to his ear, and says, “I can hear the war!” Joel’s invention is the opposite. He converted a gun into a pink “tickle bazooka.” Frank likes it but Clayton hates it. Frank introduces the movie as a feel good movie that makes us laugh about love. And it has a great theme song.
Segment two: Joel explains “The Sixties.” It wasn’t uncommon for your mom to bring you a steak and she was smoking and she brought your dad a Manhattan for the road—and that was just breakfast. No one wore seat belts, there were subliminal messages, and people smoked openly on The Tonight Show! Crow asks about the rat pack. Well, Dean Martin was the chairman of the board and he could make chicks go up to the room and Jerry Lewis got dumped. Hugh Heffner held court and all the musicians went by their first names, like Crow. Everybody believed what the president said! Toys had metal edges and were breakable and would fit into your mouth. Parents were told to spank their kids! My mom made me get the belt in front of company! The ‘Bots want to know why he can’t just remember the good stuff like everyone else. Joel continues. Did I mention there were drugs?
Segment three: Tom Servo is looking at a frame from the movie with the creepy girl who spoke in poetry to the nerdier of the two dorks on the deck of the cruise ship. He keeps crying, “Oh, creepy girl, oh, creepy girl.” He sings a song to her while Joel and Crow dance slowly. Most of the song is about how you can’t tell what ethnic group she’s from – French, Italian, or one of those swarthy gypsy types? There’s a hilarious stretch in the middle: C is for that feeling of uncertainty knowing what ethnic group you’re from. R is for the gifts you give me every time you smile. The first E is for . . . I’m not sure, and the second E is a grammatical thing otherwise it would be “Creppy Girl” and where would that leave us? P is definitely not Phlegmotonic (?), and Y? Because I love you.
Segment four: Joel thinks Tom’s sarcasm sequencer is out, so he field strips him. Meanwhile TV’s Frank is having a Tupperware party with some mole people. He shows how it’s better to transport guns underwater in Tupperware than in plastic baggies. Clayton shows up and makes Frank nervous so he drops a grenade and some fruit in his lap. Clayton attempts to melon ball Frank’s face.
Final: Joel asks whether it was a confusing film. Crow says no, but for one question—“What the sam hill was going on?” The only part Tom understood was that darling creepy girl. He breaks into song. Joel explains the plot with a chart, but the ‘Bots argue about how all the other non-plot stuff fit in, like the creepy girl and the singing and dancing. Joel smashes the chart over their heads. They read a letter from a couple who fell in love watching MST3k and want them to come to the wedding. Tom loves romance and breaks into the creepy girl song again.
No stinger.
Funny Riffs
The credits are delivered with a silly cartoon that looks like Inspector Clouseau scuba diving.
Joel: Jacque Cousteau meets the Pink Panther!
Servo: So what’s a Catalina Caper?
Joel: It’s one of those little balls you find when you’re eating peel-and-eat shrimp.
A bunch of kids in their very late teens are dancing a little too frenetically.
Crow: Is there a history of epilepsy in your family, Lloyd?
Four girls are standing on a boat watching the post-fight rescue in the water. They don’t help.
Tom as girls: We’ll just stand here because they’re men and we’re not.
A bad band is playing. The camera does a close-up on one musician.
Tom as band member: I’m going to quit this band and start a career in music.
A scuba diver comes up after looking for the scroll.
Tom as diver girl: Hey, everybody! I found a new script. And this one’s funny!
During the corny Hollywood tie-up-the-loose-ends ending:
Tom: Ok people, everybody, wear eye protection. There’s a lot of loose ends flyin’ together all at once here.
The Catalina Caper IMDB Page