posted March 06, 2005 04:36 AM                    

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…our very own Charles Gray [remember him in ‘The Devil Rides Out’] is narrator as he talks to the camera very straight facedly anad recalls the dark stormy night when clean-living Brad Majors [Barry Bostwick] and his innocent fiancee Janet [Susan Sharandon] get a flat tyre and ask for help at a nearby old mansion. The door creaks open and they are ushered in by a mad-cap butler, Riff Raff - played by Richard O’Brien, who also wrote this zany concoction. The great hall door opens to reveal a collection of guests dancing ’The Time Warp’.

Brad and Janet back away only to come face to face with Dr. Frank-N-Furter who is wrapped in a swirling black cloak, this is whipped open, ‘flasher’ fashion, to reveal that the doctor is wearing only frilly panties, girdle, suspender belt and high heels - a far cry indeed from the conventional Dr F as personified by the respectable Peter Cushing. Frank-N-Furter then launches into the song ‘I’m a Sweet Transvestite from Transexual Transilvania’ which continues:

I’ve been making a man
With blond hair and a tan,
So come up to the Lab
And see what’s on the slab…

The muscle bound creation is called Rocky Horror [Peter Hinwood] and soon the decadent Doctor marries him in a bizarre ceremony. This leads to the even more weird finale with Dr F on the stage of his own theatre; its setting resembles the familiar radio mast of the old RKO pictures logo. By now everyone is dressed in black stockings and suspenders as they sing ‘Don’t dream it - be it. Dr F is shot with a ray gun and his creation, Rocky, climbs to the top of the mast with the poor Doc hanging round his neck - as the Kong like lyric continues ‘Whatever Happened to Fay Wray’!

The whole thing is quite outrageous, but if you like the feature, then you will go for this. It is a far cry indeed from the usual bootlace fair and is definitely not suitable for showing to aunt Mary! Good print quality with belting sound.

Bill Davison - Movie Maker September 1980

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Unfortunately, my copy doesn’t have the belting sound that Bill described nor is the print that sharp, it is a little on the dark side as well but that said, it is still watchable and a great teaser for the feature. I would like to have seen more of Meat Loafs excellent ‘Bless my Sole’ routine as he drove round the lab on his motor bike - one of the high spots of the film for me.

A great and unusual film that is probably even more outrageous now than it was when it was first released!

Mike

[ April 18, 2005, 01:24 PM: Message edited by: Mike Peckham ]

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Auntie Em must have stopped wondering where I am by now...