Santana high school shooting opens old Columbine wounds

Since the Columbine School massacre in April 1999, I stupidly believed the safest place to send one’s kids to is not a public but a private school.

That logic comes from how no one’s gone on a killing spree much less been arrested for carrying a gun to a private school that I know of.

All that’s changed now. The sad truth of the matter is a repeat of Columbine can happen at any school, and it doesn’t matter if it is public or private anymore.

A couple of days after 15-year-old Charles Andrew Williams shot 15 classmates and adults, killing two, at Santana High School in Santee, California on March 5th; an eighth grader walked into her school cafeteria armed with a 22.cal. pistol and shot a fellow classmate in the shoulder.

Her name was Elizabeth Catherine Bush. The school she attended was a private one, Bishop Neumann in Williamsport, Pa. Her intended target was Kimberly Marchese.

Bush’s reason for the shooting, according to the March 19, 2001 issue of Time, was she wanted to be accepted by Marchese who was the school’s cheerleading captain and known for hanging out with "the cool crowd."

The events that preceded the tragic events at Columbine and Santana High School are no more different than the one that occurred at Bishop Neumann.

Students in private school are just as privy to being made fun of and bullied as those in public school.

It seems Bush is no more different than the Charles Williams', the Eric Harris’, and the Dylan Klebold’s of the world. According to Time, Bush studied martial arts and once practiced shooting a gun at a firing range with her father.

"She has a kind heart," said her mother, Catherine, in the Time article. "In school she made friends with a girl in a wheelchair and helped her out. She would always put herself between those who were being picked on."

Like Williams, however, Bush was reportedly the subject of ridicule at the public junior high school she attended before going to Bishop Neumann. On one occasion, the column said, students pelted her with stones.

And just like many school shootings of year’s past, parents and friends once again asked "Why?" "What made he or she do it?"

"She seemed really happy," said Jenn Oglesby, a friend who spent most of her weekends watching movies and going out shopping with Bush. "We talked about school, but she didn’t mention any problems."

It amazes me at how things have changed since the 1970s and 80s when I attended both junior high in Chicago and high school here in Dallas.

The only drills we prepared for back then were for a fire or tornado drill. Now schools across the country prepare for the unthinkable; practicing what to when an armed intruder is on campus.

Santana High School was prepared for such an incident. According to Time, when Williams told friends of his plans to "pull a Columbine", the students there took the boy’s threat so seriously that one frisked him shortly before the shootings occurred. They checked everything but the backpack Williams had on.

I doubt any of the people I went to school with, much less their parents, teachers, and administrators, ever considered the thought that someone amongst them was a ticking bomb waiting to explode. God forbid the day I send my kids off to school that I must give he or she a cell phone so they can call me at work letting me know they are ok in case one of their own decides to go on a killing spree.

Every time a school shooting occurs, society plays the blame game. The list is endless. They blame violent movies, rock bands, the internet, the press, the National Rifleman’s Association (NRA), the politicians, the school, the teachers, administrators and the classmates when the real finger needs to not just be pointed at the ones who pulled the trigger, but the parents.

I am sick and tired of these endless debates that will no doubt come up again when the next depressed kid somewhere in the country decides to mete out her/her own brand of twisted justice.

Unbelievably, there is something people can do to stop the blood of the innocent from spilling in our nation’s schools.

"When America teaches our children right from wrong and teaches values that respect life in our country, we’ll be better off," said President Bush in response to the Santee shootings.

The only way as President Bush calls these "disgraceful acts of cowardice" will be avoided is when parents take an interest in what their kids do under the roofs of their own homes and outside.

How hard is it for a parent to tell their kid they love them or ask, "How’s it going?"

©3/28/2001

Some people need to be scared straight on the dangers of drunk driving

The last time I took a defensive driving class was in 1995.

I remember the instructor telling us how they used to show very graphic videos of what happens when you drink and drive. The reason they had to stop was because the scenes upset too many people. My answer to that is some people need to be scared straight. What better way to get through to people today than to show exactly what happens when you drink and drive.

Instead, the video we watched was a sanitized watered-down version of what happens when you drink and drive. I have seen it before in previous defensive driving courses I took. A story about an employee celebrating his promotion by having too many drinks. He is pulled over by a police officer and given a sobriety test. The test determines he is driving illegally intoxicated and arrested and must go through the shame of being bailed out by his wife.

The closest I have seen of the end results of drinking and driving was in August 1997 when Princess Diana was killed in a car accident. I was amazed watching the hotel video shortly before the crash at how well driver Henri Paul conducted himself as though he had not had a drink that night. The fact is you become a completely different person when you are drunk and get behind the wheel.

I figured this out last month as I was driving home from work at 3:30 a.m. Saturday morning. I did something I would never, ever do. I pulled my car over and got out to help someone who was stranded in the middle of the road. I was going down Rowlett Road towards Mesquite and if you have driven down that area, you know that part of the road is hilly, and it is sometimes hard to see what is in front of you until you come to the top. There I was going about 40-45 miles an hour when at the top of a hill, I almost rammed a woman’s red Chevrolet that was stranded in the middle of the road. It had no emergency lights on.

If these people had been guys, I would have gotten upset, looked at them like they were complete idiots, utter something insulting they could not hear and then be on my way. They were not guys though. They were two women, probably in their late 20s. The one on the passenger side had her head down like she was sleeping and the woman in the driver’s seat looked frantic and was not sure what to do.

Upon closer inspection of their vehicle, it took less than five seconds for me to regret having gotten out and offered to help at all because there was not anything I could do. The front wheel on the driver’s side was flat and pushed inward. The back tire on the same side was also flat. I asked the young woman whose name was Michelle what happened, and she said she went over the curb and now the car will not even move.

I have hit curbs before but never to the point where the car was now immobile. There was no way I could physically push her car onto a residential street judging by the condition of the front wheel alone. Besides that, the transmission was also damaged. Even in neutral, the vehicle made a loud clicking noise and would not move. Luckily, a guy in a truck came along and pushed the car out of the way of oncoming traffic and then drove off.

That was not the end though. Who am I going to call at 3:30 a.m. other than the Rowlett Police Department? But she flat out told me no and it did not take me long to figure out why.

Because of the chilly weather, it took me 10 minutes to smell alcohol on her breath. Then there was that half empty box of beer sitting in the back seat of her car. It would not take a police officer five minutes to realize this was a drunk driving case. Obviously, she sobered up after realizing how much trouble she might be in. Her friend was ok and was just sleeping.

Since Michelle wanted no police officers, I gave her my triple AAA card to call a tow truck on her cellular phone. (The AAA card is yet another thing I pay for yearly other than having a cellular phone in case of emergencies).

The wrecking service got there by 5 a.m. It should, however, be noted here that I always see a lot of police officers patrolling this area in Rowlett all the time and for that entire 90 minutes, not a single police car came by. How come when someone is out driving drunk, there is never a police officer around when you need one? But when I am on the road, I got cops just waiting for me to coast past a stop sign or run a red light just so they can pull me over and search my car?

I left once service arrived. I could tell she was still inebriated though as she wrote her phone number on her checking account slip that had a balance of $1100.00 in it, account number and all. She insisted I call her later that day so she could send me a check for helping her out. I really was not concerned about compensation. All I cared about was that she got the car taken care of and had a ride home.

I thought about the incident shortly thereafter. Several things could have happened had I not stopped. Someone else probably would have stopped and helped, I assume. An oncoming car could have hit them head-on. A member of Rowlett’s finest would have finally driven by, seen the car stuck in the middle of the road and gone out to investigate. As a result, she most likely would have been arrested.

When I called Michelle later that day, she told me the Chevrolet dealer gave her a new car and that everything was ok now. I have no idea how she pulled that off.

I also got a $50 check from her that week that did not bounce. I would not have cared if it did. This entire incident did not cost me anything other than an hour of sleep.

I hope Michelle learned her lesson this time.

She obviously did not learn it the first time.

When she was living in Colorado last year, Michelle told me her driver’s license was taken away by the courts after she was caught driving under the influence of alcohol.

©2/21/2001

My extreme hatred of drivers on cellphones!

I hate cellular phones and despise people who talk on their cellular phones while driving.

Let me say this again so you understand.

I HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE CELLULAR PHONES AND DESPISE PEOPLE WHO TALK ON THEM WHILE DRIVING!!!

Don’t misunderstand. I have nothing against new technology. I, for the most part, embrace it. I was one of the few people who paid $700 for a DVD player a few years ago that now costs $300.

There will no doubt come a time when I will buy a High-Density Television set (HDTV) or have my home hooked up to satellite instead of cable. There may even come a day when I’ll be forced to be like everyone else and buy a personal computer. That is when Apple goes out of business or Hell freezes over. Whichever comes first.

I will not, however, embrace the world of cellular phones. They are nothing but a nuisance. They are like credit cards. You can’t leave home without one. The only reason why I have a credit card, and a cellular phone is in case the car breaks down. If there was ever an assurance in life that my vehicle would never, ever break down I’d never own a mobile phone.

I am so far behind on cellular phone technology that a coworker laughed when he saw the giant mobile phone I was recharging on my desk.

It is the kind of phone that if I had it in my back pants pocket, my jeans would either rip or I’d wind up walking funny the rest of my life.

Yes, I know there are phones out there now that fold up into a nice neat little box that is almost the size of a wallet. I also know that some of them can even tell you when you have email.

I pay, or should I say, waste $37 a month to Southwestern Bell Wireless for a phone I will probably use only once. I know there are better deals out there that allow me to pay less and buy a better phone, but I despise the technology so much that I don’t have the patience to talk to the phone center at Best Buy.

Nor do I believe that a donation to some worthy cause will bring me face-to-face with an admiringly tall, good looking blond or brunette standing on the other side of the Verizon wireless phone desk as seen in those TV commercials.

The fact I have to listen to them ring whether I am in class, at the mall, bookstore or even in a movie theater is enough to make my blood pressure go up. When I saw the movie, “Cast Away” (2000), some inconsiderate jerk’s cellphone went off at least five times the entire time Tom Hanks’ character was stranded on the island (this was practically through almost the whole film). I thought at first the Hanks’ character had a cellphone on him and he was too delirious to realize it was ringing.

I don’t hate cellphones because they supposedly pose a health hazard where one’s brain will resemble a giant sponge soaked up with radiation after years of phone usage. If I was that concerned about getting a brain tumor, I would have moved away from the house I now live in years ago. It sits underneath an electrical tower that makes buzzing noises whenever there is a dense fog or heavy drizzle and according to environmentalists gives off radiation. (If such is true, it could explain the reason for my hair loss).

I do, however, firmly believe they pose a health risk for fellow drivers on the road, and I don’t need to research articles on the Internet to prove my theory. If they don’t cause car accidents, they sure as hell cause aggravation for those people who don’t use them.

Consider a friend of mine. When his vehicle broke down on the interstate and was barely off on the side of the road praying no one would hit him as he waited for the tow truck to arrive, he said 85 percent of the drivers he noticed go by were yapping on their cellphones.

Then there is the ticked off driver of an 18-wheeler whom I saw in the left turning lane a few weeks ago honking at the idiot in front of him in the SUV telling him it was time to turn.

And what was the driver in the SUV doing as I saw him turn? He had his head cocked near the window on the driver’s side like he was going to sleep. Nicely tucked in between his head and shoulders was that damn cellphone as he was slowly making a left turn with barely two hands on the wheel.

It was yet another demonstration out of hundreds where people are too busy talking on the phone and paying little if any attention to the road.

If I were a Texas congressman, the first thing on my agenda would be to pass a law keeping people from using cellular phones while driving and to make sure anyone caught driving with one in their hands is fined just as much for speeding or for not wearing a seatbelt.

It would, however, be a losing battle. I would probably aggravate all the cellular phone companies who’d leave threatening messages on my answering machine saying I’m interfering with their business. My law would lose out to a bunch of whining babies who say it’s their God given right to talk on a cellphone when they drive and if I take away their right to use one in the car, I am taking away their personal freedom.

Then I’d have to explain to such people whose intelligence is lower than the ones in Florida who don’t know how to fill out a presidential ballot, that all my law is saying is people can use their cellphones anytime they want to so long as they’re not in the car while driving.

I’d love to see a law like this passed in Texas. I doubt it ever will. I do know one thing is certain.

Remember the little white dog who became the symbol for road rage when he got thrown out in the middle of a busy street by a guy who was rear-ended by a woman last year?

If I ever get into an accident and it is caused by some idiot driver talking on a cellular phone while driving, there is one thing that’s going to go flying through the air and I assure you, it won’t be the family dog.

©1/24/2001

Voter nightmare comes true with presidential election voter recall

On the morning of Nov. 8, I confidently, though with some bit of apprehension and hesitation, went to bed at 2 a.m. with the knowledge Gov. George W. Bush had won the election and would be the nation’s 43rd president of the United States.

I had been switching stations all night from Fox to ABC then on to NBC and CBS with the exception of CNN since I don’t have cable in my room.

I can’t speak for everyone else, but I was getting aggravated waiting for the final results to come in since I wanted to go to sleep.

Then around 1:15 a.m. Dallas time, I switched to CBS for a second. Dan Rather announced the Florida results which showed Bush had won and then CBS, NBC and Fox (ABC was the last to report), went live from Austin saying what, according to Rather, CNN had already said minutes before that Bush was now the 43rd president of the United States.

Somewhere between the hours of 2 a.m. and 7 a.m. that cold, Wednesday morning, however, I had a nightmare. The dream was we still didn’t have a new president and that another recount had been called. It would be another hour or so from the time I went to sleep that Governor Bush’s Democratic Presidential Candidate and current President Bill Clinton’s Vice President Al Gore would concede; the first time that is.

My disappointment and horrors were verified when I turned the TV Wednesday morning to find every news anchor on every station saying they still don’t know who the next president of the United States would be.

I was excited about this election, and I don’t get excited about much (those who know me personally will verify this). I hate most all sports and don't have a favorite team, though I do bowl and play racquetball.

I knew, watching the election results, how people felt whenever there is a super bowl, World Series or Stanley Cup and their favorite team is playing.

What made me feel especially good was, unlike some people I know, I went out and voted.

I voted a week early on Friday Nov. 3. I got in line around 10:50 a.m. at the only school in Mesquite that held early voting and was done by around 12:15 p.m.

The aggravation of waiting for about an hour and a half in the voting line, though, didn’t phase me at all. The time went by fast. Maybe it was the knowledge I felt I was doing something constructive with my time for once.

I’ve heard all the incredibly dumb excuses why people don't vote. They go right under those reasons why people don’t work out. They don’t have the time. They have too much to do. They work all the time. The fact is, aside from being apathetic; they are just too damn lazy.

Of course, when it comes to the presidential election, they say their vote doesn’t count. They say it’s the Electoral College that determines the final results.

Some simply don’t care. As long as the nation’s current events don’t interfere with their personal lives, people could care less about who is running for president.

I cared about who would be running the country the next four years. It’s safe to say, so did everyone else standing in that small lobby waiting to vote (some had to stand outside in the rain but not for long). We all came together to do one thing; vote for who we thought was the best candidate.

A guy behind me had a hat on with the name "Gore" on it. No one said a word until we came closer to the front line and one of the ladies running the voting booths kindly asked him to take it off because he was advertising. The guy didn’t protest. He understood and put his hat in his pocket.

It’s not like the joke we’re seeing in Florida now where outraged minorities and confused residents talk about how both they and the candidate they voted for got screwed.

It’s been said the dumbest question in the world is the one people don’t ask. If the ballots people filled out in Palm Beach County Tuesday night were confusing, why in the name of Hell did he/she fill them out? Why in the name of Hell didn’t he/she ask someone?

The ballot, which was published in one of Florida’s local papers, was similar to the ballots residents in Chicago’s Cook County filled out Tuesday night. I have yet to hear anyone from the windy city complain. What makes Palm Beach different from Cook County? Are people up north more intelligent than those living in the sunshine state?

It’s Thursday Nov. 9 at 7 p.m. as I write this column. The latest recounts from Florida have barely changed who won the election. They’re practically the same as when I went to bed Wednesday morning.

Bush is still in the lead with 2,909,661 and Gore; 2,907,877.

We may not know until Nov. 17th when all the overseas ballots are counted before, we find out who won.

I seriously doubt it will end there. Bush is already forming a cabinet. The Gore campaign wants to file a lawsuit and have the final decision made by the courts.

Personally, I am sick of hearing about it.

My advice to the Bush and Gore camps is to think about what is in the best interest for the country and have one concede.

No one’s going to like the outcome regardless of who wins.

©11/15/2000

My Personal Worst Films: Battlefield Earth (2000)

Battlefield Earth NO STARS
PG-13, 117m. 2000

Cast & Credits: John Travolta (Terl), Barry Pepper (Jonnie Goodboy Tyler), Forest Whitaker (Ker), Kim Coates (Carlo), Richard Tyson (Robert The Fox), Sabine Karsenti (Chrissie), Michael Byrne (Parson Staffer), Sean Hewitt (Heywood), Michael Perron (Rock), Shaun Austin-Olsen (Planetship), Kelly Preston (Chirk). Screenplay by Corey Mandell and J.D. Shapiro based on the book by L. Ron Hubbard. Directed by Roger Christian.

I’d be lying if I said "Battlefield Earth" had some redeeming entertainment value. The film has none, hence the NO STAR rating I have gladly bestowed on it. Thinking of something positive to say about the picture is like thinking of something nice to say about someone or something I hate. I come up with nothing.

The movie is based on the 1980 bestseller by L. Ron Hubbard. I haven’t read it, but I did glance through it one day at the bookstore marveling at how long it was (over 1,000 pages). I held out hope seeing since this is John Travolta’s pet project (besides starring in, he is also co-producer here along with Jonathan D. Krane and Elie Samaha) who is also involved with scientology (which Hubbard supposedly started). I had no doubt that Hubbard’s book, much like author Frank Herbert’s Dune, had the word “epic” written all over it.

The only thing epic about "Battlefield Earth" is how dreadfully awful it is. It is one of the ugliest, unbelievable motion pictures I have seen in a long time. The film cost its studio, Warner Brothers, $65 to $70 million according to some entertainment articles and watching it made me ask, where did all the money go?

Almost everything seen on screen is obscured by darkness. It’s as though the filmmakers and studio execs at Warner Brothers were so horrified by the final product, they felt it was better if the sets and ships were illuminated at night by a lot of explosions and people running for their lives.

All the sets and costumes are reminiscent of earlier memorable science fiction, action-adventure pictures and sci-fi television shows. Destroyed cities like Washington D.C. are almost identical to what the Capitol building looked like at the end of "Deep Impact" (1998) when a meteor hit the ocean except the buildings are surrounded by sprawling vegetation.

The alien fighter planes look like an early concept for what became the armored police helicopter Roy Scheider flew in the John Badham movie, "Blue Thunder" (1983). The ships run on four engines that exhibit a blue, purplish light except when they are in-flight, they don’t seem to move at all especially at night. When in battle, the fighters line up the way the video game characters in Space Invaders do waiting to be picked off by Air Force jets that apparently can still fly despite lying dormant in a hangar for 2,000 plus years.

The remains of the human race, most of whom either hide out in caves or are prisoners of an alien race known as the Psychlos, are led in revolt by Jonnie Goodboy Tyler (Barry Pepper). His name sounds like the ones a few of the “Greaser” characters were apparently christened with when they were born like “Ponyboy Curtis”, “Sodapop” and “Two-Bit Matthews” from director Francis Ford Coppola’s "The Outsiders" (1983). The outfits they wear are a cross between the cavemen of the prehistoric times and the ones seen in Kevin Costner’s Waterworld (1995).

The film’s sex appeal comes in the form of the long protruding tongue Travolta’s wife (Kelly Preston in a brief cameo as a female Psychlo) sticks out. The scene reminded me of those fantasies the male characters have in "Ally McBeal" (1997) when they see a hot looking blond step off the elevator and where Jabba the Hutt licked Princess Leia’s face in "Return of the Jedi" (1983).

I wondered how this alien race made it to Earth. It didn’t take long for me to learn the answer. The Psychlos came here via transporter (similar to the one seen in the Star Trek movies and television shows) from their home planet called, believe it or not, “Psychlo.” The most we ever see of the planet, however, is a city I assume that looks like a giant nuclear power plant with factories in the background.

On Earth, the glass dome the Psychlos live in is a cross between the one the humans resided in "Logan’s Run" (1976) and Disney’s Epcot Center except the entire place was once a zoo, now converted to imprison humans.

The Psychlos themselves might as well be called Klingons from the Star Trek franchise. They are much taller than humans, unattractive and have long hair. All that’s missing are the large protruding lumps that stick out from their foreheads down to their spines. Instead of large facial lumps, the Psychlos sport nose pinchers held by two leather ropes that go around their heads and look as though lines of snot were spewing from their noses.

The aliens act like disgruntled employees who work for a major corporation. They either can’t wait to quit or be transferred to another division. The story centers around Terl (Travolta), Psychlo’s chief of security, who oversees Earth’s mining operation.

When he is not laughing maniacally, sitting in a bar downing drinks, belittling his assistant, Ker (a barely recognizable Forest Whitaker), and threatening to report fellow co-workers to “the home office”, Terl is checking on Jonnie’s and the other slave’s efforts to mine gold all of which comes from Fort Knox in the form of rectangular blocks (Terl thinks they actually dug it up).

"Battlefield Earth" dredged up dreadful memories of some of the celluloid trash Travolta churned out back in the 1980s that include "Staying Alive", "Two of a Kind", the Look Who’s Talking sequels, "Perfect" and "Grease 2" (oh wait, he wasn’t in that movie, but it was still a lousy one nonetheless). Those films at least had one thing going for them. I could laugh at how bad they were.

"Battlefield Earth" is not even a fun bad movie. It is a wasted atrocity and an abomination in science fiction movie making.

©5/16/2000

My Personal Worst Films: The Hollywood Knights (2000)

The Hollywood Knights «½
R, 92m. 1980

Cast & Credits: Robert Wuhl (Newbomb Turk), Fran Drescher (Sally), Tony Danza (Duke), Michelle Pfeiffer (Suzie Q), Gary Graham (Jimmy Shine), Stuart Pankin (Dudley Laywicker), Gailard Sartain (Bimbeau). Written and directed by Floyd Mutrux.

A number of “coming-of-age” movies come to mind while watching "The Hollywood Knights." There is George Lucas’ 1973 hot rod film, "American Graffiti", which "The Hollywood Knights" gets most of its ideas from (or should I say steal) with the exception of its raunchiness that likely comes from "Porky’s" (1982) and "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" (1982).

The difference is those three movies are considerably better than "The Hollywood Knights." Even "Porky’s" which is on my personal list of “Movies Critics Hated That Were Not As Bad As Critics Said They Were.” There is almost nothing funny or original about any of the jokes in The Hollywood Knights.

The film, released theatrically in 1980, marked the big screen debuts of Michelle Pfeiffer (Scarface - 1983), Tony Danza (TV’s "Taxi" – 1978 – 1983) and Robert Wuhl (HBO’s "Arli$$" - 1996 - 2002). The picture also featured Fran Drescher whose annoying accent eventually won her the lead role year’s later on CBS’ "The Nanny" (1993 – 1999).

If you ask any of these four to compare "The Hollywood Knights" to their later work, chances are you’d probably get the same response Tom Hanks gives when entertainment reporters ask him about his roles in "Bachelor Party" (1984) and "The Man with One Red Shoe" (1985) as opposed to "Saving Private Ryan" (1998) and "The Green Mile" (1999). I have often heard how his face turns red with embarrassment when asked about his earlier comedies.

On the other hand, Pfeiffer’s, Danza’s, Wuhl’s and Drescher’s responses might be what Michael Caine said when someone asked him why he did "Jaws: The Revenge" (1987). Caine reportedly said he did it for the money.

"The Hollywood Knights", which takes place Halloween night in 1965, is an American Graffiti want-to-be. The picture is full of classic automobiles from the fifties and sixties (there is even a car similar to the one James Dean drove when he died). As the song, “Wipeout” is heard in the background, fellow drag racers gun their engines at the red traffic signals along Hollywood Boulevard ready to hit their accelerators the minute the light turns green.

The best, perhaps only good thing about the film, is the soundtrack which features tunes from The Beach Boys, Wilson Pickett, Jan & Dean, The Byrds, The Supremes, The Four Seasons and Ray Charles. Even if you don’t know who I’m talking about, chances are you’ll at least be familiar with the song titles that include “Surfing USA”, “Rag Doll”, “In the Midnight Hour”, “What’d I Say”, and “He’s So Fine.” Instead of radio personality Wolfman Jack announcing the hits like in "American Graffiti", it is some unknown disc jockey called “Surf Sam” in The Hollywood Knights.

The musical soundtrack is the reason why the picture has never been released on video and digital videodisc until now. Like "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" (1975) and Heavy Metal (1981) before it, which took years before finally bowing on home video, “Knights’” distributor, Columbia Pictures, had problems negotiating the musical rights. The film marks the last of that so-called list of “Most requested titles not on video” (John Wayne’s Hondo (1953) has yet to surface).

Like Steven Spielberg’s "1941" (1979), which had one laugh in the movie’s opening sequence where the director makes fun of his previous box office hit, "Jaws" (1975), I laughed once watching "The Hollywood Knights" and it too, was in the beginning.

The scene happens when a hot rod stops alongside the curb where an old woman is sitting waiting for the bus. Sticking out of the trunk is an arm that starts moving. The old woman is horrified thinking it is a dead body. The leader of “The Hollywood Knights”, Newbomb Turk (Wuhl) gets out and closes the trunk acting like no one saw a thing. This is the kind of stuff you’d see the frat boys in "Animal House" (1978) do.

The rest of the film is awash in sexual conversations about whether so-so “puts out” and how someone “came too quickly” before doing it in the backseat. There is also scat and flatulence humor as Newbomb and his gang enact their revenge on police, city and school board officials for closing down their favorite drive-in, Tubby C’s. The group crash Halloween parties mooning people, spike the punch with their urine, and kidnap the class nerd (Stuart Pankin) in between trading pictures of female classmates sunbathing in the nude and watching them undress in an area the women think is safe from peepers.

Every once in a while, an egg or two hits the windshield of a police car but you never find out who threw it. The movie appeals only to those who at the age of 30 still find this stuff amusing.

What’s great about the DVD edition is I can fast forward through much of this with the click of a button and get to some of the brief scenes between Danza’s and Pfeiffer’s characters (she plays a carhop who dreams of becoming an actress) as the couple discuss their future. There is also a subplot involving one of their buddies (Gary Graham) who is going to Vietnam.

When one of the characters says how “Things change. Nothing ever stays the same,” the quote reminded me of the underlying theme in "American Graffiti." The characters played by Ron Howard, Richard Dreyfuss, Paul Le Mat, Charles Martin Smith and Cindy Williams were high school graduates who, near the end, realized they were now adults.

Most of those characters in that film spent their last night either with their girlfriend, cruised the streets looking for girls to date or looked for someone to race. The worst any of them ever did wrong was yank the back wheels off a police car or pay someone to buy them alcohol because he or she was too young to drink.

The characters in "The Hollywood Knights" are high school seniors who are months away from graduating. The trouble is most of them act like they are still in grade school.

©5/10/00