The Miami News from Miami, Florida • 23

Friday, May 31, 1985 The Miami News a 3C Movie reviews fletch' A suiara 'to be reckoned wfofa JON MARLOWE Mm Nm Mnk Critic FLETCH with Chevy Chat, directed by Michael Ritchta. Ratad PG: no offanaiva material, At tha A mar tea. Bay Harbor. KandaU, Millar 1 67th Suniland. Cinema 4 and Sheridan 7 V'' being subjected to the whole film for fear of winding up in the obituary column.

(Yes, he died yesterday bored to death.) Instead, the person(s) responsible for the horrendous "Fletch" trailer should be pink-slipped immediately. Rather than the inane atrocity the trailer led us to believe we were headed for, "Fletch" is instead a fine little movie and the best film Chevy Chase (who stars as Fletch) has made in eons. While Chase didn't seem anywhere near the right choice to portray McDonald's beloved super-snoop (Michael Keaton or Tom Hanks seemed much better choices). Chase acquits himself as Fletch nicely, putting his trademark pratfalls on hold and going for and succeeding with off-the-wall wisecracks and some funny, obvious ad-libs. Plus there's McDonald's fine story, which keeps twisting and turning in all sorts of weird, comic and lethal directions.

Fletch while posing as a beach bum for a story on drug trafficking is approached by a wealthy man who offers him lots of cold, hard cash to kill him. It's not every day you get a proposition like Fletch, with that big nose of his for news, smells something rotten in the city of LA and begins doing a little digging into the man's history, and pretty soon Fletch is notepad-deep into all sorts Can we talk about film-trailer makers? These people are paid good money for a job that's quite important, but let's face it isn't that hard. All that these folks have to do is watch a movie, pick out the film's best scenes, attach a nice little hook line when you thought it was safe to go back in the water and presto! you have your basic 30-second film trailer, Shown before the regular feature starts, trailers are supposed to be so enticing that you sit there wishing you were about to view the film being advertised rather than the movie you just paid to See. Alas, many moviegoers have learned by now that film trailers are the prime offenders in sucker punches. Those 30 seconds" you see up there on the screen are it the only 30 worthwhile seconds in the whole film.

That's why, when the trailers appeared for "Fletch" director Michael Ritchie's adaptation of novelist Gregory McDonald's beloved reporter-sleuth, I.M. Fletcher high hopes didn't exactly enter Into the picture. There wasn't a funny second in the entire trailer for "Fletch." and you were almost afraid of of girls, guns, greed, mad dogs, mad men and even a little bigamy. After such disasters as "Caddyshack," "Foul Play." "Modern Problems," "Deal of the Century" and "National Lampoon's Vacation" (can you believe how many bad films one man has it figured that Chase didn't even have it in him to say "It's Saturday Night Live!" anymore without screwing up his lines. Yet here he is.

just as lovable and funny as before his string of celluloid strikeouts started. Ritchie is also smart enough never to linger too long on the journalist side of Fletch (which is about as real as the Easter Bunny) and instead smartly concentrates his film more on Fletch the wisecracking funnyman of 1,001 disguises and names who always gets his man and 84-point-headlined story in the end. Chase should revel in the success of "Fletch" while he can. In a few weeks, he's slated to take a "National Lampoon's European Vacation." With his horrendous film track record, two miracles in one summer don't seem possible. Chase models the latest in Yuppie fashion Vengeance goes down those 'Savage Streets' SAVAGE STREETS with Linda Blair, John Vernon, Robert Dryer and Johnny Veno-cur.

directed by Danny Stainmann. Rated violence, language. At tha Ambassador. Hialaah, Marina 8, Miracle, Normandy. Omni and Sheridan 7 wr jm.

"Tsar' m. aav v( ur eA -y. of ouAurr 0sVVJu 9 'photo- tSmV fSNW "3 3 A lot of people are going to feel that the only hook to "Savage Streets" another "take the law and modern weapon into your own hands" film is that Linda Blair's newest movie was hastily made just to cash in on the heated pro-con Bernhard Goetz editorials, massive journalistic violence-in-our-society think pieces, and yes, even that dumb MTV song, "Ber-nie, Bernie, Berriie," about the Manhattan subway gunman. No, the real hook' to "Savage Streets" is a kinky, slinky, seamy, fleshy, sleazy one. We get to see Linda Blair all grown up, wearing Ultra-tight dominatrix black leather, exposing her body and uttering a constant diatribe of four-letter words that would make even Ed-die Murphy blush especially in the film's final showdown, where she provokes her soon-to-be victims by imploring them to "come and get me" and to do downright rude, nasty and perverted things to her body.

The other hook: Rather than a sawed-off, double-barreled shotgun or .44 Magnum, Linda stalks the slimeballs of Sunset Strip with a telescopic crossbow. Although Blair looks just a tittle too long in the tooth for the role of a high school senior, that part is quickly dispensable, since our heroine doesn't spend that much time studying geometry and hanging out in the school cafeteria once her deaf sister ts gang-raped by a bunch of stereotypical Hollywood punks. As soon as the rape goes school's out and death's in. A mad-as-hell Linda makes a quick stop at a sporting-goods store, picks out that nifty crossbow and pops her jeep into fourth gear. Pretty soon LA's cops are going to have a lot less scum-of-the-Earth to worry about by the time she's through.

Granted, "Savage Streets" is sexist, cliched, exploitative and all those other esoteric, negative cocktail-party adjectives, but that still doesn't stop us from hanging onto the edge of our seats until the final frame rolls and that last arrow flies. Like "The Terminator," this is Class A Grade stuff. Jon Marlowe WUEACHYOU HOW IT WORKS FREE PHOTOMANIA PHOTO CLASS WPURCHASE OF SLR CAMERA 3 fnVC HASSELBLAD PRODUCTS )rm BITTER DEALS I ::.::4 I BETTER DEALS IS Nikon Nice-Touch. LI 35 Wl GIVE YOU FREE FILM CLUB WPURCHASE OF ANY SLR CAMERA, LENS OR FLASH AUTOFOCUS MTV, from 1 YOUR COST AFTER REBATE BODY ONLY flfCEb Nikon 1 1 1 0 if $100.00 PHOTOMANIA MAD MONEY WPURCHASE OF SLR CAMERA SAVE, SAVE, SAVE! a RROOaAMMIP, AUTOMATIC OB MANUAL RKMT VIIWMNOH a AUTOMATIC HASH a IXFOMMtl COMPIH- tATIOM aunoN a INClUOif NIKON t.A. YYAtlANTV ASK ASOUT NIKON RIBATI ON LINSIS.

FLASHES A MOIORDRIVIS fUM IOAOWM MNCMG Me 16 I0M MtORfWINDUKl INCLUDES NW ON U.I Jl aUCTNUNtCOVta atRHMTY OTHER NIKON CAMERAS iucaa.uu MFQ NMtON rO- ROOT ONI NIKON FE-t BODY ONtY NIKON FA ROOV fea.as at oa as naa.ai -AVA si NIKON Fl HIGH EYE POINT RODY MKONOS ROOV ONIV ASK ABOUT HOC REBATE ALL NIKON PRODUCTS ON SALE JOIN OUR DARKROOM CLUB W. PURCHASE OF ANY CNLARGER MINOLTA W50MMF1.7AF LENS WCRLD'S OKLTSLI 1'JILT-II AUTOFOCUS IUTOKATIC KUITI-PROCRXM SELECTICa (AMPS) AUTOFOCUS TTL PRSCRAM if denly "Dancing in the Dark" means having a party instead of permanently residing down at the end of Lonely Street. With one reel of film, the song's heartbreaking themes are twisted into a cheery Hallmark greeting card as Bruce offers a pitiful lip-synch, smiles a lot, flexes his muscles and dances on stage with this real Yuppie-looking girl (intentionally hired and paid for by director Brian De Palma). After seeing that video, you could never again listen to "Dancing in the Dark" without seeing Bruce and that girl twisting the night away rather than a desperate man trapped on the long, lost highway with all the exit ramps closed forever. Yet is this MTV'a fault or that of the record companies, art-ists and vid-directors for making such ridiculous cfips? It's too easy to blame just MTV.

It's too easy to make fun of Martha Quinn and Nina Blackwood and Alan Hunter and Mark Goodman and J.J. Jackson (especially J.J. Jackson). It's too easy because these people are just glorified delivery boys and girls, showing us videos that musicians have created for their cable-TV outlet. MTV doesn't make videos, they just exhibit them.

In other words, do we kill the messenger because we don't like the message? It's obvious that rock videos can work, beoause there are exceptions to their inane rule. Van Hal-en, John Cougar Mellencamp and ZZ Top make great videos that are enjoyable and somehow maybe because they took the time and did them right still leave the songs open to personal interpetation. Yet the other 98 percent of Videoland'i population has betrayed us for the 1 y.i AUTOMtlKMt $319'5v FLASH OPER.TICI DON'T WORRY IF YOU CAN'T COME IN WE SHIP TO YOUR DOOR Fimiiieon BUILT-IN M0T0R1ZCB FILM wniwa 1 DVr torn MroiBAnoN CCXTR3L JTJTCH IKCIODES KK0LT1 1.SJL WiRMTT cciitoiHi eiauai wouet RIOWMi MKNXTA WAMANTY BODY ONLY fhwh wnn. tmaon lACt ALL MINOLTA PRODUCTS ON SALE! OLYMPUS OLVIVJFUS OM-PC WE OFFER OPTIONAL EXTENDED WARRANTY PLAN ON YOUR EQUIPMENT (COME IN FOR DETAILS) Can Music Survive The Video Virus?" The NME's conclusion: No way, Jose! Suddenly the people who had snickered, then went merrily on their video way when Joe Jackson first had the nerve to tell MTV where to get off were no longer smiling. Even Martha Quinn didn't seem to have the same wide-toothed Crest grin anymore.

Maybe that's because these people all had the inside track that CBS Records would announce last week that beginning Monday they would start charging from $500 to $6,000 each for the use of their videos. CBS' bottom line: You guys at MTV keep saying you've been the salvation of the music business. Well, after Joe Jackson and Wilfried Jung and the NME, you know what? We're not so sure about that anymore. So guess what? No more free ride. You want it.

You take it. But now you pay the price. Again, the Earth didn't come to a screeching halt, but as one record company executive said of CBS' sudden cash-on-the-line video-clip decision: "Everybody's in a major panic." Good. No. cancel that make it great.

Now we're finally getting somewhere. Then this week came the final kicker: Dire Straits released their latest LP. "Brothers in Arms." It includes a scorching track titled "Money for Nothing," the first song ever issued by a major rock group (the band embarks on a 220-city tour this month) whose acidic lyrics tell the folks at MTV what a bunch of bozos (and other quaint names) they are. Dire Straits' leader, Mark Knop-fler. doesn't care about the song's consequences.

Like many other rock musicians and music lovers today, Knopfler is simply mad as hell and isn't going to take his MTV anymore. Reason? In a mere three years, MTV has evolved from being fun and fashion-setting Into a lethal monster that chews up great tongs and spits them out in horrible mind-bending video form. In most cases, you can't bear to listen to a song again after seeing it once on MTV because your personal images of it have become so altered, shattered, destroyed, annihilated. Premier case in point: Bruce Springsteen's "Dancing in the Dark" comes blasting from the car radio and you think, here it is the ultimate outside-the-law anthem for all the rock roll spies who never came in from the cold. A stark, bleak, nihilistic classic about a man who can't stand his hair, face, clothes, job, life (in other words, all of us).

Then came the "MTV Exclusive World Premiere" video for "Dancing in the Dark" and all of a sudden everything's reversed. Sud 1. fl BODY ONLY A IICMIMVI OlYMFUt HP A OT MtntlH; AUTOMATIC 1S.JKO Ml AA MTTIM ai coama. a coioeoat a lib RitaiAY a Mi-iit a MUCMOfi C4YMU WABiANTY AUTOMATIC INFIAIID AUTO FOCUSING AUTOMATIC 01 CODING AUTOMATIC Filet AOVANCI tfWINO AUTOMATIC IOADINS AUTOMATIC I1FOSUII INCLUOfS OlTMeui U.S.A. MAIIANTT ei mot.

ALL OLYMPUS PRODUCTS ON SALE LAY-AWAY AT SALE PRICES GET IT NOW PAY LATER dollar. They've taken away our imagination, and in tne process reduced rock 'n' roll to a great book turned into a bad film. "The last thing we wanted to do BODY ONLY VnHtar 70210 F4.5 PEfJTAX Wrr-: zoom with our first video was to ruin the song for people." says Foreigner's lead singer Lou Gramm. "I only had to watch MTV for a few hours to think to myself, 'Oh my God, why are these bands doing TMIIUIMlUllalTl WE SPECIALIZE IN CAMERA, SLIDE MOVIE PROJECTOR REPAIRS fJAaRWqWA 9 COMAACY I this? Taking such fine songs and making them into such tasteless We shot most of our video in the studio so people could make a mm At Foe roetaaiTt tFQeit FMOIOOFAFNT a lAf OvtBAYlOMi I tVU FOCwt MtOOY Vivitar 28133 F3.5 up their own images to the song tiKItO TOUCH" AMUAt nm I tl T.rtrt.S a Ou "MA04C MtieO" lOABM film--'4 MACRO ZOOM a CX I IMf RfWTAI If tnm OF MK UNMt a cr iom a tMCIUM FtWIAl MA raajlNTY FCNTAX KtOOQ 7SOMM F2 0 YOU CAN iUY rSOMUS WITH CONFIDENCE You have to remember that in the end, it'i still the music and the extremely personal thoughts that people attach to your songs that you're offering. You begin taking that away from people, which is what I see happening now, there's eventually going to be this very bitter backlash.

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