Word: schlock
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Intensity, by Dean Koontz (Knopf; 308 pages; $25), is expert schlock by a writer who has specialized in horror. No creatures from beyond the grave here, just that reliable old formula, babe in distress. Chyna Shepherd is the sole survivor after a fairly efficient thrill killer invades a house where she is a weekend guest and murders everyone else. She's terrified and unarmed, but naturally, instead of calling the cops, she stows away in the killer's motor home as he escapes...
...John Waters had manhandled this trite premise, "To Wong Foo" could have been at least funny. In Beeban Kidron's directorial thumbs, it becomes schlock. In the spirit of drag and "gay humor," Kidron tried to camp up the movie, and instead made it forced and silly. Catering to straight middle America, Kidron turns drag queens into freaks and drag shows into freak shows. The Webster Hall drag contest at the beginning of the movie was reminiscent of Jabba the Hut's palace from "Return of the Jedi...
Then came the wild years of shock schlock that included Tom and Roseanne's mooning a stadium of baseball fans before a World Series game and announcing a joint "marriage" to their nubile young assistant. Meanwhile, Tom was throwing his considerable bulk around the Roseanne set, improving the show, by many accounts, but making enemies. "It was an odd situation," he says now. "I was the boyfriend, then I was the fiance, then I was the husband. People just will not respect that...
Well, Universal has a right to have the blues. It was bad enough for the studio that a little Mad Max ripoff originally written for B-movie schlock king Roger Corman grew into the most expensive film ever made. It's worse that Waterworld, in its final ambitious form, provides a slow ride on very bumpy surf. So much effort expended, to so little effect...
...movies and music poisoning America's soul? Probably, but not without the millions who plunk down billions for this schlock." Patrice K. Yeatter Duvall, Washington CONGRATULATIONS FOR ADDRESSING THE violence in the media issue [Cover Stories, June 12] with a degree of responsible depth. You not only suggested viable solutions but also respected the intellect of your readership. It's disturbing that more politicians don't exercise the same qualities. Fred Moffett Orange, California...