Note: 11-22-97 host segments for King Kong (1976) are missing. In case you didn't see it, it ended with King Kong climbing one of the twin towers of New York's World Trade Center and getting shot down by helicopters or fighter jets, falling 110 stories to the pavement. The movie poster shows him with his legs on the two towers, but I think the towers are too far apart for that. Anyway, everybody thought he was dead, but ten years later we find out differently in:
King Kong Lives
Intro
"All right. In 1976, Eyetalian producer Dino DeLaurentiis
decided he was gonna be the one to remake the old 1933 King Kong movie. He
vowed that "when the monkey die, people gonna cry." Well, the critics
HATED it, but people went to see it, and it was a big overseas hit, so ten
years later he decided to make a sequel. He asked Stephen King to write
it, he asked a bunch of other people to write it, and it's basically
Dino's plot: "Doctors bring out largest stethoscope in world. Big monkey
heart go ka-thumpa ka-thumpa." In other words, Kong gets a pacemaker and
we get to SEE the actual monkey I.V. work and watch him wake up in
Intensive Monkey Care.
Okay, I gotta be honest with you. When "King
Kong Lives" came out in the theaters, most people didn't like it too much.
I think I was one of the few, cause I could identify with the monkey love
story. They have to fly this giant Bimbo Monkey over to East Tennessee to
give Kong the transfusions he needs to survive, but then as soon as he
wakes up the Bimbo Monkey is GONE and so he starts rippin needles out of
his arm and knockin down buildings. Course, pretty soon the Army starts
shootin rockets at Kong, tear-gassin his wife, and drivin him down to the
Everglades where he gets tortured by some geek duck hunters, and it's only
a matter of time till you know what: Monkey Fu.
Let's do the
drive-in totals and get it started. We have:
Two breasts, which of
course you'll never see. Two monkey breasts, which you will.
Fifteen dead bodies. Five dead cars, with two crash and burns.
Monkey Vision. Giant ape transfusion. Gooey monkey surgery.
Monkey tear-gas. King Kong Butch Cassidy impression. Giant
monkey dungeon. Live alligator eating. Redneck eating.
Trailer-park stomping. Maternity Sequel Kong. Gratuitous
DeLorean smashing. Jungle-dart Fu. Monkey Thorazine Fu.
Two and a half stars.
Check it out, and we'll be here to
jump-start you when necessary.
[fading] When the writers told Dino
their idea, he said no one would believe a female Kong. So they said
"Dino, he had to have a mother," and Dino said "Mama Mia! I neveh woulda
thinka thatta." I'll try and keep my Dino impersonations to a minimum
tonight, but it won't be easy."
King Kong Lives Commercial Break #1
"I love the Giant Monkey
Transplant scene. That's genious. And there's Linda Hamilton in a doctor's
smock. Let's face it, when Linda Hamilton isn't doing James Cameron
movies, she is the definitive B-movie leading lady. It's like she has two
separate careers--Terminator and "Terminator 2" over here, and Children
of the Corn and "Black Moon Rising" over here. I think "King Kong Lives"
belongs on the B-side, and she did the B-volcano-movie last year, "Dante's
Peak." I'm not sure if I think she's pretty or not. I mean, sometimes she
looks HOT--I love when she was all buffed out for "T2." But sometimes she
just looks a little... unapproachable, if you know what I mean. Like if I
asked her on a date, she might put me in a headlock. Not that I'd mind
that. Is she still with Jim Cameron? He dumped his third wife, director
Kathryn Bigelow, for Linda, and I think now he dumped Linda for Suzy Amis,
who was in "Titanic." So I guess we can just watch his next movie to find
out who wife #5 will be. But let's get back to "King Kong Lives." Roll
it.
[fading] Wow, I felt like Joan Rivers for a second there. Maybe
I can get a job this year doing the red carpet thing at the Oscars. Can
you see me doin that? "Oooooooooooooo, let's go see what Winona Ryder is wearing!"
"Oh, it's so slutty!" I could do that.
King Kong Lives Commercial Break #2
"I have a question. Why
are cars crashing all over the place? Why does Kong picking up Lady Kong
and carrying her away cause ALL THE CARS IN THE MOVIE to suddenly crash
into one another? If you know the answer, please write, okay? Dino
DeLaurentiis hired fellow Eyetalian Carlo Rimbaldi as the chief creature
creator on the 1976 "King Kong" movie, and he won an Academy Award for it.
He spent a million dollars building a mechanical Kong that was a BIG
failure and ended up on screen for about ten seconds. Dino tried to
convince people that they used the robot, even though it was really
make-up artist Rick Baker in a monkey suit. Jim Danforth, a stop-motion
animator, was so p.o.ed that they got an Oscar that he resigned from the
Academy. This time around they gave the two guys that play the monkeys
actual billing. Peter Elliot, and George Yiasomi, as Kong and Lady Kong.
George--is he cross-dresser in real life? I don't know how Method they
went with this thing. So they did tell the truth about the guys in the
monkey suits. But they tried to lie about something else, which I'll tell
you about when we get there. Okay, let's go.
[fading] You know what
high-tech special effect they used for the full moon in that last scene?
They painted a beach ball. And then they told people it was a
million-dollar actual-size mechanical moon, and three more guys resigned
from the Academy. Little known fact."
King Kong Lives Commercial Break #3
"Brian Kerwin plays Hank
Mitchell, the Indiana Jones guy who captures Lady Kong and sells her to a
lab for a quick buck, and then acts all protective over her. He plays a
lot of guys named Jack or Hank or Buck. He was Sally Field's no-good
husband in "Murphy's Romance" right before this flick, but it's kinda hard
to tell how good an actor he is when he looks at a sleeping bag and says,
"You sure about this?" One of the things about this movie that makes me
mad is when Kong finally carries Lady Kong off into the woods and they
DON'T SHOW THE MONKEY SEX. Instead we got Linda Hamilton and Brian Kerwin
rootin around in that sleeping bag, because as Linda says, "We're
primates, too." Which, if you saw this movie in the theater, was one of
the howlers. People hooted the screen when she said that. And why do they
need money to open up a reserve, when they can just ship the monkeys back
to where they got em? I'll tell you why. Because in the SCRIPT, the place
where they find Mrs. Kong gets overrun by tourists and cheesy postcard
stores. But the director, John Guillermin, apparently thought he didn't
NEED to show THAT. So now the movie doesn't make a whole lotta SENSE. This
is the guy who directed "The Towering Inferno" and the immortal "Sheena,"
so we expect more from him. All right, let's go back to the
film.
[fading] I believe the full title is "Sheena, Queen of the
Jungle." Tanya Roberts half-nekkid and bareback on a galloping zebra. They
had to DOUBLE-truss those babies."
King Kong Lives Commercial Break #4
"Okay, as you know, here
at "MonsterVision" we try and give you the full story, so I have here a
list of all the big monkey movies that have been made. Like I said
earlier, the original, beloved "King Kong" with Fay Wray as the monkey's
love interest was made in 1933. It was so popular, they made "Son of Kong"
and put it out the very same year. "King Kong Appears in Edo" came out in
34. There was a movie called "Nabonga" in 1944, which seems to be a remake
of one called "King of the Kongo" from 1929. They're not really King Kong
movies per se, but they do feature giant African apes. In 1949, "Mighty
Joe Young" came out, with special effects done by Willis O'Brien, who was
one of the original Kong creators, and Ray Harryhausen. A remake of that
one's coming out this year. In fact, I saw a trailer for it, and it looks
like they've really ironed all the kinks out of big monkey special
effects. Okay, "Queen Kong" was the female "King Kong." "Konga" or "I Was
a Teenage Gorilla" is self-explanatory. We mustn't forget the great
Japanesey kinda movies from the sixties: "King Kong vs. Godzilla," "King
Kong vs. Frankenstein," and "King Kong Escapes." And for thoroughness,
I'll throw in "Ingagi" from 1931 and "Son of Ingagi" from 1940. I'm not
sure about the first one, but the second one featured an African-American
cast, which sets it apart a little bit. And then we have the 1976 "King
Kong" with Jessica Lange playing Fay Wray, and tonight's extravaganza,
"King Kong Lives." And the whole thing really goes all the way back to the
fairy tale "Beauty and the Beast." Which is weird, because there was a TV
show called "Beauty and the Beast" which starred... Linda Hamilton.
Coincidence? I think not.
[fading] Now. I KNOW somebody is gonna
write to us and say, "Joe Bob, you IDIOT, you said you listed ALL the big
monkey movies, and you didn't even BOTHER to mention 'Magilla Gorilla Eats
a Taco' in 1936. Why don't you CHECK YOUR FACTS? DUDE!" So go ahead, fire
away. E-mail me. Tell me how WRONG and PATHETIC I am. I can take
it."
King Kong Lives Commercial Break #5
'Monkey see full
moon--monkey in love. Why is the military holding Mrs. Kong? How does an
ARMY COLONEL get carte blanche to hold a rare animal species in a silo for
months on end, with no plans whatsoever? I mean, let's say it was one of
those Chinese pandas that zoos get every so often, and it got out. You
KNOW they'd have veterinarians and animal psychiatrists and Chinese
panda-food experts crawling all over the place. This is the part of the
movie that just doesn't do it for me. Actually, some of the special
effects are okay. They used three different methods for the big monkey
illusion: One was a 50-foot ape they used for the operation scenes. That
looks pretty fake. Another was actors in monkey suits and miniature
sets--like when Kong walks through the chain-link fence carrying Mrs.
Kong--which looks pretty good. And the third was blue-screens and
split-screens, for scenes with both human actors AND monkey actors. I
think those look the worst. But I do kinda like this part comin up. So,
roll it.
[fading] You know that scene where Kong chomps the
alligators, and he's got that big pile of bones there? While they were
shooting that part, they decided they needed a LOT more bones, so they
sent out for four or five dozen Buffalo wings. Then the model shop had to
EAT the chicken off the bones. I can't believe they weren't at least
NOMINATED for a special effects Oscar for this movie. If they'd gone all
out and done the full-bore giant-monkey sex scene, they woulda got it for
sure. Giant monkey sex on the Panorama Cinemascope Imax screen. They don't
call em monster shots for nothin, do they? . . . Sorry, a little insider
porno joke there."
King Kong Lives Commercial Break #6
"Then they had their fun
with him."
"Kong, you've killed now. Nothing will stop them from
killing YOU."
"His heart won't last a day."
Screenplay,
copyright 1986, by Ron Shusett and Steve Pressfield, all rights reserved.
Don't even THINK about stealing one of those lines. Martha Schumacher, the
producer--who later married Dino DeLaurentiis, by the by--said the
picture, quote, "was taken very seriously and it has the stamp of
reality." But the writers said it's a "semi-spoof." Who do you think was
changing their story slightly ex-post-facto? Lucky for us, it's time for
our weekly installment of what we fondly call "Joe Bob's Jailbreak," with
someone who makes MY heart stop, the TNT Mail Girl. [enters] By the way,
where's Reno tonight?
Rusty: I don't know, but she's not tied
up and gagged in my dressing room, so don't look in there. Did you
miss me? MAIL GIRL: If it'll get me a raise, I did. Here's a letter
from Brandon M. at the Chuckawalla Valley State Prison.
"Dear Joe
Bob,
"Hi! I am an inmate at Chuckawalla Valley State Prison in
California. It's about 30 miles from Blythe. This place really sucks
(about 130 degrees in summer). I personally feel that if California was
given an enema, they would insert it in Chuckawalla. It's so bad here, I
live for Saturday nights because MonsterVision is the highlight of my
week. Anyway, I want to ask if you can show a couple old movies I haven't
seen in years: (1) Omega Man and (2) "Andromeda Strain." Also, to ask if
you would be so kind as to send me a photo of the Mail Girl showing as
much of her physical attributes as possible (if you're involved with her,
I'm sorry, but it can't be helped; she is fine). Also, send me a studio
photo of you with your trailer. Oh, tell your editors to keep up the good
work of letting the flesh slip past--it helps us to stay focused on the
B-movies. "Your captive fan, Brandon M."
Well, thanks,
Brandon. We do love a captive audience. Indeed, the Mail Girls ARE fine,
and they haven't gotten involved with me yet, but I have hope. Rusty, how
much DO I have to pay you to miss me?
MAIL GIRL: Oh, I think a ten
percent increase would do it. Ten percent to miss me. How much to
LONG for me? MAIL GIRL: That would be at least 20. How much
to lust after me? MAIL GIRL: Just lust after you? Not do
anything? Lusting after me is doing something. MAIL GIRL:
Just say, "I lust for you, Joe Bob." No, really FEEL the
lust. MAIL GIRL: Eighty. Eighty? MAIL GIRL: You
wouldn't want me to fake it, would you?
I'll think about that.
Chuckawalla Valley State Prison is located in Blythe, off of I-10 in the
California desert. 3600 male inmates, minimum and low medium security. Low
medium? What's that? Part of their Mission Statement goes like this:
"Under state law, and we believe, the primary purpose of incarceration is
for punishment for and deterrence of future criminal behavior." Brandon,
get your butt outta there. I'm not sure who this quote is from, but
someone at Chuckawalla said the following: "Not to make this sound too
nice, but there are a lot of opportunities for our inmates to improve
themselves." Those opportunities include dry cleaning training, which
sounds a little misdirected, but also landscaping and gardening, masonry,
plumbing, roofing, upholstery, and welding. Among their recreations they
list horse shoes, so I hope those metal detectors ARE working. Free your
minds and your butts will follow.
So what'll you do for a flat
500? MAIL GIRL: Don't even go there, Joe Bob. Dang . . . Go
where?
King Kong Lives Commercial Break #7
"You know what one of my
favorite Dino DeLaurentiis movies is? Remember that erotic thriller
Madonna did, "Body of Evidence"? Where she and Willem Dafoe have sex on
top of broken glass on the hood of a car? And she drips hot wax on Willem
Dafoe's whangdoodle? Nasty nasty NASTY movie. The movie drips down off the
screen and gets on your SHOES it's so nasty. Dino made a lot of bad
choices in the decades after "Barbarella," and he finally had to sell the
movie studio he built down in North Carolina, but these guys never seem to
go totally out of business, do they? They just change the name of their
company and keep pumping out pictures. He made "Breakdown" last year, so
it looks like he's on an upswing again. Okay, grab your partner, it's time
for a ho-down in the conclusion of "King Kong Lives"!
[fading] This
movie TANKED at the box office. It cost 20 million dollars, and it brought
in four-and-a-half. Maybe it did big in Europe. Whenever a movie tanks,
they always say it did great in Europe. "Well, nobody in the STATES saw
'Sorority Babes in Snowsuits,' but it made millions in Uzbekistan."
King Kong Lives Outro
"Excuse me, but just WHAT is the
gestation period for a giant gorilla? Can I ask that? Since Lady Kong is
the size of a small office building, I would say about, oh, A HUNDRED AND
FIFTY MONTHS, wouldn't you? And when did they bring her to America? About
TWO WEEKS ago? Does anybody else think about this stuff? Okay, I told you
the special effects guy, Carlo Rimbaldi, fibbed about something else in
this movie. He said that the junior Kong was completely mechanical. Well,
the newborn ape was actually played by a 7-year-old kid named Benjamin
Kechley, and the baby Kong at the end was Peter Elliott, the guy who plays
King Kong throughout the rest of the movie. Man, you gotta watch these F/X
guys, huh? Lyin like rugs.
Lemme remind you that we'll be back in
two weeks with the 1987 flick that gave "Ishtar" a run for its money--The
Gate, along with "Twilight Zone: The Movie."
And that's it for me,
Joe Bob Briggs, reminding you that men are from Earth. Women are from
Earth. Deal with it.
Did you guys hear the one where everybody on
earth dies and goes to heaven? God says, "I want the men to make two
lines. One line is for the men that dominated their women on earth and the
other is for the men who were whipped by their women. Also, I want all the
women to go with St. Peter."
So the women go, and the men form two lines.
The line of the men who were whipped is several hundred miles long, but
there's only one guy in the line of men who dominated their women. God
says, "You men should be ashamed of yourselves. I created you in my image
and you were all whipped by your mates. Look at the only one of my sons
who stood up and made me proud. Learn from him! Tell them my son, how did
you manage to be the only one in that line?" And the man says "I don't
know. My wife told me to stand here."
Joe Bob Briggs, reminding you
that the drive-in will never die."
Weekly World MonsterVision ... Week of November 30, 1998
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REVENGE OF THE E-MAILS
Dear Joe Bob,
A few weekends ago you hosted the film Back to the Future. In one segment you were engaging in badinage with your Mail Girl when you mentioned "wormholes", which she took to mean perforations made by any of the various invertebrates as those of the phyla Annelida, Nematoda, Nemertea or Platyhelminthes, whereas you were referring to a break in the space-time continuum, as was clearly indicated by the context of the film, to wit, time travel. Fortuitously, Webster's, which provides free word-of-the-day e-mail, selected as its word for July 30 "wormhole". Therefore, in the interests of greater precision and clarity in English, I wish you would pass along to your Mail Girl the following Webster's definition so that she too might be informed and enlightened and thereby enhance here vocabulary. An enhanced vocabulary is an asset to anyone, even your Mail Girl, although in her case it might be eclipsed by her more visible attributes.
Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 30 is:
wormhole \WURM-hole\ (noun)
1 : a hole or passage burrowed by a worm
*2 : a hypothetical structure of space-time envisioned as a long thin tunnel connecting points that are separated in space and time
Example sentence:
Some science fiction writers speculate that wormholes will become the highways of the future, allowing people to travel "where no one has gone before."
Did you know?
If you associate "wormhole" with quantum physics and sci-fi, you'll probably be surprised to learn that the word has been around since Shakespeare's day -- although he admittedly used it more literally than most modern writers. To Shakespeare, a "wormhole" was simply a hole made by a worm, but even the Bard subtly linked "wormholes" to the passage of time; for example, in _The Rape of Lucrece_ he notes time's destructive power to "fill with worm-holes stately monuments." To modern astrophysicists, a "wormhole" isn't a tunnel wrought by a slimy invertebrate, but a theoretical passage poked through the fabric of time and space, perhaps by a black hole.
Dan
Dear Dan,
Ever since I received your highly informative info on the wormhole, I've been trying to get the Mail Girl to enroll in a physics seminar with me. Sometimes we can learn from the insect world, and sometimes we can learn from the space-time continuum. Either way, it means making a slimy mess, right?
Joe Bob
Dear Mr. Briggs,
Today, during my pitiable afternoon of flipping channels, I happened upon the Lawrence Welk Show. Now, I used to watch Mr. Welk as a little girl with my parents. As I recall, he was on just before Hee Haw. Normally, I would flip right past the Lawrence Welk Show, but today, I had to stop. I stared at Lawrence's broad smile and knew that I had seen it somewhere before, on someone else's face. Unbelievably, it came to me. That was the same broad smile that I've seen you wear a thousand times. If you don't believe me, go to http://www.zeldman.com/welk.html . I know you might not see the resemblence, but I'm sure that your crew will agree.
Mr. Briggs, you appear to be the spawn of Lawrence Welk. I don't think this is a bad thing. Millions of people LOVE Lawrence Welk. Heck, they're still showing re-runs of his show on PBS. The man's smile screams wholesome. (I've seen some of your fan sites. I'm thinking they're seeing your smile and remembering that wholesome Lawrence Welk.) So use it baby. Blow some bubbles. Don an accordian. Push the envelope.
Hope your popularity soars...
Darla Coppedge
Dear Darla,
And all these years I thought that my great uncle Larry had been safely interred with all our Bohemian ancestors. Yes, I admit it. On the weekends I polka in knee socks.
And a-one and a-two . . .
Joe Bob
Hello Bob (And yesh I'm calling you Bob because after showing that lame movie "King Kong Lives" you deserve to be named Bob instead of Job Bob.);
What the hell are you doing!!! Why did you show that stupid movie?! I had never seen King Kong Lives before until now. And now I know why! What a sad waist of film.
Well you asked on your show, "why was Kong carrying his girl?". Isn't it obviouse!!! Who ever wrote that damn movie thought it would be neat to show gorillas in a human persona. I swear it was the people who wear black that wrote this movie. If you don't know who the people that wear black are, they attended art schools in the late eighties (I'll explain it to you later).
In showing gorillas in this manner, this so called intellectual writer (I do hope the person I'm rippen on who wrote this corn in shit movie isn't a person that I admire. :) ) can show us dummies that the differences in human behavior and animal behavior is really very little. NOW ISN'T THAT JUST MARVEY.
I do have some questions for you Bob (I'm still mad at you for showing this movie so I'm not going to call you Joe Bob). Why the hell does the Colonel giving chase look at Kong through binos?! Like, isn't King Kong big enough at that distance to see? And what is it with the wrong size of baby Kong when it was born?! This gives the word premi a new meaning. It was the size of a pea. When Queen Kong gave birth to him, he should of shot out like a bugga flicked at some bodies head in church!!! He wasn't even wet and slimey with goop and after birth!
And Bob, What is it with you?! When I what to see sex I watch me and a girl, a porn flick, or an orgy across the street . I don't what to see two gorillas bump and grind, slap da booty, and knock da boots! You're sick!!! What are ya tryin ta do, be a spokes person for the spread of AIDs!!! Didn't AIDs come from monkies?! I do have to admit though that I saw on the Discovery Chanel two whales. Now THAT was a purple helmeted LOVE SOLDIER!!! :) Speakin of doin the nasty, I'm watchin Mary Ann on Gilligans Island. I always did think she had a slammin ass and looked a far cry better than the bimbo wanna be movie star Ginger.
Well Joe Bob, gotta go. And don't play "King Kong Lives" ever again!!!
Lates;
Travis L. Payne
Dear Travis,
Unfortunately, when we show animal sex at TNT, we show . . . animal sex. "King Kong Lives" was written by some very very kinky people, and I DON'T WANNA THINK ABOUT IT, okay?
Hang in there,
Joe Bob
Note: 11-22-97 host segments for King Kong (1976) are missing. In case you didn't see it, it ended with King Kong climbing one of the twin towers of New York's World Trade Center and getting shot down by helicopters or fighter jets, falling 110 stories to the pavement. The movie poster shows him with his legs on the two towers, but I think the towers are too far apart for that. Anyway, everybody thought he was dead, but ten years later we find out differently in: